The day finally arrived. We were supposed to leave at four o'clock in the morning for a sunrise photo from the Atlantic Ocean at Island Beach State Park, but it didn't happen. Instead we slept in. I had been up until after midnight re-loading the car. This was because David was able to take the test for his driver's license last Friday and I had to unpack the car. We made our first stop, The Bagel Express, for coffee and bagels. We said good bye to Michelle and Mary who gave us extra bagels for the road Thank you soooo much). Our first picture was the "leaving East Brunswick sign." Not knowing exactly where we were going we headed towards Route 27 south. When we got to the D&R Canal State Park in Kingston, South Brunswick we stopped for a few pictures and for Sasha to do her "business". Unable to find a garbage for Sasha's "poop" and realizing that we left a few things back at home we returned home. I tossed Sasha's "bag" out in our garbage and we went into he house. Realizing at this point that it was already late in the day, that we had no clue where we were sleeping that night and that "State Road Maps" were useless for secondary road travel. We needed a plan. First, I called a KOA in Front Royal, Virginia http://www.koa.com/where/va/46106/index.htm.
I made reservations so we knew where we would be sleeping that night. Next, we needed a Streets and Trips 2004 program, so our next stop was Best Buy for that software. We also took a pair of walkie-talkies and my electric beard trimmer. We decided that in order to get to Front Royal, Virginia before dark, we needed to take the Turnpike. So we got on at Interchange 9 and headed south. Now it felt like we were on our journey. Getting on what would be known to us as I95, we were on our way to see our country. The journey across the USA had begun. We didn't know where we would be the following day. We only knew our destination tonight was Front Royal, Virginia a place we never heard of before today. We knew that we would travel through New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia on Day 1 of our journey. Before we knew it we were on the Delaware Memorial Bridge heading out of New jersey. We've been on this Bridge many dozens of times over the years. I've taken this bridge enroute to Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Williamsburg, Florida, North Carolina, ... You get the idea. Only this time we were going to keep going, and going and going...
I called my friend, Marc, who lives in Florida to let him know our journey had begun. David was learning the Streets and Trips program so we got off the highway. I saw some skateboarders under the bridge so I took a photo. We were seeing the Newport Skate Park in Newport, Delaware. You can learn more at http://www.skateboardparks.com/delaware/newport/index.html. I was anxious to begin photographing wildlife during our journey, so I took a picture of some cows along the highway. You will see as the journey continues, I took many more photos of "cows" but I got better at it. David was working very hard at learning the trip program so he could navigate us to our destination, the KOA in Front Royal, Virginia outside of Washington, DC. Meanwhile, Sasha was settling in the back seat and getting some sleep. She had no clue at his point that we'd be spending 24-7 for 73 days together...and neither did we!! We finally got an opportunity to take our first "State Welcome Sign". Isn't it funny that the "first state sign" we took was of the "first state". You can learn more about Delaware here http://www.delaware.gov/. We weren't in Delaware too long when we then entered Maryland. We took a picture of the Delaware sign as we were leaving Delaware and the Maryland sign as we were entering Maryland. It took a couple of U-turns to be able o stop for he shot. As we approached dinner time we realized that we forgot Sasha's Eukanuba dog food at home. So we had to find a pet store that carried it. We eventually found a pet store in Maryland, picked up a 20 lb. bag, fed Sasha in the parking lot and continued on. It was early evening and it was becoming more real that we weren't going "home". We passed by the Conowingo hydroelectric plantt in Conowingo, Maryland so I took a photo. We traveled on US Hwy. 1,then onto I695 where we took our First Sunset photo in Lutherville Timonium, Maryland enroute to Front Royal, Virginia. It was getting dark and we needed to get to where we were going to camp/sleep for the night. It was getting too dark for anymore photos. NOW we needed to reach our destination. We stayed on main roads the rest of the way and finally neared Front Royal. It was pitch black out and we had difficulty finding the road to the KOA. Eventually, we did. As I drove ever so slowly up this road, we drove over what we learned we metal grates. The noise and presence of animals outside the car startled Sasha. She sat up, alert as I have never seen her before. There was something alive outside our car. I continued very slowly down he road, not even sure we were still going the right way. A little further ahead we saw he entrance to the campground. I pulled in, David got out of he car and went to the "night registration" desk. There was "our" envelope telling us where our campsite location was. I drove around some more making no sense of the map at all. Finally, I pulled into a vacant site. We had planned and practiced for weeks in advance pitching the tent in our backyard. We had it down to under 12 minutes...tying Sasha to a tree, David seting up the poles and the fly while I prepared the groundcloth, and hammered in the tent stakes. Well all that training and practice went right out the window!! David stayed in the car with Sasha, shined the headlights so I could see and about 30 minutes later we had a place to sleep. We ALL jumped into the tent for our FIRST night camping out. It certainly wasn't what we expected! We were so exhausted ALL three of us were out cold in minutes!!