Tuesday - May 12, 2026 Paducah, Kentucky
We left home by 8:00 am on our way to Paducah, Kentucky to spend the night. We ate chicken salad in the car for lunch then stopped at the Jolly Cone Drive In in Van Buren, Missouri for a small twist ice cream cone. It was a good place for a break in the driving and good ice cream. We arrived at the Drury Inn and Suites by 4:15 pm and had time to rest from the eight hour drive before dinner. We went down for drinks then dinner at 5:30 pm. They served grilled chicken fajitas for dinner and had a grill in the kitchen area so the meat was actually grilled, not microwaved. We enjoy staying at Drury Inns when we are traveling so that we don't have to drive to a restaurant after a long day of traveling.
Wednesday - May 13, 2026 Columbus, Ohio
We got up at 7:30 am, had breakfast and coffee, then got on the road by 8:30 am. The breakfast was okay, but the coffee was horrible. Once again we ate chicken salad for lunch in the car. Traveling was okay until we got to the Cincinnati area where the traffic got extremely heavy. We got to the Drury Inn and Suites Orion Place in Columbus by 5:30 pm. We were there just in time for drinks and dinner. Dinner this evening was pasta and chicken and steamed vegetables. Pretty good. The hotel was very nice and was close to the Columbus Zoo. I used the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium app to buy tickets for the zoo on Thursday and to pay for parking. We were really tired after the nine hours of driving so had an early night.
Thursday - May 14, 2026 Columbus Zoo and Aquarium
We got up at 8:00 am, had breakfast (once again the coffee was awful), then left for the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium by 9:15 am. It was a 30 minute drive from the hotel to the zoo, but wasn't bad because we didn't have to get on any interstate highways. We had to pay for parking again because I wasn't able to prove that I had payed for parking on the app. I must have put my email in wrong because they were supposed to send me an email with a link. Luckily, I had managed to save the image with the entry tickets after I purchased them. When we had parked and walked to the zoo entrance I was able to show the woman working at the entrance that I had payed for parking the night before and we got that money credited to our credit card. However, all this trouble defeated the purpose of paying for parking ahead of time. We visited the North America and Africa exhibits then shared a burger for lunch. After lunch we visited most of the Asia exhibit and the aquarium then called it a day. It had gotten very cold and we were really tired after walking five miles through the other exhibits. We did manage to visit the manatee area and the penguins before leaving. The only area we didn't visit was the Australia Exhibit. We got back to the hotel and had dinner and drinks. Dinner this evening was barbecue sliders, baked beans, and cole slaw. This is one of my favorite meals they serve at Drury Inn. After dinner we called it a day. We were really tired, but it was an extremely fun day.
Friday - May 15, 2026 Williamsport, Pennsylvania
We got up, had breakfast, and were on the road by 8:30 am. Traffic was not bad all day. We stopped at a rest stop in Pennsylvania for lunch where we once again had chicken salad. We got to the Gennetti Hotel in Williamsport, Pennsylvania by 4:30 pm. This is an old historic hotel that is part of the Best Western Chain. It was in downtown Williamsport so we could walk anywhere we wanted to go in town. However, it was very run down. The ceiling in the lobby was falling apart and the headboard on the bed was very loose. I propped the headboard with a cushion from a chair in the room. to keep it from moving. Not the nicest place to stay, but it would do for one night. After getting checked in we walked a block to the Bullfrog Brewery for dinner. This was in an old building in downtown and was obviously a popular local place to hang out.
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| Murals on buildings in Williamsport |
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| Williamsport City Hall |
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| Old building in Williamsport |
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| Bullfrog Brewery |
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| Sunset from our room |
Mike got a dark lager and we shared fish and chips with cole slaw for dinner. It was all really good. After dinner we walded to a liquor store to buy wine then back to our room.
Saturday - May 16, 2026 Mystic, Connecticut
We got up and had breakfast in the hotel. The breakfast was very good and the coffee was excellent. We left the hotel around 9:00 am on our way to Connecticut. The weather was nice. We stopped at a gas station to buy a coke zero and ate chicken salad in the car in the parking lot. Traffic was heavy most of the day, but the drive through the mountains was beautiful. Gas had gotten really expensive. The most we paid was $4.69 a gallon. We got to the Bext Western Inn in Mystic, Connecticut by 4:00 pm. This was our first time to be in Connecticut. After getting settled in and resting we drove across the highway to Gino's Pizza for dinner. If the traffic hadn't been so heavy on the highway we could have walked since it was so close to the hotel. Mike got a beer and a chicken Caesar salad and I got lasagna with a salad and garlic bread. Both meals were too big for us so we took leftovers for Sunday night. Both the salad and lasagna were really good.
Sunday - May 17, 2026 Mystic, Connecticut
I got up at 8:15 am and went down for coffee and breakfast. Mike got up at 9:00 am then he joined me for breakfast. The coffee was good, but the breakfast was only okay, not much to choose from. We left the hotel around 10:00 am and drove one mile to the Denison Pequotsepos Nature Center. The worker was an older lady and we had a pretty long conversation with her. She let us in to the nature center exhibit for free because she liked our accent. The exhibits were not very large, but there was a video about night in nature that was good. After visiting the center we hiked about two miles on one of the many trails at Denison. It was a good trail with a lot of it being on a boardwalk.
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| Part of the boardwalk trail |
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| A part of the trail over a small stream |
After finishing our hike we drove back to the hotel and ate the rest of the chicken salad for lunch. We rested for a while then drove into Mystic to the Mystic Seaport Museum. It cost $30 each and was totally worth it. There were exhibits about the fishing industry and the historic whaling trade inside the entrance to the museum, a replica village of historic Mystic, and two old ships one of which was an old wooden whaling ship. We spent over three hours here and still didn't see everything.
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| Entrance to the Mystic Seaport Museum |
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| The church in the replica village |
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| Old mast heads inside a building in the village |
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| An old house in the village |
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| Inside the church |
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| Outside of the school house |
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| Mike on the old wood whaling ship |
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| Part of the whaling vessel |
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| The whaling vessel |
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| A Lego replica of a whaling vessel |
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| European Colombine in one of the gardens |
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| Fuchsia in a garden |
On our way back to the hotel we stopped at the Twister Ice Cream shop and each got a twist cone. We say outside to eat it and the weather was perfect as it had been all day. We got back to the hotel after 4:00 pm. Later we had our leftovers for dinner then called it a night. This was a very enjoyable day in Connecticut.
Monday - May 18, 2026 Newport, Rhode Island
We got up, had coffee and breakfast, and checked out of the hotel around 10:00 am. We drove to the river park in Mystic, viewed the old drawbridge, and walked around some. After that we drove through the town of Stonington, Connecticut and on to Stonington Point Park and walked around some more.
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| Mystic River and Drawbridge |
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| Close up view of drawbridge |
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| Mystic River |
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| Sign in the park |
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| View of Atlantic at Stonington Point |
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| View of beach at Stonington Point |
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| Ligthouse at Stonington Point |
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| Main Street in Stonington |
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| Typical house in Stonington |
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| Another street in Stonington |
We then drove to Conanicut Island in Rhode Island and stopped by Windmill Hill in Jamestown, Rhode Island for lunch. When we finished with lunch we drove across the Claiborne Pell/Newport Bridge into Newport, Rhode Island. This was a toll bridge that cost $6.00 to cross.
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| Windmill Hill in Jamestown, Rhode Island |
We got to the Holiday Inn Express Newport North - Middletown by 1:30 pm. We got checked in and rested for a while before going out for dinner. We ate at Anthony's Seafood . Mike got a local beer and we both had fried shrimp and fries for dinner. Anthony's was a seafood place that a lot of local's went to and the food was very good. After dinner we went back to the hotel and called it a night. This was a nice day with good weather and a pleasant drive. This was the first time we had visited Rhode Island. We have now visited all states other than Hawaii.
Tuesday - May 19, 2026 Newport, Rhode Island
We had breakfast and left the hotel at 10:00 am. We drove to Easton's Beach to park while we hiked on the Cliff Walks. It cost $27 to park for the day and there was no option for just a few hours. This was awfully expensive, but we had no other option. We walked up the street to the North End access to the Cliff Walks. We hiked one mile to the Forty Steps Access.
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| Easton's Beach |
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| The walk to the Cliffs Walk entrance |
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| Mike at the Cliff Walk entrance |
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| View from the Cliff Walk |
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| Another view |
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| Mary on the Cliff Walk |
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| Nice weather for a hike |
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| View at the Fort Steps section of the Cliff Walk |
While we were there an older man gave us a Cliff Walk brochure and told us that we could take a free trolley from there to the historic downtown area. We decided to do this since we had paid to park our car for the whole day. We had to walk about two blocks to the trolley stop. When the bus came we discovered that we had been given bad information. It was not really a trolley, but a bus and it wasn't free until May 22. The driver was nice and let us on for free and we rode to the transit center where we had to get off for the driver to take a break. We waited for fifteen minutes, got back on the same bus, and rode to our original stop. We did pay to ride, but it was just $2.00. We did get to see a lot of the mansions of Newport so that was interesting. We walked back to our car on the Cliff Walk.
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| View on the hike back to our car |
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| Easton's Beach on way back to car |
We ate lunch in our car then drove to the Breakers at the other end of the Cliff Walk. The Breakers is a huge mansion on the south end of the Cliff Walk that you can pay to tour, but we just drove by and looked at the outside. We stopped at a Wendy's on our way back to the hotel and got a Frosty for dessert. We got back to the hotel at about 4:00 pm and rested for a while before going to Coddington Brewing Company for dinner. Mike had a local beer and we shared a Greek pizza. It was very good and we had enough leftover for Wednesday.
Wednesday - May 20, 2026 Lehighton, Pennsylvania
We had breakfast and left the hotel around 9:30 am. Travel started by going back over the Claiborne Pell/Newport Bridge over Conanicut Island and through a different portion of Rhode Island before getting back into Connecticut.
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| Claiborne Pell/Newport Bridge |
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| Church in Kingstown, Rhode Island |
Traffic was pretty heavy at times and it rained for the last 1 1/2 hours of the drive. We arrived at the Country Inn and Suites in Lehighton, Pennsylvania around 4:30 pm. The drive through Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, and the Poconos of Pennsylvania was really pretty. We ate leftover pizza for dinner then called it a night.
Thursday - May 21, 2026 Lehighton, Rhode Island
It rained most of the day. We did go for a drive to Lehigh Gorge State Park, but were unable to hike because of the rain. We went to a grocery store in Jim Thorpe to get supplies then went back to the hotel until time for dinner. We ate at the only restaurant close to our hotel and thankfully it was good. It was P. J. Whelihan's Pub and Restaurant. Mike had a local beer, chicken wings, and sweet potato fries and I had a Cobb salad. It was all very good and Mike had leftover wings for lunch on Friday.
Friday May 22, 2026 through Wednesday May 27, 2026 Scott's House
We got up and left the hotel fairly early so we could get to the DC area before the big rush of traffic going into and out of DC for the Memorial Day holiday. We got to Scott's house around noon. It rained almost every day that we visited there, but we still had a good visit. I took the kids to see the movie 'Michael' at the theater and Mike, Scott, and Oscar went fishing one day. We played a different board game every night which was a lot of fun and the kids and I played 'Mammycraft' almost every day.
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| Aslynn, Elli, Hunter, and Oscar before the movie |
Thursday - May 28, 2026 Charleston, West Virginia
We left the houae around 9:30 am after the major rush hour traffic was over. On our way out of town, Google took us on a road that was closed for construction so we had to turn around costing us about 20 minutes. There were a lot of other cars turning around because the signage for the road closure was not good. Other than that the drive was good and went through some pretty country. We got to the Holiday Inn Express in Charleston around 4:00 pm. We were able to use points to pay for our room there. We ate at an Outback Restaurant in the mall that was pretty good. I got a glass of wine and Mike and I shared an order of coconut shrimp that was pretty good. After dinner we went back to the hotel and called it a night.
Friday - May 29, 2026 Sikeston, Missouri
We ate breakfast and had coffee at the hotel then got on the road. Not much happened and it was a pretty good driving day. We stopped at a Wendy's for lunch. We got to the Drury Inn and Suites in Sikeston, Missouri around 4:30 pm. We got checked in then went down for drinks and dinner then called it a night.
Saturday - May 30, 2026 Home
We got up about 7:30 am, had breakfast, and got on the road by 8:30 am. We drove west on highway 60 until we got to Springfield, went south on highway 65, then at Harrison went west on 412. We got home around 2:30 pm. We had a good trip and were able to check off the last two states in the continental US that we hadn't visited. We also showed ourselves that we could still drive cross country if we just take our time. This was our first road trip since we totaled the RV.
