By Shelby
This was a very relaxing and quiet week for us. We are back in our home state of New York for my sister’s wedding. It is about the halfway point of the trip for us. We’re taking some time off from all the big adventures to relax, reset, and visit family. Unfortunately, the weather is getting colder so we won’t be staying too long before heading directly south down the east coast.
After working at a library in Binghampton on Monday we drove a few hours north to an Airbnb in Norwich, a small town in central New York. Since the nights were possibly below freezing for a couple of days we figured an Airbnb might be a good idea.
The place we got was a nice single apartment on Main street with a lot of charming decorations. It had a record player and several albums that we listened to while working Tuesday and Wednesday. It was very nice to just rest and stay in a single place for a few days.
We also utilized the Airbnb’s full kitchen to make some home-cooked meals using the oven. We made baked Tuscan chicken and pasta. It was pretty good. And it was so refreshing to have a full sink for doing dishes and cleanup. We also used the kitchen’s toaster to make bagels with cream cheese, one of our favorites that we can’t do in our car.
On Thursday we left the Airbnb and drove to several NY state parks. Since we are back in NY a little early we decided to do some preemptive searching for a place to hold our wedding next year. We want someplace relatively inexpensive with some scenic nature. Ideally someplace in central NY which splits the distance between our families. We figured state parks with a private pavilion area might be good.
We started with Gilbert Lake State Park, which had a nice lake-side lodge. I think in the end this was our top choice but we just aren’t sure if it will be big enough. There is another larger pavilion at the same park if we need something bigger. After that we went to Glimmerglass State Park which we did not like at all. The pavilions were too public. Finally, we went to Delta Lake State Park which had a couple of pavilions that could work.
We had planned on doing more at each park, maybe a hike or relaxing at the beach, but it was very cold and windy on Thursday so we just quickly checked them all out. We had designated the whole weekend to visiting these parks but ended up doing them all in one day. We stayed at Planet Fitness in Utica that night and decided we would just relax Friday and maybe do a hike on Saturday when the weather looked better.
We went to a library on Friday and ended up playing some board games. It was fun to just do whatever and not have to worry about planning a big day. We also did some more wedding research and started looking for things to do while traveling south on the east coast. Unfortunately, that night I started to feel cold coming on.
Saturday I woke up feeling very sick so instead of doing a hike we just went to a local park and spent the whole day resting. Spencer played video games while I relaxed and watched movies. Sunday I was feeling better but still not great. We did our usual routine of laundry and website work. Overall it was definitely a quiet week for us. Next week will probably be similar. We plan on working in Utica and then checking out a few more wedding locations before heading to Rochester.
Fun Facts from Week 26:
- The ‘V’ is worth 5 points in the mobile app Words with Friends, but only 4 points in the board game Scrabble.
- Utica used to be known as the radio capital of the world.
