Road Trip 2011: Day 5 of 20 (Lewes, DE to Wilmington, DE)

I never heard the train that Helen claimed to hear, but only Adam could ignore all the birds that started chirping well before sunrise

The boys went on a bike ride around the Cape Henlopen State Park campground while Helen and I packed up

The ferry to Cape May, NJ was a very short drive away from the campground

Adam loves the big pretzels. They were so good that Derek wanted one too.

Cape May is known for its beautiful Victorian houses

Cape May Migratory Bird Refuge

That water was cold! No Gulf Stream to warm the water.

Nice field of flowers we were parked in front of. The discoloration on the bottom fence rail is Adam not being able to hold it until we could find a restroom.

There was a small but cute natural history museum at the Cape May Lighthouse Park. The lady was impressed by the boys' interest and knowledge of the animals and took them into a back room for a personal tour.

Lunch at the Mad Batter

The food was good, but it seemed like it didn't measure up to the setting

Adam went with Mom to find a bathroom so Derek and I went for ice cream. When we met back up, this is the look Adam gave me when I presented him with the peanut butter ice cream I got for him.

Adam immediately gave the ice cream back to me and said he didn't like it

I asked Adam if he wanted to go and see if there's a flavor he might want. He said yes so we walked back to the ice cream shop. Adam stepped up to the counter and when they finished telling him all the flavors, he calmly said he wanted peanut butter - the same flavor he claimed he didn't like in the first place. It's childish, but he's such a mini-me that it's hard for me to get upset at him whenever he pulls these stunts. It's exactly what I would have done (and probably would still do) to protest the fact that somebody else had the audacity to make a choice for me instead of letting me make my own choice.

We drove up the coast to Wildwoods, NJ

We had intended to go to Morey's Piers in Wildwoods, but a couple of things changed our minds: One was the fact that an 11 year old girl had fallen from the ferris wheel the day before and died, which kind of gave us pause, but the main reason was because the area just seemed trashy and not very family oriented.

We did enjoy driving up and down the strip looking at all the Doo Wop 50's architecture

Luckily the kids were tired and didn't seem to mind missing the amusements. This was just not our kind of place.

We drove up the Jersey shore and saw lots of nice houses along the water

Although Atlantic City isn't necessarily family oriented, I still wanted to see it

And I wanted to eat at White House Subs

I don't know what we (Adam) would have done without the makeshift pee bucket

All clean and headed to bed with a warm DoubleTree cookie in their belly

Saturday June 4, 2011

We were all snuggled up in the tent hiding from the bugs outside when morning light came too quickly, but it gave us plenty of time to get packed up and to the ferry terminal for the first ferry to Cape May, NJ. It also gave the boys their first opportunity to get the bikes off the rack and ride around.

It was a nice ferry ride to Cape May. We drove through town looking at all the cute houses and then headed to the Migratory Bird Refuge. We enjoyed our time soaking in all the natural beauty. Afterwards, we went to the Lighthouse Park and were pleasantly surprised by the neat little natural history museum.

We had lunch at the Mad Batter. It was the cutest restaurant with a very romantic porch dining area. Unfortunately, our food didn't live up to the atmosphere. Helen ordered the crab cake, hoping it would be as good as the one she had at Chick and Ruth's in Annapolis, but it was one of those less meat and more filler cakes. My fish and chips basket with its 2 paltry fillets was OK, but way overpriced for what you got. Oh well, the atmosphere was nice.

We walked around town and stopped for some ice cream before heading to Wildwoods, NJ - a short drive up the coast. We had hoped to spend the rest of the day at the boardwalk amusement and water parks, but just couldn't pull the trigger when we saw that the place had more of a young and trashy party feel, rather than the family friendly vibe we had hoped for.

Since we didn't spend much time in Wildwoods, that gave us time to take a drive up the coast to Atlantic City. I knew Atlantic City wouldn't have much to offer in terms of family friendly entertainment, but I still wanted to see it as well as the towns along the way. I also wanted to eat at White House Subs. The area around White House Subs was a little sketchy and we had some trouble finding parking, but we were glad we went. Those were some really good sandwiches.

We punched the directions to our next destination, the DoubleTree Hotel in Wilmington Delaware, into our GPS and headed out of Atlantic City as night was falling. You start to put blind trust in the GPS and sometimes lose track of where it's sending you. I didn't expect it to send us up to Philadelphia first, so we were caught off guard as we passed right by the big Philadelphia sports venues, Citizen's Bank Park and Lincoln Financial Field. The Phillies were in town and Citizen's Bank Park was festively aglow with activity.

After tasting his first DoubleTree chocolate chip cookie, Derek decided that DoubleTree was his favorite hotel and that we should only stay in DoubleTree's from now on.