Baltimore, Maryland

A few days before, my mom had reminded me that a dear family friend, Elaine, now lived in Baltimore with her husband. She is seven years older than I, and was our neighbor at our first house in Rochester. I have great memories of her coming over and doing homework, babysitting, and hanging out. I called her up, and we were able to put something together for the evening of the day we left Philadelphia. During the 100 mile trip from city to city, we made hotel arrangements for that evening.

We arrived in Baltimore late afternoon, and Franz insisted we stop for a car wash before he acknowledge any acquaintance of mine, friend or foe. So, while Franz ran the car through a gas station wash, I pulled out a fresh change of clothes and a hair brush for each of the girls to freshen up and dragged Jackson along on his leash. The stop took a little longer than expected, but Franz felt better and the girls looked better, so I guess it was worth it.

Elaine and Ernie called as we were pulling out of the gas station on our way into downtown. They told us to meet them at the Barnes & Noble on the Inner Harbor. Visiting the Inner Harbor made Baltimore my other top choice of best cities to return to on this trip. It was beautiful.

Not your average Barnes & Noble.

From there, we walked around the Harbor and made our way to a seafood restaurant. The wait for the table wasn't bad, but the wait for the food seemed very long. After awhile it was difficult to converse and watch Jackson, but finally the food came, and his new favorite - french fries (much to my chagrin) kept him happily preoccupied for a time. At their suggestion, Franz and I tried crab cake sandwiches, which were delicious.


Because it was a weekend night, the Harbor was hopping with live music and milling crowds. It was full of energy and very fun. All too soon, it was time to part company. I enjoyed meeting Ernie for the first time, and would have liked to have visited a little longer, but we were all growing very weary after taking in parts of two cities in one day.
We headed for our hotel, which was almost halfway to Washington D.C., where we were meeting friends at the National Zoo early the next morning. Needless to say, we were wiped out and all slept very well.