Another Fort, and the King's Garden

After spending a day at the Saratoga battlefield, our next history stop was at Fort Ticonderoga in New York.  While not part of the National Park Service, the friends of Fort Ticonderoga have done an excellent job in preserving and re-telling the history of life at the fort over time.  Because this is the nation’s 250th anniversary year, they have set and staffed the fort to be set in 1776.  The fort has many artifacts in its museum and they change them out based on what time period is being portrayed.  It reminded us of our visit to Colonial Michilimackinac in Mackinaw City, Michigan, on our Middle States tour.

We arrived shortly after the site opened so we’d have time to get our bearings before the 10:15 orientation talk.  We find these talks are helpful in setting the stage for what we are about to observe, sometimes even helping us to immerse ourselves in the time period.  We learned about the events that took place at Fort Ticonderoga involving Ethan Allen (whose homestead we would see the following day in Burlington) and Benedict Arnold (before he became a traitor).  We learned why the Fort was coveted by the British and the Americans, and we learned how it changed hands a few times during its heyday.

The museum collection is in the upper floors of the barracks buildings, and the most interesting things to me were the powder horns on display.  They were etched with names, poetry, and figures, personalizing each man’s powder horn.

If you’ve been to a fort before, you know one of the best parts is getting to walk around the top and take in the views.  Fort Ticonderoga doesn’t disappoint as you can see the southern portion of Lake Champlain as well as the Adirondacks of New York and the lush green mountains of Vermont.

Another part of the Fort Ticonderoga experience was a visit to the King’s Garden.  If you read my post the other day about Winterthur Gardens and my comment about needing to get over the fact that gardens doesn’t always mean flowers, well, the King’s Garden restored my faith in gardens!  This was truly spectacular.  The vibrant colors, the arrangements of the plants together, and the fragrance of the blooms – well, it was magical!  I walked around telling each flower how beautiful she was before taking so many pictures!

But wait?  What’s behind that brick wall?

When I walked through and saw even more flowers, I got so teary-eyed at the beauty of the place.  I also thought of my sister-in-law who recently passed away and her love of flowers, too, and how I wished I could send her the pictures.  I did send them to my mom and my kids.  And shared a few on Instagram!  Here are a few of my favorites!

In addition to the flowers, the garden also has herbs and vegetables that are used in the Fort’s restaurant in the spirit of farm-to-table.

Up next:  My 50^th State!

~ Cindy D.

Saratoga Springs, DVC or Saratoga Springs, NY

About 20 years ago, we bought into the Disney Vacation Club and our membership began with the DVC Saratoga Springs Resort.  At Saratoga Springs Resort, they have five areas:  the Springs, the Paddock, the Grandstands, Congress Park, and the Carousel.  We knew that the resort was themed after Saratoga Springs, New York, so when we planned this trip, we thought it would be fun to spend a night in the actual Saratoga Springs!

We also decided we would splurge and stay at the Embassy Suites in Saratoga Springs.  When we checked in, it felt luxurious and the suite was spacious, much like the DVC rooms.  And while there wasn’t a washer/dryer in our room, our suite was right near the laundry room for the hotel which made it convenient to get some laundry done!

The hotel was two blocks from the actual Congress Park, so we walked down to the visitor center and through the park to see where the inspiration for the Disney property came from.  At the visitor center, they give you a paper cup so you can try the water coming from four springs within the park.  While I opted to not try any, DH did.  One was really terrible - it reminded us of how at the Coca-Cola center at EPCOT, there's the Beverly flavor that is awful.  So it seemed kinda fitting.  We also saw the actual Carousel.  It was closed (open on weekends) but it’s in a glass enclosure so we could see it and take some photos.  Here are a few.

After walking around Congress Park, we went to a restaurant nearby that came highly recommended from the Gluten-Free Travel group on Facebook.  It was called Cantina and they served Mexican food.  This was the first Mexican food we’d had on our trip so far.

The Embassy Suites was our favorite hotel so far.  They offered the ability to stream SiriusXM through the television, so it was nice to listen to some music while writing blog entries, working on my smash-book, and sorting through the day’s pictures.  They have an evening reception so we got a couple of Diet Cokes and some snacks.  And the breakfast is the absolute best!

Next up:  Getting to my 50^th state!

~ Cindy D.

The Battle at Saratoga

One of the American Revolution sites we wanted to see on this trip was the battlefield at Saratoga.  So we planned the day to be a short driving day from Albany to Saratoga Springs so we could spend as much time as we wanted at the Saratoga National Historical Park.

But before we could go, we wanted to gas up as there would be a driving tour through the site.  We stopped in the little town of Halfmoon, NY, where we got gas for $4.09/gallon at the Valero station.  Gas prices are only going up from there.  Thankfully the car is getting 34-35 mpg most days.

So once we got to the Saratoga NHP, we checked in at the Visitor Center for an orientation film and an illuminated display of the troop movements of significance during the battle in October 1777.   They also have a cannon that was actually there in 1777 along with two cannon barrels that were surrendered at the end of the battle.  Seeing the actual cannon from 1777 was pretty amazing!  You may be able to zoom in on the photo with the description to read more about the cannon.

I got my passport stamped, and off we went on the driving tour.  The narration is through the NPS app or you can use your cell phone to dial into each stop.  We had used the app at the Guilford Courthouse several days ago in Greensboro, NC, so we thought we’d do that again.

The driving tour takes about 2 hours if you stop and listen at each point and also get out of the car to walk to see the wayside displays set up at each stop.  One of the stops, the Neilson’s Farm house, is usually staffed with a ranger who will give you a quick tour and talk to you about what happened there.  The farmhouse is where Benedict Arnold stayed during the battle.  The Neilsons had left the area when they learned the fighting was coming to the area.  When they returned later, they saw how much of their home and farm had been wrecked by the troops and battle that occurred on the land.

We were there the day after Labor Day.  We only saw a few other cars doing the drive, but the rangers at the Visitor Center told us that the cars were bumper-to-bumper on Labor Day. I’m glad we were there afterwards because we were able to take our time, always had a place to park or pull-over, and were able to really engage with the tour.  We took the time to feel the presence of the men who fought for our country nearly 250 years ago.  You know, when we started planning this trip and adding in a lot of American Revolution related things to our itinerary, it had not occurred to me that 2026 was the 250th anniversary for our country.  It just happened to work out that way.  And that's why there are things like the cannon on display as part of the 250th anniversary.

When we were at the Visitor Center, someone came in and asked at which stop on the tour would they be able to see the statue of Benedict Arnold’s foot.  That intrigued me, and we found it at the 7th stop.  It doesn’t have his name on it, and it’s a boot.  You can read about it here.

Here are a few photos from around the battlefield.

 Next up:  Checking out Saratoga Springs, Disney vs. New York.

~ Cindy D.

An afternoon at FDR's home in Hyde Park

Our original plan for Labor Day was to drive from Ewing, NJ, to the north side of Albany, NY on our way to Saratoga Springs.  It was to just be a driving day because we were expecting heavier traffic due to the holiday.  It was going to be pushing our limits for a full day of driving, so when I saw there was a national historic site along the way, we thought that would be a great way to break up the trip.  It was also a cooler 66 degrees when we left.

Hyde Park, New York, was the home of Franklin D. Roosevelt.  He was born there in the same home he lived in as a child and then used as his home even while serving as the President of the United States.  He and his family just referred to the home and property as “the place.”

When we made our Middle States trip, we made a late addition to a long driving day through Kansas when we learned about President Eisenhower’s boyhood home and Presidential library and museum in Abilene, Kansas.  We spent some time there, but not nearly as much as we would have liked to be able to see the home and give the museum the attention it deserved.  So when we scheduled a stop to see FDR’s place, we made sure to time it so we could get there and be able to not feel rushed through.

We left the hotel early and arrived at the FDR home site just after noon.  Because DH is a national parks passholder, there was no charge for us for the tour, but we did have to pay $10 each (senior rate) to be able to go into the museum.  The museum tickets are good for two days.

We had time to watch the film they show in the visitor center before walking over to the stables where we would meet our ranger / tour guide for the house.  The house is absolutely beautiful!  It’s not extravagant like the Biltmore, nor has it been turned into a museum.  It is frozen in time.  The Roosevelts had agreed that when he finished his last term as President, they were going to donate their home to the nation’s people and go live in eastern New York.  Even though FDR died while still in office (April 21, 1945), his wife Eleanor continued with their plan, and their home was opened to the public for viewing a year to the day later.  The tour guide told us that there were 5,000 people who came on the first day to see the President’s home.

Here are a few pictures from the house that caught my eye.

This is the library / living room area of the house.

This is a portrait of FDR.

This is the view from the "back porch" which was really on the side of the house.

This is the side of the house with a beautiful screened-in porch.

This is from the front.  The middle part was original house; the two wings were added on later during FDR's lifetime.

This is the staircase inside. FDR had an elevator installed that allowed him to go upstairs after having been struck with polio.

We learned that FDR established the first Presidential Library.  I hadn’t really thought about it before, but it’s nice that he started a grand tradition.  As we toured the museum, we saw artifacts and documents with his own handwriting on them.

As for the museum, the one thing DH wanted to see was FDR’s car.  And of course, it was nearly the last thing you come across in the museum.  They make you look at everything else, and when a man has served in four terms of presidency, well, you can imagine how many sections there were in the museum ahead of the car.

After we finished up at the house and museum, we headed up to Albany, NY for the night.  I had programmed us to get to the hotel but then we decided we wanted to go eat dinner first at the Chili’s I had found that was just a half mile from the hotel – or so we thought!  I had looked on the maps at home and targeted Chili’s for dinner because of its proximity to our hotel, and we had liked it when we recently took a trip to Texas and ate at one on the way.

When I got the restaurant added as a new stop along the way, the GPS sort of lost her mind and had us go through downtown Albany and through their broken streets.  It was not even near the route through Albany that she was taking us originally to the hotel.  But we finally got clear of things, saw the hotel, and went to eat.  The server was so helpful with my celiac, and we enjoyed a lovely meal.  When we got back to the car, the GPS wanted to continue us another 15 minutes to the hotel (which we just saw on the way to eat).  So I turned her off.  But as we were pulling into the hotel parking lot, it dawned on me that the address wasn’t right.  So yeah, apparently when I was studying maps, I had pulled up the wrong Holiday Inn Express on the map.

So we drove the extra 15 minutes to the one where we had made our reservation.  And there was barely anything at the hotel area (are you starting to see a theme?  There wasn’t anything around where we stayed the night before, either.)  Thankfully the rest of the evening went well and we had a good rest for the following day.

Up next: Another day, another battlefield.

~ Cindy D.

Valley Forge

The next day on our trip to the northeast was a Sunday.  We had spent the night in West Chester, Pennsylvania, so we were teed up for getting to church services in Exton, Pennsylvania, about 25 minutes away.

After church, we headed over to King of Prussia, PA, to get a quick lunch from Shake Shack, our first time eating there.  They have gluten-free buns so I got a burger for lunch.  We both liked the burgers okay, but we didn’t try a shake, so I guess that means we’ll need to go back another time.  The restaurant was just a few minutes from our (nearly) daily dose of the American Revolution – the Valley Forge visitor center and grounds.

The Valley Forge site offers guided trolley tours that take you around the property.  You can’t pre-purchase tickets, but you can call ahead the morning of the tour for a reservation.  Thankfully I had remembered to add that note to my planning document, so on the way to church services, I had called to schedule us for the 3 PM tour.  That would give us time to get to have lunch, get to the Visitor Center, watch the movie, and look around the exhibits before taking the tour.

I didn’t know a lot about Valley Forge until we recently watched the PBS documentary about the American Revolution.  Between that, the film at the Visitor Center, and the tour around the property, I began to realize just how important and significant the time spent at Valley Forge was for the Continental forces.  Even though many people died that winter from disease and injuries suffered before they settled at Valley Forge, the time there was a time for reassessment and regrouping.  And training!  This is where more formalized and standardized training was implemented among the regiments fighting for the colonies.  In fact, some of the procedures and concepts are still in the Army’s Blue Book today.

While on the trolley tour, we had two stops where we got off to look around.  One stop was where an interpreter ranger gave a musket firing demonstration.  I was so happy when I looked back at my pictures and found I had captured the moment when the shot was fired and there was smoke in the air.  We also saw small huts where a dozen soldiers would sleep in each hut.  These were smaller than the tiny houses that are popular these days.

Later in the tour we stopped to see Washington’s Headquarters.  The building is undergoing restoration / maintenance so we couldn’t go see it close up, but it does give perspective to how the encampment at Valley Forge might have worked.  When you look at how far it is from one place to another, it boggles my mind about how they communicated back then.  Messengers on foot or horseback still took time to get from place to place.

From Valley Forge, we headed over to Ewing, New Jersey for the night.  The GPS took us through the Delaware Water Gap but I didn’t realize we were going to go that way – I know later on in our trip we will be going through there (the other direction) and had made plans to stop at the Pennsylvania Welcome Center there.  It had looked a bit confusing on the map, so now that I’ve had a preview, it’s not quite so.

Our hotel for the night was out in the middle of nowhere, but considered itself an airport hotel.  Ewing is just outside Trenton, the capital of New Jersey.  We’d been to the capital city of Delaware the day before, and the next day we were going to be in Albany, the capital city of New York!  And after having spent the afternoon at Valley Forge, we were thankful to have a nice, comfortable hotel room for the night!

~ Cindy D.

A Day in Delaware

After spending a nice day in Delaware visiting New Jersey, we spent the next day actually seeing some things in Delaware.  Our first stop was the Old State House in downtown Dover.  They do a tour of the Old State House beginning at 10 AM, so we arrived shortly before that and spent most of the time trying to figure out where to park.  Apparently they do a weekly market on the Green each Saturday so all the spaces you might otherwise use were filled with vehicles for the vendors.  We parked a few blocks away at the public library.  We were thankful it was a little cooler of a day so we didn’t mind the walk.

The Old State House is a National Parks property, so I was able to get my NPS Passport stamped.  The tour guide gave us a talk about the formation of the state and the uses of the building in the early days.  It had been shared space between the county and the state until such time as the state took over.

The building was slated to be destroyed at one time, but a prominent citizen, Mable Lloyd Ridgely, came forward and spearheaded the movement to save the building.

The building is pretty cool, and they’ve done a good job of restoring it and preserving it.  But the most exciting thing we saw there was a life-size portrait of George Washington.  Next to it was the charcoal sketch that the artist had prepared for approval before painting.  It took him a year to produce the painting, and the tour guide pointed out several differences between the sketch and the final portrait.  We figured that the artist got tired of painting so he just left things off, like the spurs on Washington’s boots.

We walked around the square a little bit after the Old State House and looked at some of the old buildings.  They have a nice self-guided tour that explains a lot of early Delaware history.

From Dover, we drove north to the Wilmington area to visit the Old Swedes Historic Site and Cemetery.  I wrote a blog entry a few months ago explaining why this was important for us to go to.  From my genealogical work on DH’s family, we have traced one branch back to this area of New Sweden in the mid-1600s to a man named Johan Anderson Stahlkofta (now Stalcup).  Several generations of his direct descendants have been buried at the Old Swedes Church Cemetery.

When we arrived at the site, a woman greeted us and when we told her why we were there, she said she knew right where that area was in the cemetery and was able to take us right there.  We’d probably still be wandering around looking for them without her assistance.  She also showed us where some of the related families through marriage were buried.  It’s a beautiful cemetery and is still well tended all these years later. While they don’t do burials there any more, they do still accept cremains.

In 2020, a friend gave me one of those 1,000 Places to Go calendars.  Each day as I tore off a page, I put it into a pile of “been there”, “want to go there”, or “want to go there and realistically could get there.”  When we started planning this trip, I pulled out both of the “want to go there” stacks to see if any might make the cut.  There was one that did – Winterthur Museum and Gardens just outside Wilmington, Delaware.  This property was home to part of the DuPont family, and one of the descendants made the home into a museum, not representing his family’s life there, but a museum that was home to all of America.  Each room in the house is made from or furnished by things reclaimed or collected from all over the U.S.  It was fascinating to see the vast collection of things gathered to display.

There is also a gardens tour which is really a tour of the land portion of the property.  The guided tram tour takes about 30 minutes and brings you from the Visitor Center to the house / museum.  You see more than you could just walking the paths.  I’ve got to get over my thought that “gardens” means “flowers” because in this case it was all about the trees.

Admission to the Winterthur Museum and Gardens is covered by an American Horticultural Society membership which I purchased for us on the first of September (it will last until the end of September 2027).  I paid $70 for the AHS membership; without it, the Winterthur admission would have been $54 for both of us.  We have at least one more place on our itinerary that we’ll be able to use it for a reciprocal admission so we’ll have at least broken even before this trip is even over.

We elected to stay in West Chester, Pennsylvania, just across the Delaware / Pennsylvania border for the night at a Holiday Inn Express.  It was a little complicated to get to because of how the highway was constructed, and there wasn’t much in the way of restaurants nearby.  But there was a Costco!  Gas was $3.99 / gallon, over my budgeted $3.75/gallon, but it was Labor Day weekend, so we expected the gas to be higher.  Delaware is a pretty short state, so we only needed $15 worth of gas, but we knew the next day or two would be longer drives, so we wanted to be topped off.  As for dinner, we found a Fresh Market on the way to the hotel from Costco, so we picked up some chicken salad to have for dinner and saved the leftovers for the next day (my notes for the next day said “eat before you get there because there’s nothing there” which was accurate as you’ll see in our next blog entry).  Fresh Market meets our dining criteria because even though we have a Fresh Market at home, we never go to it.

So, overall impressions of our days in Delaware – it was good – we enjoyed the things we saw and the people we met.  There’s quite a bit to see and do in this First State that we didn’t even come close to seeing or doing.  If you’ve never been, we’d recommend a few days to visit.

Up next:  Valley Forge.

~ Cindy D.

A ferry ride to state 48 (and the rest of the day)

DH woke up excited for this day because it meant he was going to New Jersey, his 48^th state!  We got up early to get to Lewes to take the Cape May – Lewes Ferry over to Cape May, New Jersey.  We booked the 8:45 AM ferry because we wanted to be back to Lewes in time to do a few things in the later part of the afternoon.  That meant we had to be back on the ferry at 1 PM.

Two years ago, we spent part of a day on Mackinac Island, so I used that as a basis for figuring out what we might enjoy at Cape May as well as figuring out which ferry to schedule.  They also offer a shuttle service ($12/person round trip) to take you from the ferry to the Cape May Welcome Center where you can then walk around town, find something to eat, or enjoy going for a walk near the beach.

The ferry take almost 90 minutes to cross.  After we boarded, we were able to watch the cars loading onto the ferry.  They can take up to 100 vehicles, and they can accommodate large vehicles such as tractor-trailers and RVs.  We saw a few motorcycles as well as trucks pulling campers.  They also take foot passengers like we were.  Some are day-trippers and some go to stay overnight and return another day.  There’s a pretty big parking lot on the Lewes, Delaware side.  The ferry offers snacks and beverages and has a small gift shop, too.  There’s inside seating and outdoor seating, and there are also decent restrooms onboard.

The shuttle was waiting when we disembarked and the shuttle driver knew how many passengers onboard had shuttle transfer tickets so he was able to make sure we all made it onto the shuttle and no one got stranded at the ferry terminal.  The shuttle took about 20 minutes to get into town.

I had a couple of cards to mail, so we headed first to the Post Office.  From there we walked down a few blocks to the Cape May Promenade which runs the length of the beach in the tourist area.  You can access the beach from there, and on the beach is a walking path so you don’t get sand all over you.  We didn’t need to get down to the water’s edge – it was a really wide beach – which was just as well because they would have charged us a beach access fee just to go on the beach.  (The season ended on Labor Day, but we were there before then.)  The lady said she’d let us walk down to take pictures if we wanted as we obviously didn’t look like we were there to spend the day at the beach.

There was one store I wanted to check out – Fralingers – to get some saltwater taffy.  They had so many flavors!  My favorite has always been peppermint.  We each picked out the flavors we wanted (and put them in separate bags) so we can enjoy them throughout the rest of the trip and probably still have some when we get home.

The only other thing I really wanted to do was get ice cream.  We didn’t have a particular place in mind, so we saw Uncle Charley’s homemade ice cream sign just down the block from Fralingers, so we went there and each had a scoop of butter pecan.  Butter pecan is my favorite flavor of ice cream.  While I wish I could have a cone, I’m just as happy with a scoop in a cup – and I’m not sure, but maybe I get a little more for my money!

The shuttle driver told us to meet the shuttle at the welcome center at 12:10 PM for the 1 PM shuttle, and don’t be late!  We were back about 20 minutes early.  While there, we were able to watch the Revolution Rail get set up and take off on one of their tours.  If you’ve never heard of this (we hadn’t), it’s pretty cool.  They take you on a pedal-powered vehicle with a group of people down old railway tracks to nature preserve land and other sites.  Check out the link.  It makes me wonder if there’s any track left by the St. Marks trail in Florida that would work for this type of activity.

The shuttle got us back in plenty of time, but  not too much time, to make the ferry.  We just relaxed on the way back, and DH even took a nap.  It was nice to be out of the car for the day.

When we got back to the parking lot, we drove a few miles further to reach Delaware’s Cape Henlopen State Park.  I wanted to check out Fort Miles museum.  And go to The Point to look at the Cape Henlopen Lighthouse.  Delaware charges $20 per out-of-state vehicle to visit their shoreside state parks.

The fort wasn’t what I was thinking it would be – I’m thinking like the forts we usually visit.  This one was more modern and had weaponry such as a 16-inch gun out front.  They had a video they showed about the process for loading and blasting the guns which showed how much cooperation and precision was needed back in the days before electronically operated weapons were implemented.

The Point was also a bit disappointing as I was hoping it might be a nice little beach area and a good view of the lighthouse.  I think we had a better view from the ferry even though we were further away.  I guess I’m spoiled with our close-up lighthouses in Florida.  Even so, I wanted to see it, so we did.  If you’re keeping count, this was lighthouse #2 for our trip.

From the state park, we headed into Lewes to find a place I read about online that serves gluten-free fried chicken.  It’s called Kick ‘n Chicken.  It was a little tricky to get to because of some road construction, but it was worth it.  I had really enjoyed the fried chicken tenders earlier in the week at the Disco Chicken and Donuts in Knoxville, and the friend shrimp at Abbey Road Restaurant in Virginial Beach, so having one more shot at gluten-free fried anything sounded good to me.  And yeah, it was so good, too.  But I am done with the fried food for this trip, at least as a main course.  (So Dr. P, if you’re reading this, don’t worry!)

I had found a gas station to fill up at on the way out the next morning, but because of the construction, we had to leave the restaurant a different way that took us right by the gas station and it was on the right side of the road to make it easy to get in and out of.  So we were able to fill up at – wait for it - $4.15/gallon.  Eeee-ooooowwwwww.  Highest we have seen so far!

You may remember from an earlier post that we were going to be looking for Asics Outlet stores along the way.  There was one in Rehoboth Beach on the way back to the hotel and on the right side of the road, so we stopped and were able to get the socks we wanted.  As we were leaving, there was an Auntie Anne’s pretzel shop in the middle of the parking lot – more of a stand than a food truck.  DH stopped to get a cinnamon pretzel – his favorite kind.

After we got back to the hotel, we noticed that the laundry room was available, so we decided to do a load of laundry.  It was $1.50 to wash and $1.50 to dry although I added extra time so we spent $2.25 on drying (medium).  Once that was done, we repacked everything so we’d be ready to head out the next day for a full day of exploring Delaware.

Next up:  Getting to a place from the 1,000 Places to Go calendar from 2020.

~ Cindy D.