Road Food

WhileI wish I could say that I really got off the beaten track as far as meals for my drive south, the fact is I did no such thing. My first stop on the way to Scottsville, Virginia was at a rest stop in western PA. There I tried the bacon cheeseburger from Burger King. It was not so magical or royal.

Suminski Innski in Tivoli

During the first years of my post-college existence, I remained in the Hudson Valley. I worked a short while as an assistant manager/bartender at a failing inn before ultimately leaving that job in favor of working at a nearby sheep farm. This was one of my more inspired decisions, even if it didn't actually allow me to make ends meet. I worked at the farm/yarn shop for about two years and really loved the combination of rather mindless/zen body work that processing wool entails and the more action-packed activities, like herding loose sheep, dealing with newly-born lambs, mending fences, and either putting up or taking down my boss' storm windows. I haven't been back to the farm in a while and recently contacted my former boss, M., to see what the schedule was for shearing and lambing. She replied, and it turned out that shearing was the following weekend. I decided I wanted to go up and at least take some photographs and lend a bit of a helping hand. The only slight obstacle was where to stay. The Red Hook/Tivoli area is entirely free of chain establishments and some of the cheaper motels are a bit too seedy/long-term residency for me. I reached out to L. to ask her if she had any ideas and she came back with the Suminski Innski. And what a good call that was. I contacted Tim, the owner, who turned out to be a former bartender of mine during the halcyon days of my last year or so of college (I was, to put it mildly, a frequent patron). The Inn(ski) is located at the bottom of a long hill off the main road of Tivoli. Other than a gravel road, the only thing between it and the Hudson is a set of still-active railroad tracks.
I had requested one of the cheaper rooms with a view of the river and a bathroom shared with four other rooms...but upon my arrival I was bumped up to the one room with a private bath, as I was the only person staying that night. This was a boon for me, as the room was beautifully laid out and eclectically decorated and its bed extremely comfortable. And while I was totally fine with sharing a bathroom with strangers, it was also nice to have the privacy of taking a shower without worrying that someone was desperately in need of relieving themselves and held back solely by my penchant for long showers.
I arrived around 2 or 3 on Friday and spent the majority of my afternoon sitting on this porch reading Pride and Prejudice on my Kindle Fire. I also, from time to time, would venture to the river and back to the room. The weather even three hours north was still quite lovely, mid-60s and sunny. Perfect, really.
Tim has done a whole heck of a lot of renovation to the building. I'd never been down to it in its former state, but from the photos and the stories it's clear that the establishment as I saw it was a marked improvement to what it had been like ten years prior. Seriously, it was gorgeous and I didn't take nearly enough photographs of the interior parlors and dining areas, with their great variety of art on the walls.
A venture to the tracks. I loved the trains going by. Perhaps for some this would have been a distraction or too much of an interruption from the otherwise extremely quiet and peaceful setting. But for me, having grown up with tracks just about the same distance from my own front porch, it really just made me feel right at home. As I sat two young men (I assume Bard students) drove up to the tracks and got out. One had a camera, the other a trumpet. And for about 40 minutes I had the pleasure of reading on a sunny porch with a well played trumpet and the occasional rumble of a train as my soundtrack.
The view from one of the room's windows. When you live in these parts, as I did for six years, you almost become accustomed to the sheer beauty of the place. From rolling farms and well maintained old houses to the river itself and the Catskill mountains looming ever-present across that expanse of water.
Sunset.
Train.
Another window caught in mirror as sun sets photo.
De-lightful.

This was a great home base for my Friday and Saturday. I'll share a few more photos once I get through with some meals and other activities.

Drive on Up and North

So, what I have decided will be a mystery until the tail end of this post is where M. and I decided to go instead of France. It was in a northern direction, so northerly we did go. At about the half way mark M. drove, which allowed me to take a few photographs without risking anyone's life.
We drove through this small town and should have stopped whatever 'Railroads on Parade' was ... but we didn't because I am a merciless time taskmaster and wanted to make sure we arrived at our destination in plenty of time for ... well it ended up being in plenty of time for rush hour but shhh.
So. Our destination was Canada. And here is what it looks like when you are driving up to go across. I didn't take any more photographs because we didn't want them to think we were casing the joint, especially because we were not casing the joint. The French Canadian who allowed us to cross asked us if we had switch blades. I would never even think of that as being a question one would have to ask of two upper class white women, but there you go. Upper class comparatively to, I don't know what I'm talking about.
The signs in the province of Quebec are in French.
M. purchased a set of CDs to help us remember how to speak French, which we put in as soon as we crossed the border. She and I were in at least one French class together in high school, so it was like a mini-reunion of sorts. Not really. We were reminded of how to say it is a little truck, it is a big truck, it is a little car, it is a big car, and a few other phrases that really helped us out throughout our visit to ... Montreal! In this photograph I think M. is exclaiming something along the lines of 'sacre bleu, il est un grand camion!' But maybe not. We definitely didn't learn 'sacre bleu'.
The driving speed wasn't bad for the majority of our way to Montreal, but once we hit its true limits the fun was 'fin.'

Here's one thing we learned throughout the tedious driving that then followed: French Canadian drivers are assholes and don't know how to make right or left turns. They also are rude and unsafe and have no respect for simply waiting your turn to merge. So in that way they're very much like the French. Note: I haven't actually had the experience of French people being overly mean, but it's a stereotype that works in this context, so I'm going with it.
We crossed this bridge. It took a very long time to cross this bridge.
Next up you will see what we ate. I realized just now that I didn't take a single photograph of our hotel. It wasn't so spectacular that it truly deserved a photograph, neither was it so awful that it shouldn't have at least one photographic proof moment.