The Beginning

OOPS – TEXT FOLLOWS PICTURES!

 

Diamondback terrapin, National Aquarium, Baltimore

Diamondback terrapin, National Aquarium, Baltimore

Delmarva squirrel (endangered), Chincoteague NWR

Western kingbird, Pierre SD

Blacksnake, Burgess, Va.

Black skimmers feeding, Chincoteague NWR

Black skimmer

Black Skimmer feeding, Chincoteague NWR

Black skimmer feeding, Chincoteague NWR

Piping plover, Chincoteague NWR

Muskrat, Chincoteague NWR

Glossy ibis, Chincoteague NWR

Hummingbird, Quick, WV

Assateague horses oceanside

Assateague horses bayside

Sunbeam egret, Chincoteague NWR

Egrets, Blackwater NWR

Egrets, Blackwater NWR

Bald eagle, Blackwater NWR

Chincoteague sunrise

Salt marsh, Blackwater NWR

Assateague sunset

Now I know why we did all the other trips in the winter: everybody else travels in the summer.

We did pretty well going across eastern Montana because we had a tailwind.  Not so farther east.  It’s discouraging to see the gas needle drop at the same rate the speedometer rises.

The next day we were tooling along in the middle of South Dakota when I was jarred awake by a loud WHAP! WHAP! WHAP!.  So I pulled over. One of our tires had delaminated and the tread was laying waste to the side of the cramper.  Both water hookups and the cover for the electronics were gone.  The molding along the bottom of the cramper and the wheel well were twisted and hanging loose.  But the tire wasn’t flat.  I changed it anyway.   We figured the closest place to get tires was Pierre, 30 miles north, so we did that.  We camped at a State Park along the Missouri up there.  The next morning at 6, the sky to the north was Wizard-of-Oz black.  I didn’t see Margret Hamilton going by on a bike, but she certainly could have.  We headed for Sioux Falls, and got there just as the wind was picking up.  We found a place to fix the cramper and they had us park inside the shop.  That was the best thing that could have happened.  For the next eight hours it rained in sheets, accompanied by almost continuous thunder and lightning.  The electricity in the place went out, everybody else went home, and we sat in the showroom watching the light show.  Best campsite ever.  They had nine inches of rain that night, and by morning the interstate was closed, and we were on an island.  We got going about noon and made it to Alice’s parents in West Virginia the next day.

Our first destination for photography was the Delmarva (Delaware, Maryland, Virginia) Peninsula, which divides Chesapeake Bay from Delaware Bay and the Atlantic.  We decided to leave the cramper in WV and do this section from motels.  I wanted to do the horses at Chincoteague and Assateague for the book, so that’s where we headed first.  The horses at Chincoteague (Va) are on a National Wildlife Refuge, but are owned and managed by the local VFD.  They are isolated from the public. No photo ops there.  These horses are rounded up once a year and certain ones are auctioned to the public as a means of population control.  On Assateague (Md) the horses are managed by the Park Service and are allowed to run free.  A mare is allowed to have one foal, and after that she is darted with a birth control drug each year.  You can run into the horses anywhere, but I never did get them down on the beach.   Both locations are popular beach spots for tourists and locals.

I’d always heard that Cape May, NJ is one of the best birding sites in the country, so we took the ferry from Delaware over there.  It was pretty much a disappointment as far as birds go. As with anything else you’ve got to be there at the right time.  It was disappointing for photography, too.  But hey, it’s New Jersey, so I didn’t expect much.  We’re bypassing the rest of it anyway – I hear the bridge traffic is terrible.

We stopped at the National Aquarium in Baltimore so I could fill my terrapin gaps for the book.  After leaving there we toured the Civil War battlefields at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and The Wilderness.  It is always pretty sobering to see the actual locations of all that carnage.   Good thing we’re smarter today.

Then it was on to Alice’s cousins, Robert and Fran, who live in Burgess near Chesapeake Bay.  Three days of excellent food, boat rides, museum tours (Maratime Museum in Hampton Roads where they have the Monitor, raised off of Cape Hatteras), fireworks, beach hikes and crabs.  We told them we’d give them a plug on Yelp, but this probably reaches more people, so if you’re ever in the area stop by….

When we were at Chancellorsville we got a call from our friends, Dave and Barb, from Gettysburg, telling us about the 151st reenactment of the battle over the coming weekend.   We’re nothing if not flexible, so it was off to Gettysburg.  I played lacrosse with Dave at WVU.  He is a Civil War historian, re-enactor and competitive black powder shooter, and is the one to see these things with (Dave was killed on Little Round Top in 1863, and can be considered one of the true “Ghosts of Gettysburg”).  I got to be a real combat photographer  for a couple of days and it was good to catch up with old friends.

We’re back in WV now, and will continue the trip around the 22nd of July when we head to Long Island – where there is actually a Wilderness area on the south shore.  This should be interesting…..