It’s Labor Day and while we certainly don’t put our MTA travelers to any “real” work during our trips, we are happy to celebrate this day. But in this photo you’ll see our motor coach chief mechanic, Carson, giving his first assessment of what’s wrong with our coach when it broke down during last summer’s Virginia trip. Carson, and others, soon had us up and running with a replacement bus and we didn’t miss a thing.
 
Carson is coming back next summer on our New England adventure and he’ll be happy to know we’ve made arrangements for a coach for that trip. In fact, we were so spoiled with the chauffeur-driven coach that we’ve made arrangements for a motor for both of our trips in 2019.
 
CLICK this link to check out to learn more about our 2019 adventures. 

Two years and a couple of months ago we were enjoying a sunny day on top of Mt. Washington in New Hampshire. The observatory there has recorded some of the worst weather in North America. Well, not on the day we ventured up...by cog railway. We're thinking about making a return to New England (and possibly include a bit of Canada as well) for a future trip. 
But until then, check out this video of a scientist braving 109 mile-per-hour winds on top of Mt. Washington filmed just a couple of weeks ago. Thanks to good friend and MTA staff member Doug Williams for sharing this with us. Doug was with us on that trip in 2014 and will be back with us this summer for our West Virginia-Tennessee adventure.

Check out the video.

It’s amazing how quickly two weeks can pass. It’s also amazing how much we can do in that time. I’m sure if you ask the boys today what their favorite activity was, they’ll say Canobie Lake Amusement Park and that’s understandable. That was our last activity and it will certainly be a good memory.

I’m also hoping the boys will remember some of the other highlights of their two weeks on the road in New England. Taking a look at the trip photos will surely bring back lots of favorite activities and bunches of lasting memories.

I’m thinking of kayaking, bicycling, and hiking in Acadia National Park, sailing on the 102 year old schooner in Portland, hiking to the waterfalls in the White Mountains National Forest in New Hampshire, taking the cog railway up to Mt. Washington, the nature cruise around Frenchmen’s Bay and the Bar Harbor areas. The list continues with tours of the Maine Maritime Museum, the Transportation Museum, Ben & Jerry’s, Cold Hollow Cider Mill, and Orvis Rod Factory.  And we can’t forget mini-golf, Bromley Thrill Zone Park, candlepins bowling, and of course…there’s Canobie Lake. We visited some cool stores like LL Bean and the Orvis store and well as the Vermont Country Store – and who could forget Perry’s Tropical Nuthouse in Belfast, Maine?

We also ate well, rarely visiting a restaurant (even a chain) twice.

The boys were good. Not always angels. We all have our good and bad moments…but this group continued what the boys on the Virginia trip did and that was get lots of compliments. On this trip we had hotel staff at two properties say that we were the best group they’ve ever had or had this season or had in the past ten years, etc. We even got an email complimenting our behavior from one museum and a notice on Trip Advisor about the boys’ good behavior.

Thanks for following our journey. We’ll be back for another. Hopefully some of these same boys and leaders will be joining me.

It's late as I type this Friday entry. We'll be leaving in just a few hours for the airport so will post a final blog about the New England trip tomorrow.

For now you should know we spent the day at Canobie Lake Park in Salem, New Hampshire. It's a very old amusement park founded in 1902. Canobie Lake retains a lot of its old-timey flavor but has been updated to offer plenty of thrills for kids of all ages. The boys had a blast. I'm sure they'll remember this as one of the highlights of the trip, but I also hope they'll remember some of all the other wonderful things we experienced. It was an amazing two weeks.

It's an early wake-up call for us tomorrow.

Thanks for following our adventures. Click to see some photos from our adventures.

Our Thursday adventures started with a stop at the Vermont Country Store near Rockingham, VT. I imagine many of you have seen the store's catalog and have a sense of what's inside. You might compare this to "our" Mast General Store. The boys enjoyed looking around at all of the stuff...but what they loved most was the candy counters. It didn't take long before boys discovered that there was some candy that was actually priced at just one cent a piece. In hindsight I think we should have limited their purchases because some boys bought a bag full of some of the penny stuff. Actually, I imagine those candies had to be money losers for the store - but it did what it was supposed to do...make boys extremely happy! Some boys did buy other souvenirs and we all enjoyed relaxing on the store's porch or out in the yard on gliding swings or rockers. This was a worthwhile and relaxing stop.

After about an hour at the store, we headed toward our destination for the last two nights of our trip - Manchester, New Hampshire. We knew we wanted to go candlepin bowling so we had the location loaded in our GPS and headed for that. We found the place, parked, and then walked to lunch nearby.

We were in the bowling place around 2 and the owner seemed happy to have some completely "foreign" customers. He graciously gathered the group together and explained how the game works and how to score the game and how to use the overhead scoring system.

Now on this trip you can always find someone or several someones who have at least experienced an activity such as kayaking. But not a soul (except me) had ever even heard of candlepins bowling. You will need to get your son to explain how it works but briefly you use a ball about the size of a large grapefruit. It has no holes in it. You get three rolls per frame and you throw two frames at a time. The pins are a different shape as well, and once a pin falls it stays on the lane while you throw the other two balls. After three balls, you reset the lane. Boys found out it's much harder to get high scores in candlepins, but using the bumpers did help some. We found out that no one has ever scored a perfect game in candlepin bowling.

We did have a friendly little competition in the second round and a few guys received a small cash prize. Candlepins is pretty much a New England sport and something these boys will remember. Of course I hope they'll remember a lot of things they did on this adventure.

We made it to the motel a bit before 5 and a bit after 5 we were heading to dinner and then onto our evening activity - a baseball game between the New Hampshire Fishercats (a Toronto Blue Jays affiliate) and the Portland River Dogs (a Boston Red Sox affiliate). There was several thousand people at this Double A game and the boys had fun in the ballpark. We even had a welcome to MindStretch Travel Adventures on the electronic scoreboard. We stayed until the end because it was "fireworks night." 

Another great day. Click to see some photos from our adventure.

We were privileged to have a private tour this morning of the Orvis Rod Factory in Manchester Center, VT. That’s how we started our day. When we drove into town yesterday we didn’t even know this was the home of Orvis. We found out about the tour while visiting their flagship store and decided to take advantage of the opportunity. We were split into two groups for the nearly hour-long tour and each group learned about the process of making fly fishing rods. Much of the work at Orvis is done by hand and we were able to observe each step along the way. This was no usual factory tour where you peer down on workers through windows, but a walk-on-the-floor and stop production kind of tour. Our guides (both managers at the factory) would have workers stop and explain what they were doing. I can now see why a fly rod can cost as much as they do, sometimes more than a thousand bucks each.

After Orvis we let the boys walk around Manchester Center for ninety minutes to check out stores and to have lunch in small groups. They got to pick out their own place to eat which they enjoy doing when given the chance. This is only the third time they’ve had this opportunity, the other two being in Bar Harbor.

Our major activity of the day was spending the afternoon at Bromley, a ski resort turned adventure park during the summer. The boys had wristbands giving them unlimited chances to try out about a dozen rides or activities including a climbing wall, a giant swing, trampoline jump thing, space bikes, miniature golf, water slide, etc. But their biggest thrill came from the alpine slide where they come down the mountain in a small sled on rollers. Boys learned how to control the sleds from a manager when we arrived at the park and were soon giving it a try. We did have a couple of spills, but we still have all our boys.

We had a couple of swim sessions to round out our day along with dinner at the Double Hex Restaurant and some frozen custard at a roadside stand to end the day.

It was the end to another long and fun day and you can just click to see the latest photos.

We started the day with a tour at Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory in Waterbury, Vermont. They did a great job of mixing in humor with facts and we all enjoyed it. We got a small sample of a new flavor of ice cream at the end of the tour and then boys chose their own favorite Ben & Jerry's treat to enjoy outside. We did visit the graveyard of long gone flavors. That was a hoot. This rather realistic-looking cemetery was filled with real tombstones each with an inscription (in verse) detailing the demise of one of the Ben & Jerry's flavors. We got a kick out of that. Check out the photos for some examples.

After our time at the ice cream factory we loaded up for our trip to Manchester Center, Vermont. We stopped at Bromley Mountain Adventure Park where we have a day planned for Wednesday. I had gotten a phone call in the morning from the attraction's office just letting me know that weather might be iffy and perhaps we could explore other visiting options. It wasn't raining at 2 when we arrived so we checked it out. An earlier shower had closed down a couple of their attractions so we decided to come back on Wednesday afternoon. It did give the boys a chance to see some of what they had available.

From here we took a drive through Manchester Center just to see what was there and there was a lot more to see than I was expecting. Lots and lots of shops, many high-end retail establishments. We did eye the flagship store for Orvis which apparently got its start in Vermont. Several boys wanted to visit there so we decided we would come back after checking into our motel.

Our motel is a delightful find. It's a mom and pop operation, the third of those on this trip. They've all been nice but this one is especially nice. It has a different feel to it. It's owned by a couple from Europe (Maria & Richard) and they take great pride in maintaining their property. The grounds are landscaped with all kinds of flowers and the property borders a nice creek. I doubt the boys were all that impressed as long as the place has a pool and a hot tub,..and the Toll Road Inn has both.

After checking in and swim time, we loaded up for a short trip to Orvis and then back to the motel for the evening. We walked across the road to Bob's Diner for dinner. It's an "authentic" 50s diner and we enjoyed our meal complete with juke boxes at most of the tables.

Click to see the most recent photos from our trip.

There really aren't any quiet days on a MindStretch Travel "adventure," but today was about as quiet as they come. We didn't have tons of stuff planned but still managed to fill the day with "stuff." This was a travel day as we moved from Gorham, New Hampshire to Waterbury, Vermont. The drive was about 2 1/2 hours but that times always spreads out as we take breaks here and there.

There weren't a lot of places to eat lunch along the way so we had a very late lunch at a great pizza place in Waterbury, our destination. I'm sure most of us had more than our share. We waddled from lunch a couple of miles to the Cold Hollow Cider Mill where Paul, the owner, came out to talk with the boys about his company and then took us into the process room to see how cider was made. They had finished pressing for today, but free samples of great-tasting cider was still in ample supply. They also make some really special apple donuts so we all had one of those before packing up for out hotel.

After checking in several boys went swimming and then at 6 we went into downtown Waterbury for dinner. We decided it was time for most boys to eat "healthy" and we encouraged salads and sandwiches. After the heavy pizza just about three hours earlier I think they were ready for something a little lighter.

We drove around Waterbury to check it out and didn't find much of interest to boys so we returned to the hotel for a very noisy 30-minutes swim session and some time in the arcade.

And that's our daily report.

Click to see recent photos from our trip.

There were several highlights of the day, but hiking in the White Mountains of New Hampshire was certainly the biggest. We hiked about four miles today getting nice views of two waterfalls. The hike was pleasingly flat which made for an easy walk in the woods. We had the trails pretty much to ourselves which was an added bonus. As we were nearing the end we kept coming up on this spiderweb of plastic piping in the trees. It was a mystery. It wrapped around trees and was strung through the trees heading downhill. We finally solved this mystery when a hiker we passed explained that these were the taps for the maple sap used to make make syrup. It all made sense and we later saw the collection house where it all comes together.

After our hike and lunch, boys explored a little flea market going on in the Gorham Park in downtown Gorham. A lot of boys also played on the playground in the park before we headed back to the motel in time to watch the World Cup final match. 

Boys were offered a choice after lunch. They could either watch the World Cup finals in their rooms or choose to go on a geocaching expedition. Three boys (Ras, Hayden, and Austin) wanted to go geocaching so James Mills and I took off at about the time the soccer match was starting for a two-state geocaching expedition. We never had time to find any geocaches in Maine and since we're just ten miles from the border here in New Hampshire it made sense to see if there were any near the state line. And of course, geocaches are everywhere. In the end we found three in Maine and three in New Hampshire. We had a fun time searching and dodging a few raindrops - the first rain of the trip. 

We had a wonderful dinner in town (Gorham) and ended another wonderful day with an evening swim for those who wanted to enjoy the pool. Most boys did.

Click to check our our most recent photos.

We started the day with a rather grueling and demanding activity - laundry! It was a trip to a nearby laundromat with soap and quarters in hand for what might have been a first for many boys - doing their own laundry. They were a patient group, helped along by their electronics and the fact that a flea market store was right next door. We were done in less than two hours and returned to the hotel for a few minutes to put their clean clothes away.

Now I should point out that moms might have noticed in photos (especially of their sons) that it appears he has been wearing the same clothes for several days in a row. The explanation for this, according to the boys, is that they have numerous outfits exactly the same. Who can doubt that logic?

The highlight of our day was our ride up and back Mt. Washington on the cog railway. It was to experience this first of a kind engineering marvel. At one point the train was climbing a 37 degree incline. (Average incline is 25 degrees or so.) This is only possible because of the cog system in which a cog engages the huge chain beneath the engine to move the train up and back. Boys enjoyed standing in the aisles (which is allowed) as the train slowly moved up and down these inclines to see what it felt like. It was a hoot to watch. 

Mt. Washington is nearly 6,300 feet in elevation and has some of the nastiest winter weather in North America. We had a beautiful day on top where we stayed a little over an hour before boarding our return train. The temperature on top of Mt. Washington during our visit was around 54 degrees with brisk winds. It felt great. Boys had time to explore, take photos, and even visit the "Extreme Weather Museum" which is housed on top.

Finished the day with a great dinner at a restaurant within walking distance to the hotel and several boys went for a full-moon swim before bed.

Another great day and you should click to check out some of the most recent photos.