We had a comfortable night at the Gosnolds Hope Park in Hampton, VA.
We drove up I-95. Skirting past Richmond on I-295, and rejoined I-95 for a trip right through Washington, DC. We could have bypassed DC also be decided that we wanted to look at a few of the old buildings. We didn’t stop on this trip since we had spent a week there several years ago. That city hasn’t changed except for a few of the residents.
The smog became unbelievably thick just before reaching Washington, DC and continued that way throughout the day. How can a society live in conditions like this? And why isn’t anyone doing anything about it? Of course, that’s a hard question to ask when we are consuming our share of gasoline and contributing to the air pollution.
Baltimore is a strange town. It has obvious area of urban decay and disadvantaged people. But, the waterfront has gone through a rebuilding that is unbelievable. We were drawn to the waterfront to see the USS Constitution and regretted not allocating the entire day to the waterfront area. My only caution is to research parking in the waterfront area. We paid $14 for 2-hours to park the Roadtrek. Our choices were limited due because its almost 9-foot height just won’t fit inside most parking structures.
We did rush our tour of the Constitution so we could spend a few minutes on a retired Coast Guard cutter that has been converted to a museum. We didn’t have time to tour the submarine, lighthouse, and several other things we would have visited if we had the time. We spent a little time running along the great brick walkways that stretch the length of the revitalized waterfront.
Our next stop and the reason we left the waterfront so early, was to maximize our time at the B&O railroad museum. And that decision was a good one. This museum is one of the best railroad museums we ever had the pleasure to visit. The number and quality of trains rivals and may exceed the Sacramento Railroad Museum. The engines cover a wide range of years and include coal, oil, and diesel-electric models. The sizes range from a reconstructed model of “Tom Thumb” to a few engines that are too large to fit into their roundhouse. We stayed until the museum closed and I think we managed to see everything. This is a place that should be visited by all railroad buffs.
We spent the night at a Flying J on I-95 that is just inside New Jersey. There, we filled the gas tank and topped off our propane before settling in for the night.
