Planning on the Fly
Since we had no cell signal at Rickett’s Glen SP, we couldn’t make arrangements for our next stop or even properly research the options. We wanted to see the Finger Lakes and James wanted to go to the Moosewood Restaurant in Ithaca. James used his GPS to discover some Ithaca Museums and I noticed the Finger Lakes National Forest on a paper map and figured they might have some dispersed camping options. We met at the McDonalds in South Waverly on the PA-NY border for lunch to access wifi and make some calls. James called FLNP and they said there were a few pull-off dispersed sites as well as a campground with no dump station for $10. I called the Museum of the Earth and asked if we could park overnight to visit the museum and they said yes! We were tired of camping and wanted to be in town so we headed for the museum.

Great decision! Their upper parking lot was partially sheltered from the road by a hill and the museum was just a few miles from downtown, though down a steep road. Furthermore, it turned out Ithaca was having their Ithaca festival – yes! We managed to serendipitously hit an event! Unsure of parking with the festival, I asked a departing museum employee if he could give us a ride downtown and he said yes! So we grabbed our stuff and hopped in his car – Matt was super nice and we talked about environmental issues as he is a recent environmental studies graduate. He dropped us right at the Moosewood where we had yummy vegetarian dinner and I bought a t-shirt.

Timing was perfect to catch the Ithaca parade right after dinner just around the corner.

We managed to catch a city bus back to the museum though we waited over 30 mins for it, we got chatting with a local Jen who works with the city’s homeless at Loaves and Fishes. Jen filled us in on the problems of drug abuse (marijuana and heroin) in Ithaca and the large number of disillusioned young people who have chosen drugs and street life over paying for expensive housing and getting a job. Apparently the shooting-up is such a problem, the city had to close all the public washrooms as they were just filled with used needles – sad indeed. I felt sympathy for these young people who must see wealth all around them but can only get a minimum wage job.

Compost & Propane
I had a full bag of compost coming out of Ricketts and nowhere but a garbage bin to put it. I kept my eyes peeled as I drove looking for a compost bin anywhere and finally spotted one. I pulled over safely and ran back with my compost bag – the homeowner was actually outside and agreed to put it in her bin so I was happy about that! Seems that compost disposal options may be hard to come by on the road – we may need to be prepared to carry our compost for a week or two if we want to avoid putting our food scraps in the garbage. It is a matter of principle for me. I needed propane again and found it along the way, this time at a TruValue Hardware store. Based on our experience on this trip, I expect we will need to fill a propane tank 3 x month at around $17 per tank – $50 per month. Laundry seems to run about the same. Good to have some practical experience to put behind those budget estimates.

Around Town in Ithaca NY
The museum was awesome and they agreed we could stay one more night so we decided to unhitch to go downtown with our bicycles in the van. We rode around Stewart Park – a municipal waterfront park Jen said was nice – she was right! Then headed for the Ithaca Fallsview trail in town – a short hike to a huge 104 foot tall waterfall we were not expecting!

Next up Ithaca bakery for dinner and a fresh loaf of bread to bring home – yay! We left the van at the bakery (with permission) to hop on our bicycles a few blocks to where the festival continued with an artisan sale and live music! Perfect and Sadie got lots of approving looks in her buddy rider and managed not to bite anyone all evening!

Robert Treman SP
We headed back home and hitched back up in the fading light to make things easier in the morning. After a morning walk with Sadie and surfing the free museum wifi, we headed just 5 miles south to Robert Treman State Park. No reservation on the weekend but they still had a site for us for 2 nights. We set up in an open area happy to have full solar but it was hot hot hot! Fortunately there was a swimming hole we could walk to but the bicycles made it so much quicker to go, we went back and forth 3 times to cool off waiting for the heat to break.

New Folding Bicycles
I was super happy with the bikes and we bought two – James chose the one with no shocks – it was a bit smaller and I think it reminds him of his BMX bike when he was a kid. I liked the one with shocks – it was larger, had thicker tires and at $100 more, seemed slightly better built all round. Also works better to have shocks for Sadie on the BuddyRider. We had Yi at 2KSilver assemble mine while James assembled his own in tandem. Great solution as the bikes needed a bit of fine tuning after importing from China and Yi tuned them both up perfectly.

James also bought a new helmet (I still have one at home) and we were set. We found a park nearby to go for a test ride and let Sadie have a little run around and we were ready to head back home.

Farmer’s Market Overnight Stay
Home at Dove Valley Winery was a highlight. Parked in a field far enough from the road that the noise didn’t bother us, it was pastoral and perfect. We were sad to leave but called ahead to Rohrbach’s Farm Market where they had a spot we could stay.

The parking area had an amazing view at the top of a mountain and we saw deer grazing in the orchards against a stunning sunset – wow! We walked Sadie beside the picturesque farmer’s fields – the only downside was the traffic noise was more than we wanted but for one night it was no big deal. Our cupboards were fairly full but we still managed to plug some of the holes in our food supplies in the morning from the market without feeling like we were buying food we didn’t want. So a successful stay!

On the way north we stopped in Centralia, Pennsylvania to explore the old destroyed highway PA-61.  It is covered in graffiti and the asphalt shows huge rifts.

Waterfall Heaven
Next up was Rickett’s Glen State Park where they had a trail with an amazing 20 gorgeous waterfalls! We were unsure if we would stay 2 or 3 nights but when we realized there was no cell signal at all anywhere in the park, we decided 2 was enough. After 1 night, we drove out with the van to the nearest town to get signal so I could check in in case my tenants had contacted me for anything. It rained and the site footing was a dirty gravel that covered everything in red mud/dirt. Happy to leave that behind but we were glad we stayed there as the falls were amazing.

Washington DC
Washington was a blast but I have discovered that RVing near a city makes for a busy time! The campground we chose had an excellent location close to the Metro but also had ticks. Sadie’s bug jacket worked pretty good but she still got some ticks and we had to keep searching her whole body to find and remove them. We arrived Monday evening and stayed through Saturday with James working his Canadian job remotely at the IBM office right near the White House while I went to the free museums.

Complete Refresh
We were so ready to leave on Saturday: we had enough of the ticks plus it was Memorial Day weekend and the campground was filling up. Normally traveling on a long weekend without a reservation somewhere is risky but we called up a Harvest Host winery and had a private place to stay! We also had our first full recharge day: we drove to Trader Joe’s in the morning to get groceries and bought drinking water, returned to the campground to shower, hitch up, dump and throw out garbage. Drove to the winery and had a lovely visit, walked Sadie and got permission to stay 2 nights. Unhitched, and drove the van to the local laundromat. So in one day we completely refreshed everything! We lasted 11 days for laundry and drinking water, 5 days between dumps and got groceries 3 times so far on this trip (2 big shops and one small one).

Dove Valley Winery in Rising Sun Maryland has yummy semi-sweet wines and gave us a deal on 6 (20% off and a free wine tote bag) I couldn’t refuse. It occurred to me this morning that Harvest Hosts and Boondockers Welcome could have great synergy: buy wine at the HH and then give a bottle to a BW host as a thank you! Today we are heading to New Jersey for a 1:30pm appointment to buy folding bicycles in person from an online company that has great prices on Columba bikes! Hoping we like them!

Dumping is Top Priority
James arrived safely from Toronto on the motorcycle and enjoyed a quiet night in the Allegheny Forest with me. Traveling from Allegheny to Washington, we had 2 days so we planned to stay at a Harvest Hosts winery along the way. We felt like we had lots of time with an early start and did some touring along the way: Kinzua Dam, Bent Run falls in Allegheny and Kinzua Bridge State Park just outside. We needed to dump the black and grey water but I figured I could dump at the state park: big miscalculation as there isn’t even a campground there. We had to scramble to find a dump station and decided on Parker Dam State Park which seemed to be on the way to the winery.

Steep Sketchy Gravel Road
I followed my GPS blindly and it took me up a super-sketchy, steep gravel back road which was absolutely terrifying. I arrived at Parker Dam in tears and since it was already 3pm, we didn’t have enough time to dump and travel to the winery before they close at 5pm plus I was too upset. Furthermore the cost to dump was half the camping fee anyway and they wouldn’t give me a break for having such small tanks. So we got a site with no electricity, dumped and set up for the evening. It was hot – I put on my swim suit and walked to the lake with Sadie and found a rock I could jump off to cool down in the refreshing spring water! James preferred the comfort station showers.

Our battery was a bit low despite traveling, I had left the inverter on to try to run the fridge but James had turned the fridge off because it was clicking trying to start on propane. Not sure what happened, but we ran the genny to make popcorn (1440 watts was no problem) and finally tested out the AC on the genny: it worked! Genny seemed like it would stall on start but it didn’t and the light went back to green! Woo hoo! Our AC unit is a special power-saver model: it only draws between 1000 and 1200 Watts depending on the temperature differential so it is just the start-up draw we weren’t sure if the genny could handle.

Lessons Learned
We learned our lessons: dumping is always priority number one, avoid touring while towing and know your route! So the next day we drove directly to Greenbelt National Park campground. James created a route and loaded it in the GPS for me and I studied the route on a map and wrote down all the highway numbers on a list as a back-up. Much better: no sketchy back roads this time and we got there in good time. We rode 2 up no helmets around the campground to choose a good site since we would be there for 5 nights with no electricity. The campground was shady but we found a spot with a patch of overhead sun and borrowed the camp host’s ladder to tilt the panel (shopping list: telescoping ladder). We only needed to run the genny once on the rainy day.