A Boston Diversion ... of Sorts

No weekend getaway this past weekend. Well, we got away, but not for R&R. When your sister is moving and asks for help, there’s only one thing to do! This weekend we headed north to Boston to help Lin move. We had planned to leave at 0300 on Sunday morning in order to get there and return the one-way rental car on the other end by 4pm later that afternoon. Gone are the days when a 10-11 hour drive would be taken with a grain of salt. Now we need to stop to eat, pee or stretch every couple hours or so. It makes this 575 trip seem quite long... really long, in fact.

This was not a surprise move on Lin’s part. We had several month’s notice, but when the time finally arrived to leave Cups and head north for a couple of weeks, we were, of course, running around like the proverbial chicken with its head cut off. David had been multi-tasking all week, flitting between one project and another and it was time to get everything finished up and the boat back to some semblance of order before departing. We worked from early morning to late night Friday knowing we’d still have lots to complete on Saturday before leaving. Buttoning up Cups to leave for a couple weeks always seems a monumental chore despite how many times we’ve done it before. We were up by 4am on Saturday and when 11 am rolled around, we were pretty much done. Really? Now what? We had breakfast, packed, took a walk and then a nap.

The Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel is pretty impressive.

Some marina friends gave us a lift to the Budget rental office, we picked up the car, packed it up and we were off by 5pm. Why wait around till Sunday morning? We were across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel by 6pm and on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.

We had accrued a free hotel room credit and decided to made good use of it in Pocomoke City, Maryland, knocking a couple of hours off Sunday’s drive and affording us a leisurely dinner and reasonable night’s sleep. Up and out of the hotel room by 0400,(darn, missed that wonderful free continental breakfast!) our main concern was finding hot coffee. Once that was accomplished, it was an uneventful ride with a few sleepy moments that lots of coffee, snacks and some pit stops were able to overcome.

The Delaware Memorial Bridge "by the dawn's early light"

We crossed the Delaware Memorial Bridge “by the dawn’s early light” and were dumped quite unceremoniously onto the New Jersey Turnpike not long after.

There’s always a bit of a thrill when the Manhattan skyline comes into view through the melange of fuel tanks and electrical lines that clutter the Jersey side of the river. Then there’s the subsequent angst of driving over the George Washington Bridge and through Manhattan. But on a Sunday morning, it was a piece of cake with only moderately crazy traffic and drivers on the road.

We arrived at Lin’s around 2pm. She was excited to see us and we were excited to see her. This is her new adventure and she’s planned well. After duly returning the car, we buzzed over to the new house, a funky older house built in 1927 with lots of character and unique features. It suits her well and we agree she’ll be happy here.

Lin is the ultimate list-girl… what a surprise. We’ve got our work cut out for us over the next couple of weeks. The Captain has volunteered to handle several issues which need addressing in the old house before the sale. Then, there’s packing, the actual move, getting resettling and a huge estate sale planned for the following weekend.

It’ll all get done and turn out fine. It’s the getting there that’s the hard part.