Connecticut

Oct 4th

We drove through Rhode Island this morning. The drive only took us about 45 minutes, and that was with us stopping at the post office and a gas station. It turns out that Rhode Island is smaller than Sonoma County! We will be staying the next two nights at Hopeville Pond State Park in Connecticut. When we arrived at the campground, there were big signs saying “No Pets Allowed in the Campground”. (It would have been nice if the website had mentioned that). I walked into the ranger station to ask them about it. The ranger said that it’s probably not on the website, because pets are not allowed at any Connecticut State Campground. ???? I told him that I was from out of state and didn’t know that rule. He said that since it is off-season, and most of the campground was empty, we could stay with Oreo, but we had to keep him in the trailer as much as possible. The campground is nice, but the bathrooms are disgusting. The “pond” is very large. I would call it a lake. On the far side there are houses with private docks and motor boats. There are only six other campsites occupied, so it is very quiet here. It is very stressful trying to “hide” Oreo, but I am noticing that locals walk their dogs through the campground to the day-use area (where dogs are allowed). I think it is a very soft rule, and put in place as a way to get rid of people who have unruly pets.

Oct 5th

Mia had school most of the day, and then we went for a hike on the trails through the park. Connecticut, like most of New England, has had an incredibly wet summer and everything is damp. There are mushrooms growing everywhere. When I say everywhere, I mean it. I think if you stood still long enough, they would start to grow on you too. It started raining this afternoon and hasn’t let up.

Oct 6th

It rained heavily all night; everything is soaking wet. We found our first tick crawling on Oreo this morning. Kind of ironic, being that we are close to the town of Lyme, where the disease was first found. After a complete family tick check, we packed up and left the park. We are headed to NYC. There is an RV park right across the Hudson from downtown Manhattan, in Jersey City, and we have reserved a spot for the next few nights. The drive in was stressful. From Bridgeport, CT south, the traffic was very heavy. When we crossed into New York; it got heavier. Then in the Bronx, we had to cross the George Washington Bridge into New Jersey, and the traffic got ridiculous. The merging was a free for all, with cars and trucks passing on the right, and then trying to push in. Where there were only two lanes, there were five lines of vehicles trying to squeeze into the space. It is everyone for themselves here. No one lets you in when you turn on you signal. We had to roll down our window several times and ask the person next to us to let us in, and then they would. At one point we hit a toll plaza with seven lanes, and then it all merged back into one lane. It was a nightmare. Being in a car would have be bad, but imagine driving a truck with a big trailer through this. The last fifteen miles, from the Bronx to Jersey City took us over an hour. We arrived at the RV park frazzled but unscathed. Liberty RV Park and Marina, is not pretty. It’s literally a parking lot for the ferry terminal. They have installed electricity and water for all of the RV spots and it is gated off from the rest of the parking lot. However, the location is ideal, the staff is very nice, the bathrooms and laundry room are clean, the views of NYC are fantastic, and we feel very safe here. We set up our site, and sat down for a much-needed drink, to shake off the stress. Liberty Park, where the ferries for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island are located, is less than a mile from our campsite. After calming down, we walked over to it. Once we reached the park, we could see the entire NYC skyline across the Hudson. There is a 9/11 memorial in the park, with two walls that you walk between. The names of all New Jersey victims line the walls. On one end of the outdoor hallway are pieces of the Twin Towers, and if you stand at those pieces, the two walls of the memorial show where the two towers stood with the New York skyline in the background. The park is very big, and we walked to the other side, to get a view of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. By the time we got back to our trailer, we had walked over 6 miles. After dinner I had to get back to the park, to see the city skyline in with all of the lights. We took our bikes this time. There is a nice pedestrian/bike trail all the way there, so no worries about being hit by a car. The views are even more fantastic at night.