Road Trip

The girls, my sister, and I headed out today to visit my mother on Cranberry Island in Maine. This will be our last road trip of the summer. As shocking as it seems to me after I return home I need to start attending meetings and getting my room ready for the coming school year. Our drive today was long (as usual) and we hit several places of construction and tourism traffic. The last boat onto the Island left Manset as 5:20. We missed it by a couple of minutes. It is rather frustrating to leave your house at 9 AM and drive that long to miss a boat by a couple of minutes.

It became obvious to me as we worked our way through the congested traffic on Mount desert Island that we would not be able to make that boat. I called my mother to see about a later one only to find that there wasn't. Luckily she placed a call to my Uncle Lewis and he readily agreed to give us a lift. It was a really nice thing for him to do as he was about to put steaks on the grill to cook for dinner, but came over to get us instead. Chloe literally cheered when I told them in the car. She loves to ride on that boat. Uncle Louis said he was glad to do it as he had been rather bored and wanting an excuse to get out.

The drive itself was rather peasant and uneventful. I feel like traveling with another adult is an unbelievable luxury. I am so use to driving on long trips with two kids, a dog, and just me that I forgot what it is like to have an extra set of hands. Someone to pass back snacks and change the video, not to mention handing me things to eat. I am usually fishing around in a tote bag on the floor while the other hand it on the steering wheel. It always feels a little wreckless and irresponsible. Although as we were heading in to Bangor on the interstate I mentioned to my sister that the guy head of us on a motorcycle seemed to only be using on hand. He kept moving his other arm and head all around. It seemed odd to me for a biker. They usually seem to use both hands- especially on the interstate. She agreed that he seemed rather haphazard. We passed him a short while later only to see that he was texting. Texting while riding a motorcycle down the interstate. I couldn't believe it! When he finished he settled into the bike and flew by us going about 85- 90. I was glad that we reached our exit before I had to see how that ended. It didn't seem like any of it was a good idea. So maybe fiddling around to hand back Goldfish crackers isn't as bad as I thought.

Our Arrival

This is my second attempt to post an entry. I am using my mother's computer and the first post ended in an error. I have no idea where in cyberland it went, but I am trying again.

We arrived on Cranberry Island. The trip took around eight hours. I stumbled upon a great deal of construction traffic. It has left me pondering some questions such as: do orange traffic vests only come in extra large , or does it just appear that way? Has the Manchu come in to fashion as of late? What does extended time periods of holding a stop/slow sign do to a person? Just a few things that came to mind as I sat staring at people who controlled the speed on my journey with a mere flick of their wrist.

However, arrive we did. Much to the excitement of the girls my Uncle Lewis offered to pick us up in his boat instead of a trip from Manset to Cranberry Island on the ferry. This is a big hit with the girls. Chloe looks forward every year to riding on Uncle Lewis's boat. I think he really enjoys it too as his own Grandchildren are a lot older now. He will keep asking them the whole time if he should go faster leaving them hanging on and giggling. The wind whips across them and they cling on just to stand up, but they love it. Alexa said, "This boat ride is amazingly fun!"

This will likely be the last summer of boat rides with Uncle Lewis. He and my Aunt Anita have been spending the last few summers up here (they live year round in Florida). She has recently been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease and they feel that she will not be up for the trip next summer. We so enjoy getting spend time with them. It will be very sad for us.