Hate to say this, but today wasn't really all that hot.
To each their own, I guess. Humidity and heat just kills me, as I am naturally much warmer than most around me already.
Well, that was a fun trip, and hopefully since I'm working now I can start making more like this one on my own. I'll go through the trip itinerary:
DAY 1 We departed at 6:00 and went to a local McDonalds in Hillsborough for dinner. After spending about 25 minutes poisoning our stomachs, we proceeded down US 206 onto I-95 South. From there, we crossed into Pennsylvania.
In Pennsylvania, I-95 remained relatively free-flow until we entered Philadelphia. Construction on the highway had caused some congestion which delayed us by about 25 minutes. After that, it was smooth flow once again into Delaware.
Once in Delaware, traffic continued to flow nicely, until the I-295 interchange. I've never seen so many cars who literally are fighting to get over at once. It was kind of harrowing honestly, because we almost got taken out by someone who didn't look trying to get into the lanes for I-495. While I wouldn't have paid the obnoxious toll in Newark, my sister didn't care, and maybe didn't want to drive back roads at night, so we continued south past the toll into Maryland.
Once in Maryland, both of us were thirsty and could use a rest room break, so we stopped at the Chesapeake House rest area. I got to say - Maryland has extremely nice facilities for this purpose. The only thing I disliked was the rather expensive prices ($3 for a soda? Really?), but everything else was fine. There wasn't much to say as we continued south out of the rest area until we entered Baltimore County. As we approached the tunnel, they were doing some construction work, so traffic slowly built up, but not enough to cause any major jams. As we continued through the Fort McHenry Tunnel, there was more road work on the other side of the tunnel, which caused a small 10 minute delay to get through traffic. Ultimately though, the roadwork didn't impact us too hard, and Baltimore is really pretty at night, so I didn't mind staring at it while we waded through traffic. We also got to use the new I-95 Express lanes as we waded through Maryland, another pleasant experience.
Continuing through Howard County, we entered Montgomery County via MD 200 / the Intercounty Connector. It was a pleasant experience to drive the new ICC. It is a rather nice roadway, and the toll prices aren't even that bad. Our exit was US 29 / Columbia Pike, so we didn't have to use the ICC for too long. From there, we zipped around back streets until we got to our hotel. Then we chilled in the hotel room, and went to sleep. Except that soda I drank at 9:00 was too much caffeine and I'm pretty sure I didn't fall asleep until like 4:30, and woke up at like 8. Oh well. I wasn't even too tired when I woke up.
DAY 2 After we woke up, we ended up driving to the Glenmont Station to catch the Metro into Washington. We also were hungry, because the hotel charged $12 for breakfast, which we thought would be complimentary. I've only ridden a subway once before, and I don't remember it, so it was kind of interesting to ride it. Ultimately the experience was fine, except for almost missing the train entirely and nearly getting squished by the closing doors. Don't ask. Thanks to the work on the Red Line, however, we ended up transferring at Fort Totten to the Yellow Line. We rode the Yellow Line, which was
way more crowded to L'Enfant Plaza. I also learned that standing up on a moving subway train -
is NOT easy...
The station at L'Enfant Plaza is rather nicely built, and we took to the street at 7th Avenue / Maryland Avenue and began to walk towards the Holocaust Museum. Thanks to the humidity though, I started sweating a bit too fast for my own liking. There was not much shade walking down 8 or so blocks, so it only got better once we got into the Holocaust Museum. There was a wait though, so we went to the Cafe in the Museum (or rather, next to it) to grab a bite to eat. After that (about 2 hours), we proceeded onto the next destination. I decided it wouldn't be a far walk across the Constitution Garden / National Mall, and it wouldn't either, except for the fucking sun and humidity making it uncomfortable as hell. There was plenty of tree cover though in some areas, though by the Washington Monument, there was very little. Ultimately, we spent about an hour and 15 minutes viewing all of the monuments in the Garden. The next destination was the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, and the walking had killed both of us, so we opted to wait half an hour for the Circulator bus to drop us off where we wanted to be.
After spending about an hour and a half at the museum, we debated going anywhere else, but the walking and heat and taken it's toll on both of us, and combined with my lack of sleep and the fact we didn't know how crowded the Metro was going to be, we decided to head back to Silver Spring and find something for dinner. Most of the restaurants in DC were too pricey for our tastes, plus all we wanted to do was relax. The Yellow Line was PACKED, but once we transferred to the Red Line, there was practically no one on the subway. We ended up pulling back into Glenmont at about 6:30, and from there we went to a TGI Fridays close to us and returned back to the hotel. Then, I ended up taking a shower and watching Storage Wars until I fell asleep at around 12:20.
DAY 3The final day of the trip, we packed our bags and checked out of our hotel room at about 10:00. The plan was to eat breakfast at an IHOP close by, but the wait time was ridiculous - upwards of 45 minutes. No thanks. From there, we got back onto the ICC to take us back onto I-95 north for our last destination - Baltimore. None of us predicted the traffic from an Orioles game, however, so we had to contend with that once we got into Baltimore City limits. From there, we took I-395 to Pratt Street and found a parking garage in the Inner Harbor area. We walked around for a bit and went to the National Aquarium, and got a bite to eat. The Aquarium actually had decent food, much better than I was expecting. After viewing all the exhibits and whatnot, we left the Aquarium, walked around the Inner Harbor some more, and got back into our car and headed back to I-95 for the trip back to New Jersey.
Heading back up, we encountered some congestion that cleared up after 5 minutes. We stopped at the Maryland House rest area to purchase some soda and use the restroom. Not too far from getting back into the car, however, we ran into some stop-and-go traffic that resulted in about a 25 minute delay. After that though, we were cruising along until we hit the I-295 interchange in Delaware, where I suggested we take that back home. Well, it was a good idea in theory, but...
...we ended up adding another 20 minutes to the trip. Once past the bridge though, we took 295 all the way back to I-95 South, and from there, back to US 206. Then we went home. Yay.
Here's a summary of some new clinched and partially clinched routes:
NJ - I-295 (
clinched)
PA - I-95 (
clinched)
DE - I-295 (
clinched) | I-95 (
clinched)
MD - I-395 (
clinched) | I-95 | US 29 | MD 97 | MD 150 | MD 182 | MD 650
I'm in the process of sorting out the photos from the trip. A lot of them are crap quality, thanks to being taken from my phone. I'll post that whenever I get that finished.
