A Professional Dilettante

Today was a four-part day.

We got up early and went to a farmers’ market under a freeway in downtown Baltimore, where Teri picked up her weekly CSA allotment of veggies, then, after we dropped them back off at the house and ate a breakfast of big, gooey cinnamon rolls also purchased there, we headed to Fort McHenry, a national historic site on a point of land in Baltimore’s harbor, where the battle that inspired Francis Scott Key to write our national anthem took place. It’s a classic star fort (the shape of the embankments and buildings), with re-enactors marching around wearing wool in this ungodly heat, and playing the fife and drums. In a way, it kind of reminded me of Fort Larned in Kansas, only instead of being surrounded by prairie, it was surrounded by water.

I learned a lot about the battle, and the War of 1812, and that Key was actually in the custody of the British when he wrote the lyrics, and lots of good bits of information to fit into my mind as steel trap for useless trivia (well, not useless, but you know what I mean).

We were going to take the water taxi over to the Inner Harbor area to eat lunch, but it turns out you can only buy tickets on the Inner Harbor side, so we got back in the car and Teri drove us through downtown Baltimore again [wry g] to a place to eat lunch, and then parked near the Inner Harbor where we explored around. This was the place that reminded me of Victoria, although it’s more just the geography (the harbor surrounded by the city thing) than anything else.

The highlights were McCormick Spices’ flagship store, the USS Constellation, and one of the more unusual lighthouses I’ve ever seen. But it was ungodly hot again, and we were all fading fast by the time we got back to the car. I really enjoyed it, though.

Then, that evening, we drove to the other side of Baltimore, to a drive-in theater which claims to have the biggest screen in the United States. It’s gigantic, I’ll give you that. The whole place, though, is a serious throwback to the 1950s, including some of the most un-PC concession advertisements I’ve ever seen in my life. They’ve also got rules out the ying-yang and are apparently control freaks about them. But it was fun. Oh, and I enjoyed Finding Dory, and, to a lesser extent, The BFG (double feature and a short to begin with – the short was a Pixar thing about sandpipers). But we didn’t get back to Teri’s house until almost two a.m. It was worth it, though.

Today we’re just sitting around – we were going to go to the Great Falls of the Potomac and hike around a bit, but it was 95dF when I went outside this morning, so that got nixed. After three days of pretty much solid sightseeing in this heat, we’re taking it easy (and I’m doing laundry) until this evening when we’ll be driving down towards DC for the listee dinner. I’m really looking forward to that. Then tomorrow I shall be picking Loralee up at the airport!

Which reminds me, I really need to clear off Merlin’s passenger seat and make space in the back for her suitcase before then.

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.

I didn’t end up taking too many photos today. I did pop up into Delaware for a few miles, then came back west across the Eastern Shore to the highway. I didn’t stay on it for long, though, turning west at a sign for the Oxford-Bellevue ferry. It was not free (it cost $12 for Merlin and me), but it was scenic, and nice out on the water. I’ve never had my car be the only one on the ferry before (the capacity was nine vehicles).

After I reached the other side of the Choptank River (which was more an inlet into the bay than a river), I drove west to the tiny tourist town of St. Michaels, and then on to the point at the end of Tilghman Island, or almost to the end. The very end of the point is a private inn, and unless you’re staying there you can’t go all the way. I kind of wish I’d known that before I drove out there, but c’est la vie.

It was still a pretty drive. When I got back to St. Michaels, I ate a flounder sandwich at a local café, and then banana ice cream across the street at a little place called Justine’s. I haven’t had banana ice cream in I can’t remember how long, and it was delicious.

Then it was back to the highway. I turned off before I got there onto a back road the map insisted did intersect the highway a few miles further on, and it did, but a bit further than I expected, which was a nice thing.

I stopped at a produce stand and bought cantaloupe and big beefsteak tomatoes to take to Teri’s house, and then went up – and up, and up – and over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge (as opposed to the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel). It’s almost as tall and long as the Mackinac Bridge in Michigan, but it felt longer. I think it might have been the traffic, which got pretty intense, and did not let up through Annapolis and up into Baltimore. But Katrina’s directions were very good, and I had no problem finding Teri’s house, so that was a relief.

Nobody was home when I got there, but Teri had told me where to find a key, so I let myself in, and she arrived soon afterwards. Katrina was a bit later because she’d had to have her car worked on before she left Pennsylvania to come down, but by the time it was dark we were all together, so that was good.

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.