10/50: Maryland
In a matter of a couple of months, we went from clueless to almost experts regarding the set-up and tear-down of the Airstream.
Although we had a great training session with our friends at Woodland Travel Center before we left, in which I frantically recorded the essential part of trailer life, hooking up, we learned the most about living and learning on the road.
After state after state of practice by now, we were able to get our average set-up time within 15-30 minutes, depending on if it’s a partial or complete set-up and how many attempts it takes us to back the trailer up into the parking space just right. Our greater efficiency was due to an unwritten set of responsibilities we eventually developed:
Tyler’s duties are unhooking the truck and trailer, uninstalling the hitch, and setting up the “poop tube,” while Kendra’s roles include leveling and stabilizing the trailer, hooking up the water and electricity, and pulling out the awnings. Noel, on the other hand, her “responsibilities” are looking cute and sleeping — the two things she does best.
We actually got to spend quite a bit of time in Maryland and the DMV area — three weeks to be exact. Since DC and Virginia are so close, we didn’t have to move the trailer for those projects but instead just drove “Queen Bee” to the project locations. We enjoy the quietness of Cherry Hill Park as Fall was fully settled-in. Even better, the park had a huge laundry facility and, a special treat for us, cable TV. Tyler was especially thrilled because that meant he could actually be able to watch football on the weekend!
Since it was later in the RV season and there weren’t many other campers or dogs, we took the opportunity to continue to try and “train” Noel to walk on a leash. We may have looked like crazy cat people walking around with her, but that’s a small price to pay to live your best life!
We spent some time in Baltimore, where we walked along the water of the Chesapeake Bay, imagining a time not that long ago when Baltimore’s Inner Harbor was still a part of our young developing nation thanks in part to a growing population of immigrants alongside an ever-increasing list of industries. We learned that long before Europeans began venturing to this “new land,” it was home to the Piscataway tribe dating for the past 12,000 years.
Nowadays, the Harbor is lined with tourist attractions, including the Maryland Science Center and National Aquarium. At the same time, shipbuilding docks and steelyards gave way to corporate headquarters, hotels, restaurants, shopping, and more.
Among the museums and historical sites, we came across the USS Constellation, the Navy’s last sail-only ship that traveled all over the world and was also the Africa Squadron flagship, operating as part of the African Slave Patrol in efforts to end the Atlantic slave trade during the time of the Civil War.
While in Baltimore, we also visited our friend, fellow Michigander, and previous [HAS HEART] Veteran participant, Eric Lund, at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. Having recently undergone a double arm transplant, Eric was on week two of recovery and finally able to receive visitors. We had a great time catching up with him and his mom Laura. At the time, only one or two other double arm transplants had been accomplished, and we couldn’t have been happier for Eric and his family to experience this incredible blessing and opportunity.
You can read our previous blog post about Eric and follow his progress on his Facebook page, which is purposefully updated to allow all those we served with him, cared for, prayed for, supported, and helped him and his family out through this life-changing journey ever since his “Alive Day” in 2012.
Our Maryland project was a special one. So let’s tease it with a guided tour through the Naval Academy by an honored alum, along with a walk around beautiful downtown Annapolis along the old brick roads, past the statue of Roots author Alex Haley that observes where his ancestors arrived from Africa as an enslaved person hundreds of years ago, and toward the grand entrance of the Naval Academy located just along the edge of the Annapolis harbor.
What felt like a walk through history, the quick tour reminded us that we are not observers but participants in events that seem to occur all around us.
A couple of state projects later, we technically ended back in Maryland following the Virginia and Delaware state projects, but this time it was along the Atlantic ocean. We’ll wait to share that part of our journey for the Delaware post because let’s be honest, there wasn’t much else in Delaware for us to do.
