TGICR day 5 – not so fun

Today was too much non-highway driving, and not so much fun – although the ice cream was excellent!

The first part of the drive, to the ice cream at The Riverside Creamery in Port Jervis, was deliberately off-highway and was a nice drive … after lunch I fancied a straight highway haul to Sturbridge, but it would have got us in at 2pm. A couple of people suggested US 7 up Connecticut instead (“very pretty”).
Well, it might be pretty in parts, but if you get tired of it or stuck with traffic – and we did – there’s no other option; we were behind slow vehicles for a long time, encouraging one driver to get crazy. I think some MINI folks forget that we have to respect other road users, even if they’re going slower then we’d like.

When we finally reached highway, we still had 90 miles on the Mass Pike, with regular police activity too … so we finally made it to the hotel at 4:30, and then spent ages doing room swaps to try and find working internet. Not my hotel of choice (last nights Holiday Express was so much nicer!)

Anyway, MINIs are arriving, and some folks from OceanStateMINI are here to greet us – and it’s damn cold (low 50s) so back to long trousers before I go out.

 

This evening, we swamped Enricos – but they handled us extremely well; and their pizza was incredibly good :); we missed the evening ice cream – they were closing before we could make it to them – so we hung out in the motel parking lot and enjoyed chatting, till the Florida folks got too cold 😉

TGICR day 4 – Skyline drive and worse weather

Today our so-called fast group turned in to the slow group: we wanted to drive Skyline Drive (national forest, speed limit 35), while the others wanted to catch a brewery tour (they picked the wrong choice and missed a great drive and fabulous lunch ice-cream stop!)

Skyline Drive is less twisty than yesterdays Blue Ridge Parkway, but arguably has better views – and lots more wildlife! We saw a black bear cross in front of us, multiple deer, and assorted smaller animals …


Our lunch stop was Cones & Bones in Hagerstown, another A1 ice cream stop (and lunch across the road was excellent too!)

 

The long, slower, drive on Skyline – and the poor weather and excessive roadworks, meant we arrived at and immediately left the hotel for dinner, chasing the other MINIs to Leibys … Worth it though … 🙂