We’re home now, but wanted to do one last post about the final few days of our trip, which we spent visiting family and doing a bit of sightseeing.

After an amazing ride in the Catskills, we set of for Amish country. While we’ve both been through it before, neither of us had spent any time there. We were so close, so took the one-hour detour to check it out. The area is beautiful rolling hills of farmland with large farmsteads. We were surprised to see so many Amish out and about on the main roads. They travel by horse and buggy and by bicycle. We saw them working in the fields with horses pulling plows, and we saw the cutest little group of toddlers in a wagon waiting to cross the road. No pics of that one, but here are a few that I did manage to snap from the back of the bike.

On to the west side of Philadelphia to visit Biker’s mom and his sister and her family. We had a wonderful visit with all of them and felt really glad to have spent the time with Biker’s mom. While there, we took a quick trip into Philly to see the Liberty Bell and tour Independence Hall. We had a great tour guide who gave us all kinds of history. Did you know that the Liberty Bell was originally called the State House Bell because it was originally commissioned to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Pennsylvania’s original constitution? It became known as the Liberty Bell and gained iconic importance when abolitionists adopted it as a symbol of their efforts to end slavery. What about the crack, you ask? Well, there are a lot of theories about it, but the bell apparently had quite a few cracks – both natural and manmade – but was ringable up until the final crack occurred in 1846 during an effort to fix one of the previous cracks.

Our final stop was the D.C. area to see our youngest. We had a great time with him, as always. After a quick stop on campus to buy Biker a Georgetown shirt, we grabbed some dinner and then headed into D.C. to wander around. We grabbed scooters and visited the Jefferson Memorial – under construction, the FDR Memorial – one of our favorites (so beautiful and serene!, and the MLK memorial. We whizzed by the Lincoln Memorial – my perennial favorite; I can’t ever see it too much! – and down the reflecting pool to the Washington Monument. Wandered up north a bit and ended up for a nightcap at the fancy and always fabulous Trump Hotel bar.

The drive home was uneventful. Just long. It’s good to be home.

The last two days have been mostly about moving south to get to Philadelphia to see Andy’s mom and his sister and her family.  We hit some really great roads along the way, including New York One, a curvy, smooth pavement road with great scenery, good visibility and no traffic. We took some great video, but it won’t load here at the hotel with this wi-fi; we’ll try to update this post later.

On this trip, we’ve seen some beautiful scenery – including noticing that the leaves are definitely changing – and we’ve made some wrong turns.  On these last two points, we title this blog post “turnt.”

While we’re a few weeks ahead of the official “leaf peepers” crowd that will descend upon New England for the fall color change, we noticed even in the week we were here that the leaves were turning before our very eyes. There are many trees that are already obviously red and orange, and many trees are turning more and more yellow every day, with lots of leaves falling, which was especially noticeable during our ride today.

Regarding wrong turns, we noticed pretty early on that we were making quite a few more u-turns due to missing a turn or making a wrong turn. Not our usual situation, but as we discussed the reasons, we realized we were “winging it” more that we usually do. Justifying our mistakes – ha!

Finally, moving to the real definition of “turnt,” (dictionary.com defines as being under the influence of alcohol or drugs) — we must discuss the hemp fields we passed today. We were driving along, minding our own business, when all of a sudden we both said, “I smell pot.”  Another u-turn to go back to see what was going on, and we came across a hemp farm We decided the local teenagers probably drive back and forth along this 1-mile stretch of road to try to get something of a high. The plants look like little Christmas trees; see pics below.

Yesterday, we drove into town to ride the Conway Scenic Railroad. But first we walked around the cute little town for a bit, eventually happening upon the White Mountain Winery tucked on a back street. We spent a happy hour there chatting with the proprietor and petting her three dogs. We wandered over to the cute and fully restored station to catch our train – specifically the charming Gertrude Emma car – for the 1 3/4-hour ride. Biker entertained himself by taking about 100 pictures.

Later that night, we took a walk around Jackson – the cute little town that has been our home base for a few days.

Today, we got on the bike and ventured northeast, thinking ‘hey, we’ll just take a quick jaunt into Maine.’ Yeah, we weren’t dressed properly. It was cold and it rained, and we had unloaded all our warm clothes and rain gear from the bike. Got down to about 52 degrees. COLD. And rainy. We turned around at one point – Biker says like little bitches – but the upside is that we saw two moose on that return trip! Our first real wildlife on this whole journey.

We rode on a couple of really great small roads on the way back to the house – and it warmed up to the mid-60s, so things were looking up. See the video below for one example of a great road – the Hurricane Mountain Road.

Yesterday and today, we wandered through the land of covered bridges, across central eastern New York, into northwestern Massachusetts, and up into Vermont.  We set our sights early on toward Mt. Greylock in the Berkshires, where we rode a great little ‘goat trail’ road to the top of the mountain. Moving north into Vermont, we rode Route 100, which is a scenic byway and mostly a great road. It was a good day, and we ended up juuuuust over the border in New Hampshire where we found some pretty great Tex Mex – I know, in New Hampshire!

This morning we ate an amazing breakfast at the Four Aces Diner in West Lebanon, NH, then began our trek to our little rented cottage in Jackson, NH, in the White Mountain National Forest. Along the way, we drove the Kancamagus Highway, perhaps the most famous route amongst motorcycle enthusiasts in all of New England. 36 miles of twisties, elevation changes, beautiful scenery, great pavement, and alongside a river. And no traffic, so that made it even better. Biker dubbed it the Cherohala of the North.

We can see the leaves on a few trees starting to change – some reds, yellows and oranges. It’s just a tiny few, but we can imagine the glory.

We saw Niagara Falls from every angle – from the right, the left, the back, the side, the front, under, over, across, above, below, lighted at night and natural during the day, and so on and so on.  We saw the mist from 1/2 mile away. We heard it from our hotel room. We felt it up close.  We saw it from a whole ‘nother country. Get the picture? It’s awesome from every angle.  Seriously, to see it and to think that that amount of water moves across it every. single. second. of. every. day. for. thousands. of. years.  Is insane.

Other than that, Niagara Falls, New York, isn’t that interesting. Go to the Canada side. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.

Today, we drove across the Adirondacks. It was pretty. Not the prettiest we’ve seen but nice. Sort of like the Miss Congeniality of motorcycle rides. We had a great dinner at the Olde Bryan Inn in Saratoga Springs. Pic of Thomas Jefferson by our table; he probably at there.

We’re in Niagara Falls tonight. Nearly 2,000 miles and 8 states already … thank God we have a day off tomorrow.  We’ll spend the day wandering around and touring Niagara Falls. It will be good to have a day of rest from moving.

Saw Alex last night – met him just outside D.C. for dinner. It was great to see him; we’re so proud – he is off to a great start at Georgetown. We’re kicking ourselves for not taking a picture. But we’ll see him again at the end of the trip. Get ready for your closeup, Al. 🙂

Today, we rode from just outside of D.C. up to Niagara Falls … by way of Punxsatawney, PA.  Yep, we visited Phil! Turns out, the movie Groundhog Day does not show the actual Gobblers Knob or just how far it is from town. You cannot walk there from a bed and breakfast, Bill Murray.  But we did visit the real Gobblers Knob and we even got to see Phil!  Andy was a little sad at how small the space was for the groundhog in the stump they pull him out of on stage. Look at his sad face. 😦 .

We had lunch in Punxsy – we’re so cool we adopted the locals’ name for the town – at Punxsy Phils.  Met a very nice local farmer.  Fast forward to dinner, and we just had a nice meal at the classic Red Coach Inn – where we’re staying just 500 yards from the falls. We can hear the water crashing in our room. We’re excited for tomorrow and the rest of the trip!