Vince's 2005 Spring Break
For Spring Break 2005 I left snowy Ithaca to visit Kristina in rainy
Maryland.
Before the rain started, Kristina and I did some exploring. We went
to
Elk Neck State Park in Cecil county. We went to the very end,
where Turkey Point sticks out at the top of the Chesapeake Bay. There
was a tiny overflowing parking lot, and a nice trail with some impressive
cliffs. Also there was a light house:
It looks much the same as the
Concord Point Lighthouse in Havre de Grace.
After this, we decided that while in Cecil County we might as well
visit a covered bridge:
This is the Gilpin's Falls covered bridge. Unfortunately the bridge
has seen better days despite a 1959 renovation. But
nearby we heard the tantalizing sounds of a waterfall. So we went and
explored.
We found
Gilpin's Falls which turns out to be a "National Natural Landmark"
although that just means it is on a list, not that it is any sort of park.
In fact, it is privately owned. It is supposedly the best example of
"Paleozoic metavolcanic pillow basalt in the Mid-Atlantic states".
It was extremely pretty, and the rocks were fun to walk about on.
Though as always, no sight is too beautiful that mankind can't put
an ugly green pipe right nearby.
The rest of the week it rained. I was (in theory) busy doing schoolwork
while Kristina was at work. I did get to my family's and came tantalizingly
close to beating Kevin at
Risk 2210. Also, Kristina
gave me a German copy of the game
Fluxx
which led to much amusement as I tried to translate the rules as we played.
Also, much cooking was done in preparation for Easter. Here is a picture
of the famous "Weaver Coconut Easter Cake" that Kevin and I made, along
with Italian Easter bread that Kristina and I made. The bread actually
has easter eggs baked into it.
Kristina's family came down for the holiday, and we went into Washington
DC. We visited some places I had never been to before, mainly presidential
monuments and/or islands.
Here is the LBJ megalith on LBJ island.
Here is Teddy Roosevelt looking scary on Teddy Roosevelt island.
Here is a status of FDR at his memorial. I had not been here before;
it had a huge amount of waterfalls. Also there was an imposing
statue of Eleanor Roosevelt that women were standing in line to get
their picture taken with.
Here is Lincoln at his memorial. They have the tiniest gift shop in the
world there, I had to elbow people out of the way to get to the National
Parks passport stamping booth for Kristina and her sisters.
And here is Thomas Jefferson. As unlikely as it sounds, I had never
been to the Jefferson Memorial before.
They have some nice quotes of his on the walls; I think more people should
go there and read them.
We went on to the World War II
Memorial which was nice, although no one could figure out
the scheme for the ordering of the States on the pillars. Then we went to the
Old Post Office Tower
and went to the top for a nice view of DC. After that we went
to the Natural History Museum
to look at the rocks. Unfortunately the
fire alarm went off and we had to evacuate. Luckily it was not a real
fire, as we all probably would have died; it took forever to get out of the
building and the guards had no clue how to efficiently send us to the
right exit. Next we went to the new
National Museum of the American Indian.
Happily it did not rain all day. It was the beginning of the
Cherry Blossom Festival even though the blossoms were not out yet.
There was also some sort of Taiwan protest going on in front of the
Capitol building. Soon it was time to stop being a tourist and to head
home.
And then, all too quickly, break was over and now I am back at school.
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