Along the Kancamengus Highway

Conway, NH: Cloudy at first this morning but then cleared somewhat. I got up early and started working on the computer. Having a problem backing stuff up. Worked for a couple of hours and got nowhere. Finally gave up and by now am in a terrible mood. I did, however, get my MSN account back up. When I was on the phone with Tech Support (from India) he told me I should delete the account and then start over. Said I: But if I delete it I have to be on line to get all my e-mails, contacts, etc. back. I can’t get on line, that’s why I’m talking to you. Said he: But you need to do this. Trust me, you’ll get it back. And, of course I couldn’t get it back so I thanked him and hung up. But I was finally able to get it all back. So we headed back to the Kanecamangus Scenic Highway we were on yesterday in the rain and fog. What a beautiful drive right through the middle of the White Mountain National Forest and over the Kanecamangus pass. Beautiful, rugged mountains and right along the Swift River. Oh, and all the people that were in Conway because of the bad weather were now on the river. People everywhere--on the boulders, swimming and playing in the little chutes and falls. That water must have been cold. Hope they froze their little butts off. On the other side of the forest we went through the cute little town of Lincoln, NH. Checked out a campground over there we were thinking of going next but decided not to. It’s on a pretty little pond but the road up there was horrible. Came back over the pass and back to our campground. Mike grilled chicken and I made mashed potatoes and a vegetable. Had a fire after dinner. Played cards for a while. Tomorrow it’s supposed to rain. Hopefully they’re wrong. I am not going to touch the computer tomorrow. I’m afraid I may do something I’ll regret one of these days to that stupid thing.

Conway, NH: A few clouds rolled in this morning and then it started raining, then pouring, so after putzing around here this morning we headed out to Conway to check out the movie times and buy a couple of “chairs in a bag”. The traffic into Conway was horrendous. What in the world is going on we thought? First we thought we’d check the movie times. After getting turned around a couple of times we finally found the theatre in the local “mall” which consisted of a J. C. Penny, a Chinese restaurant, and the cinema. Mike pulled up front and I dashed in through a downpour threading my way through a bunch of kids and then realized there was nothing showing for anyone over 10 years of age. Dashed back to the truck and we headed to the L. L. Bean store. More horrible traffic. Finally get there and parked and slogged through a flooded parking lot into the store which was packed with people. By now we’re hating this town and everyone in it. Left there and headed to the Walmart which was relatively quiet. Got our chairs and decided to find a nice, quiet restaurant and have several drinks and a late lunch. Come to find out, Conway has every outlet known to man. People come from all over to shop here in this tiny town. After lunch (and several drinks) we decided to take a look at the next campground we’re planning to stay after we leave here. It’s on a scenic highway (two-lane road actually) which runs through the middle of the White Mountain National Forest along the Swift River. A beautiful drive. The Swift River is a beautiful boulder-strewn river which is not navigable—except by canoe or kayak in high water only. A couple of gorges and water falls. The first campground you come to is the “Covered Bridge” campground which we can’t get into because you have to cross the river on a historic covered bridge and we’re too high to clear. We’re planning on staying at the Jigger Johnson campground which we checked out and is very nice. Again, no hook-ups. Back to the camper and some Excedrin to quell this headache. Hangover?

I could not sleep last night for some reason. Finally at about 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. I took some Tylenol PM—which was a big mistake. Still couldn’t sleep and woke up feeling drugged. So we just hung out all day. Mike wanted to check the solar panels when they were in the sun anyway because he didn’t think they were working properly. But, they’re working fine—just get direct sun only a couple of hours a day. So, we’ll probably have to run the generator a little from time to time. We also keep getting an error code on the refrigerator since it’s been on gas. Mike thinks it’s some air in one of the propane tanks. If it keeps up we’ll have to take it and get it purged and refilled. We’ve never had a problem with the refrigerator, but if we need to replace it I’d rather do it while we still have a warranty. Anyway, that’s about the extent of our day. It was a perfectly beautiful day—sunny and cool in the morning. We actually had a fire this morning. Would have been great hiking weather if I’d have felt better. There are two trails we can take right from the campground. One is a 4 mile loop called the ledge trail. And the other is a much longer one up to the top of one of the mountains. Think we’ll pass on that one.

Carriage House / Stable

View from patio where we ate lunch

Interior of the stable cafe (these are the horse stalls)

View from the garden

Castle in the Clouds

No storms last night. A couple of sprinkles is all. We decided to explore around the area today. Planned on driving around Lake Winnipesaukee which is a huge lake—largest in New Hampshire and fifth largest in the US—according to a local. Saw a sign for Castle in the Clouds and decided to check it out. What a beautiful place! Was built by a guy named Plant who owned a bunch of shoe factories. Completed in 1914, he hired 1000 Italian stone masons out of Boston to do the stone work. He figured one stone mason could lay three stones a day. They were quarried on the property and cut into a five-sided shape—that’s why they could only do three a day. This place is built on top of a mountain. You drive up a winding road past beautiful waterfalls, spectacular vistas and come to the carriage house/stable. This beautiful building has been turned into a café. We had lunch there. Great food at a reasonable price and fantastic views of Lake Winnipesaukee. I had haddock rolled in Ritz cracker crumbs and baked in a lemon butter garlic sauce and a side salad of greens, dried cranberries, walnuts and cheese, and a large wedge of corn bread. Delicious! Mike had a great looking roast beef sandwich. From the carriage house you are taken to the castle by trolley. It’s a self-guided tour and you could wander around at your leisure. After touring the castle we continued our drive around Lake Winnipesaukee. One quaint town after another—and lots of other pristine little lakes. Stopped for ice cream at a place near the campground and then back home. Played cards in the screen room for a while. A beautiful, breezy evening. A perfect day—mid-80s.

Fri, Aug 3

It’s HOT. We’ve been having trouble getting onto the Internet with our air card. Not sure if it is MSN or the air card. Started with MSN this morning. Called tech support and spent about 2 hours on the phone with them (some guy from India). That didn’t work, so called AT&T and finally got some help. He couldn’t figure out why the air card doesn’t want to work. It all seemed to start when I downloaded an update for the aircard—probably because AT&T bought Cingular. He set up some dial-up network to use. It is very slow though. Will have to call him back tomorrow when it’s cooler. It’s now 88 in the camper as I type. This must be a cruel joke since we were both bitching about the cool weather we were having on the Maine coast. Now that we have NO hook-ups it has to get hot. In the truck while we were going out to eat (no more cooking) it was between 98 and 100! It’s supposed to cool down tomorrow, thunder storms tonight—probably severe. Jeeze...

Thu, Aug 2

Beautiful, sunny morning. Decided to have a kick-back day today. Had a fire in the morning. Then sat around reading. Really comfortable outside, but inside the camper it went up to 88. Had to make salads for dinner and was not fun. Found out it went up to 96 degrees today. Put the screen room up over the picnic table and ate dinner out there. At night it does cool down, and we can turn on our exhaust fans in the living area and the bedroom and it sucks the hot air out and brings cool air in. Comfortable sleeping... so far.

Our "facilities"--primitive but clean and good smelling

Our buddy

Our Campsite

Wed, Aug 1

Another beautiful morning. Feels like it will be a warm one. Took the computer over to the rec hall to get on the Internet. I was successful, Mike wasn’t. Back to our site and started closing things up so we could leave. Left there about 11:45 and arrived at our campground—White Ledge NF Campground—at about 2:00 after stopping for lunch. When we pulled in the temperature was about 89. Our campground is really pretty and our solar panels will get full sun. It’s in the White Mountains and they’re visible all around us. The Lakes Region in Maine which we just left is really pretty. We passed one pretty lake after another on the drive over here. Our current campsite is great and we have a couple of chipmunks which I’ve been feeding peanuts. They are so cute. After we put the peanuts away, one of them climbed into my lap looking for them. Love it!