Home Sweet Home

We've spent six hundred and sixty days touring America and it has been a truly wonderful and glorious experience. Our trip has taken us close to twenty thousand miles in our RV alone. We've traveled another seventy five hundred miles in our car, not including all of our local driving in each of our one hundred and forty-eight stops. Also, in our forty-three state journey we have had the good fortune of visiting fifty-one National historic sites which includes twenty one National Parks and eighteen state capital buildings. How's that for dropping some numbers?

Our last three stops before landing back in Connecticut were all in Brad's home state of Pennsylvania. We visited Lake Erie in N. Springfield, Penn State University in State College and Trooper Lou in Easton Pa . on our way back home to Hamden, Ct.

Even though Brad was born and raised In Pennsylvania he's never been this far north in his home state, either has Kathy and for us to complete our tour of the Great Lakes it was a fitting finish to this part of our adventure.

The Campground was beautiful and it was neatly nestled right on the lake. The only problem was the entire campground sloped towards the lake so we couldn't get the RV level. Which by the way is important in order to properly pop out your slides without any mechanical interruption. Finally, after more attempts to level than in any previous RV Park we stayed in, the owner agreed to let us pull-up right on the cement patio pad. Phew, that was ugly but like we said, the campground was beautiful.

On our first full day in Lake Erie we spent the day at Presque Isle State Park. Our first stop was the Perry Monument which was built while dedicated to the participants in the Battle of Erie in the War of 1812.

The park was sprawling. We drove around in our car since Kathy's bike $hit the bed, biking wasn't an option. We stopped at a couple beaches along the way. One was pretty remote the other was relatively busy. We stopped at a lighthouse we could have gone up in but we passed on that. It was pretty from the outside.

On our way home we hit the Erie Brewing Company for a flight each. Good beers-good beertender!

The next day we drove an hour and ten minutes to Lucille Ball's hometown of Jamestown, Pa to visit the National Comedy Center. In hindsight, Brad was glad Kathy talked him into going. Some parts felt like a homecoming for both of us. It must have featured fifty comics we played. From Lisa Lampsnelli to Jim Gaffigan (Treehouse originals) to Gilbert, Dice, Sam, Rodney, Jerry, Jay and the list goes on. It was a good time! Very interactive! Very cool!

We felt the two best parts of the museum were the Johnny Carson Exhibit and the Blue Room. The former was hosted by a Jimmy Fallon hologram featuring Johnny's best characters, greatest interviews, funniest and most famous comics along with abstract and favorite guests. That was a perfect ten out of ten.

The Blue Room was the top floor of the building and it was just like going to Treehouse heaven. Everyone was there! Of course, it featured every trend setting comic (Carlin, Lenny Bruce, Pryor, Eddie Murphy) to contemporary acts (Chris Rock, Chappelle, See above:0) that all work dirty and have/had a huge edge. It was great!

On our way home we hit another local brewery just up the road from our campground. What else is there to do in Erie but drink beer? We started outside but moved inside cause Kathy was chilly and we sat at the bar. It was fun and where the heartbeat of the place was.

Our camp sight was so pretty we had a fire every night. Actually, one night we even cooked our dinner on the open fire. It was like Boy Scouts for Brad. We both dug it!

On the last day we took a ferry ride tour of the Lake. It was fun and very pretty , a bit underwhelming but we were glad we did it. It was certainly worth the money.

Our visit to Lake Erie was a great way to finish up our tour of the Great Lakes. Next stop is Penn State University in State College. We're almost home...

Brad went to college in the Poconos and had never been to Penn State which was only an hour away from Bloomsburg. That's why we stopped. Also, because it was a little over 200 miles from our previous stop. So it was a good middle ground stop about a do-able four hour drive.

Our visit started as a drive-by around the second largest college football stadium in America. Beaver Stafium seats over 106,000 rabid Penn State football fans.

Unfortunately, it was a Sunday so not only was the stadium sealed up tight but the Penn State All-Sports Museum didn't open till Tuesday. So we kept driving.

Just after the football stadium visit there was a baseball game going on across the street. We toured the campus via car for a couple hours and then we walked the downtown. The downtown area was a quaint and made for a cute college town. We had a very nice dinner at the 5th Tavern Restaurant after copping a Penn State shirt for Brad at one of the local merch stores. The restaurant had pictures of Penn State athletes dating back 100 years.

We did additional Car touring with driveby's the Nittany Lion Inn, dormitories, subject buildings, Greek life frat and sorority houses. It didn't have the personality Brad had anticipated and Kathy didn't give a hoot. Kathy will say: "this overnight was all for you honey".

We're two-days away from home sweet home. Next to last stop... Stroudsburg, Pa.

On our ride from Penn State we had to pass Brad's alma mater Bloomsburg University. Is it still an alma mater when you leave after two years? And yes, he did leave on his own recognizance. No one could possibly have kept up that pace of fun for two more years!

We picked this two and a half hour drive so we could visit one of Brad's best friends from his 4th floor Elwell days at the Bloom. A forty-five year friendship that is more of a brotherhood than a friendship.

Trooper Lou lives in Easton, Pa. which was a twenty minute drive from our campground. We stopped by his and Renee's house, had lunch , and five hours of laughs. Renee got off of work and we had the pleasure of hanging with her the last hour. It was a wonderful visit. We love you Trooper Lou and Renee!

A one hundred and sixty-seven mile ride home should have taken us three hours. It took us five and we didn't care. We were looking forward to being home for two weeks. We've been excited to see our family and friends. That was always the toughest part of our travel. Kathy was worried that when we got home she wouldn't have anything to do. On the contrary, we haven't stopped doing since we've been home.

We started our trip with our odometer reading 9350 miles. When we finally got home, the RV had 29,305 miles. Only forty-five miles short of 20K.

What a long, strange (not really), trip it's been! Thank you so very much for following our "trip around the world". We have appreciated taking you with us on our journey. Thank you for reading down this far and we hope to continue to keep in touch now that we are home. Peace, love and happy trails! Kathy and Brad

Our baby, neatly nestled at home sweet home!