Vacation Summary Part II

Tent camping with a baby... hmmm... not the greatest idea. Now don't misunderstand, Corban wasn't terrible or anything. I honestly think he was just desperately confused.

Dad, where in the world is my bed? My toys? My house!?

At one point Jessica and I were taking down the tent (one of many times) and Corban just started bawling. It was his constant from site to site and now we were taking it away from him.

We felt pretty sorry for him actually and ended up adjusting our plans to set us on a homeward course sooner than we had planned.

After we left our first site (where I ended the previous post), we journeyed to the home of Thomas Jefferson, third president of the United States. He called his 5,000 acre Monticello (meaning little hill/mountain). It was gorgeous! This was my favorite historical stop of the trip. The house and the surrounding grounds have been spectacularly preserved.

From underground iceboxes, indoor toilets and plumbing, 18th century copy machines, and real stories of historical cover-ups, this was an intriguing (even if very expensive) stop.

After Monticello, we seriously didn't know where we were going. This is the great thing about doing this sort of trip. We pulled into a Panera and hopped online for a few minutes. We were only a few hours from Washington DC. It sounded fun. Neither of us had been there for several years. One of my favorite churches meets in downtown DC. There was a nice looking state park just south of DC where we could camp. Sold!

Prince William State Park (okay, Corban at Prince William State Park 45 minutes south of DC). Some more relaxing. A nice hot fire on an already ridiculously hot day/night. An insane squirrel with an insatiable appetite for peanut butters crackers. A hard plastic case on our stroller was no match for his vicious teeth:

On day two at Prince William, we had a hankering for swimming. Tom told us that we were close to the Chesapeake Bay. People swim there right? So we asked Tom to direct us to the nearest beach on the bay. And folks, I'm sorry to say that Tom failed us.

It turns out that just because a street is called Such and Such Beach doesn't mean that they have a public beach. So after driving about an hour and a half, it looked like our day was spoiled with no access to the enticing water.

But thanks to the friendly (even if strangely gullible) woman at the Maryland Visitors Center, we found out that we were only an hour away from a public beach. Why not?

Point Lookout Maryland on the Bay (lighthouse and all). There must have been a million Mexicans swimming that day. And they claimed that the lighthouse was haunted. But the water was warm, salty, and O so refreshing!

The next day was Sunday. We got up very early (although Corban had pretty well established that as the daily custom) and packed up camp. We drove to a DC Metro train station and took the DC subway downtown.

We worshipped at Capital Hill Baptist Church where Mark Dever is senior pastor. The church was spectacular. Literally, while we were still on the steps leading into the church, a young woman (who was not a greeter, just a regular member) took us under her tutelage and showed us the ropes.

Highlight of the morning: some excellent congregational singing of some excellent hymns!

After church, lunch at Q'doba (um-yum-yum...). Passed by the White House.

We hit one of the Smithsonian museums. (Did you know they're free?!) Tried to visit the Holocaust Museum rather unsuccessfully. At this point, our eyes were heavy. Our knees were swollen. And Corban was exhausted. And oh yeah by the way, I was going to be driving through the night once again. Time to go!

Train -> Car -> Road -> West Virginia -> Sleeping in the van in the parking lot of a gas station next to a car of crazy drunk people running around outside with their beer cans.

Whew, I'm tired just writing about it.

...to be continued (again)