Month: October 2005

Today, we drove from Hagerstown to Falls Church, near Washington. If you’re looking for driving directions in the Washington area, don’t use Map24! The directions were useless, telling us, for example, to take the exit 9B towards Shady Grove Road. Shady Grove Road is exit 8. And if you take either exit, you end up somewhere in the Washington area with no relation to where we were headed.
We finally found Falls Church, and Ben and Esther’s house, 90 minutes later than we expected because of the wrong turns we took. Aviva was somewhat apprehensive when she first saw us, because she did not remember us. We told her that she was not being very friendly, to which she replied “I’m not unfriendly, I’m rude!”. She soon warmed to us, though, and enthusiastically showed us how good she is on the monkey bars, and served me endless amounts of tea and cake from her imaginary kitchen.

I think I have to rename our blog to “Steve and Mary-Anne’s Culinary Weblog”. We drove from Pittsburgh to Hagerstown, Maryland, and the main event today was eating in the Schmankerl-Stube. Mary-Anne spotted the advert in the local guide in our hotel room, and we decided we had to try it. It is a real piece of Bavaria on the east coast of the USA! The whole place is true Bavarian style, including the waitress. The food was excellent; they import their bread from a German baker in Toronto, and sausages from a butcher near Chicago. I ate Münchner Geschnetzeltes, and Mary-Anne chose the restaurant’s specialty, Schmankerltopf, both with excellent Spätzle! Dessert was a home-made Apple Strudel, which tasted good, but the pastry was a little soft from being warmed in the microwave.
Continue reading “The Schmankerl-Stube”

We drove from Erie to Pittsburgh. The drive was uneventful, except for a few seconds of sun. The colours in the trees would have been quite pretty with a blue sky and sunshine, but we still haven’t seen anything prettier than Switzerland in autumn. (I’ll have to post some of my autumn photos when I get home.)
Pittsburgh surprised us; the approach is very green, with almost everything hidden in the trees. Then comes a road tunnel, and you’re suddenly downtown. Our motel described itself as ‘minutes from downtown’ in the brochure. We expected to be in walking distance of the centre. The description was fairly accurate; the motel really was about 10 minutes from downtown – at crazy speeds on the freeway! (Everyone here seems to take the speed limit to be the lowest speed you’re supposed to drive.) Continue reading “Pittsburgh”

This morning, we drove out along Presque Isle, a peninsula in Lake Erie. I had never visited the Great Lakes before, only flown over them. It really feels like the seaside; there is no sense of being at a lake. It was quite cool, so we didn’t stay long.

Mary-Anne enjoyed the beach immensely 🙂

Today was a relaxed day: off to a late start, we visited a factory outlet mall (where we spent nothing), ate a good yet cheap lunch in Perkins restaurant, then drove to Erie, where we found a reasonably-priced hotel with a jacuzzi bath in the room! I took the room immediately, only to discover that the water was cut off 🙁 … luckily, only until I asked what was going on and the manageress had a stern word with the plumber.
This evening, we again ate well, this time at TGIFriday’s. Having eaten so well at lunchtime, we only had an appetizer

and lots of raspberry iced tea

(OK, and a piece of cheesecake, which I have to enjoy while I’m here, because I can’t get it in Switzerland)

We’ve been travelling under clouds and in rain for three days. It’s quite depressing after the blue sky and sun of Colorado. I’ll never again say that permanently sunny weather is boring, I promise! Today, the sun broke through the clouds twice, for about ten seconds each time. It was like a breath of fresh air after spending too long in a crowded meeting room! (But much too short.)

We’re heading south to Virginia, to visit our friends Ben and Esther Rosenbaum. I used to work with Ben before they moved back to the USA. I sent him an e-mail to let him know when we would probably arrive; he wrote back to tell me that the timing was not so good, because it would be Yom Kippur, and they would be involved with family events. His e-mail closed with the words “Sorry about the timing of Yom Kippur”.
Yeah, Ben, you really should have made sure it wouldn’t collide with our visit! 😉

We returned to the falls today, having seen only the American Falls part yesterday. The Horseshoe Falls are the more famous part, and much larger. Unfortunately, we could not see them entirely, because the cool weather means that the spray immediately forms a dense cloud, obscuring everything behind it. Even so, the falls are impressive; the amount of water going over them is incredible, and the force with which it hits the rocks below simply stunning (literally, I expect 🙂 ). Even the cloud of spray is impressive if you think about it: when did you last see a waterfall which created a cloud rising so high?
We had intended to cross to the Canadian side of the falls to see the view from the top of the Skylon tower. The weather cancelled those plans; the cloud was so low that we could seldom see the top of the tower. I guess it’s better to visit in the summer!
Continue reading “Niagara Falls, day 2”