I Love To Ride A Ferry

Wednesday, 10th April 2013

Map: Rehoboth Beach, Delaware to Bordertown, New Jersey via the Cape May Ferry---126 miles

When days promise to be warm and travel distances are unusually reasonable, my husband and I like to take a walk in the morning.  This day he donned his best summer frock and brought along his chain of paper doll men to remind himself of past triumphs before hitting the boardwalk to duly note the sun rising over the Atlantic.

The wind was still blowing off shore, making a walk through the neighborhoods more interesting.  Fragrant Chinese magnolias were in full bloom, and giant fish leaped out of the busy surface of Lake Greer for their breakfast.  Feral cats wandered around, looking for their own breakfasts---one canned buffet being conveniently placed on top of a car hood.

Back at the Royal Rose Bed & Breakfast, we had quiche on

Chinese magnolia.  Rehoboth Beach, Delaware.

the sun porch and then I finished a blog entry at the same table, since there was no desk in our room.  I had started the entry during the wee hours, sitting on the floor and placing my laptop on top of our thermoelectric cooler.  The other guests at the inn made their appearance---a middle aged straight couple from the DC area.  We had parked next to their Prius V, so there was much discussion about that, and then he settled into his Washington Post crossword puzzle.

"Depression era shantytown," he read to his wife.  One could imagine this was their usual morning conversation.  "Hoover...."

"Hooverville," I piped, although surely she would have said so only a second or two later.

"Ah, another crossword puzzle player," he said.

"Nope," I replied.  "Just know my history."

Greer Lake.  Rehoboth Beach, Delaware.

I finished writing just as it was becoming uncomfortably hot on the sun porch.  My husband had packed Patsy, so it was time to hit the road to Lewes (pronounced Lewis---well, I didn't know...) to meet up with the Cape May Ferry.  Having no interest in driving through Philadelphia and having never seen the south coast of Jersey, I thought it would make a nice excursion.  We arrived at the dock with perfect timing, as we were soon heading out onto the open water, minus $52.  That was considerably more than I expected to pay for the trip, but I failed to note online that $32 was simply for the car---as a car would take itself for a joy ride on a ferry---while there's an additional ten dollar charge for each car passenger.  But hey, it's really a bargain because there's about ten minutes of duty-free shopping in the on board gift shop.

Cross currents on Delware Bay.  Cape May Ferry.

It was a perfect day to ride a ferry, and we stood up front, Titanic style, the wind playing sexily over our bodies.  This was the first time I had been on the practically open sea, and I took the lunging over the cross currents like a sailor---or at least like a drunken one when I tried to walk.

I had noticed a peculiarly coiffed old who looked just like a geriatric version of Guy Fieri of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives---his gray hair heavily processed into silver white spikes over the top of his head.  Apparently he thought my husband's mustache made them one of the same, so he wandered over for a chat.

"So where are you from?" he asked after my husband mentioned some of our travels.

"California."

"Oh!  Hey, Mary...!"  But his woman had wandered off.  "Now where did she go now?  My Mary, she's from California.  Turlock."

Apparently he thought it was terribly important for three Californians to meet, as he went off looking for her---returning with a typically attired dyed middle aged tourist displaying a slightly harassed attitude, as if to say Joe, I've got shopping to do.

"At least your not from Southern California," she sniffed upon hearing of our hometown.  "I don't know why they just split the state into two."

"I was born in Southern California," I said.  "Third generation."

"Oh."

I smiled and shrugged.

"The last time I was in Southern California was to go to Disneyland---in 1961."

"Those were better times to go there," I replied sincerely.

She went on about her hatred of Southern California, unable to see that Turlock has become pretty much like Southern California sprawl in the last twenty years.  This geopolitical game has become so dated and transparent during the rampant growth of central and even parts of northern California in the last thirty years.  It always comes down to water, even if the Bay Area sucks their vast majority of water from the same Delta---a frightfully fragile, highly adulterated ecosystem that could collapse whenever the Hayward Fault decides to whip out one of its perennial 7.0 earthquakes.  Mother Nature will have the last laugh at the expense of all of us.

"I mean, whenever they mention the weather in California, it's always about Los Angeles," she continued, as if the city was an attention whore, climbing out of a sports car sans panties.

Fortunately the captain called out the duty-free shopping, and we were left alone again to muse about travel.  At the mention of New Brunswick, Joe became quiet---displaying an introspective look.

"You ought to go to the Twin Towers site," he said softly.  "I live a forty minute ferry ride across from there.  When I saw what was happening on television, I walked down to the docks to see what I could do to help.  I was given a clipboard and told to get the names and addresses of the people coming off the boats so it could be assessed how best to get them on their way home."

"There was this woman," he continued after a pause.  "It took me a long time just to get her name and address, she was in such shock.  Finally she told me she was from New Brunswick, and I could send her along to get transportation.  Naturally she stuck in my mind, so a few days later I looked on the Internet to see if I could find out more about her.  There was a big article about her experience in the St. Johns, New Brunswick paper---that as she had ran out of the lobby of the World Trade Center part of a body had fallen on her."

Joe stared out over the water, seeing the day all over again.  I could feel a political diatribe beneath it all, but fortunately he kept the moment in a quiet, human prospective.

We were now approaching New Jersey, and the refreshing wind slackened---making me realize I had already been out in the sun way too long.  I moved to a bench in the shade of the captain's quarters and watched Mary return and leave again---my husband reach out and touch Joe's arm.  I knew exactly what had happened then---that the discussion had turned to today's political scene, and my husband had made a gesture of I hear you, but I disagree.

"Actually," my husband later reported, "I said you sound just like my brother."

That gesture went a long way.  Joe eventually admitted that some people do need all those social services.

Interestingly, Mary had departed again with you're not going to go off on politics again, are you?

As we came into the docks at Cape May, New Jersey, a school of dolphins dutifully frolicked off by the lighthouse.

I was surprised and interested to find Cape May so ungentrified.  Little postwar box houses still run down right down to the narrow shore along Delaware Bay, rarely replaced with McMansions.  It felt like going back in time, with nothing but little stores and little restaurants and little houses waiting for summer.  Towards Villas and Middle Township the postwar houses thin out and are mixed with farms, some featuring old two story houses as tall and slender as chimneys.  I wish I could see inside one, as the houses can't be more than twenty feet square and the stairs must be more like ladders.

Dennis and Corbin City can stand in for vintage New England, with large rectangular houses and doorsteps almost on the narrow pavement.  Pines and sloughs make the area very scenic and deceptively rural, despite the proximity to Atlantic City.  Although I had chosen the route carefully, I was surprised by the beauty and calmness of the area as we drove along with Patsy's windows down.

However, the rural atmosphere does have its drawbacks when it's in the upper 80s and one's looking for a Dairy Queen, let alone a frozen custard.  There just didn't seem to be much going on, and I wondered where the residents wandered off to shop and dine.  I was feeling the effects of sun exposure, so in desperation from heat and thirst, we stopped at a McDonald's in May's Landing. We decided to try their much ballyhooed McWraps.  The presentation is novel, if not wasteful: a tall box envelope one tears back on the perforation to reveal your meal.  The ingredients are surprisingly fresh and tasty, especially the mixed baby greens---but then they ruin it all by pouring on their chemical-flavored sauce, a bow to economy and efficiency.  At $3.99, McWraps aren't cheap fast food, and the lack of variety and disharmonious mix of fresh and chemical makes it no real competition to Subway, their ever more formidable foe.  Perhaps the happy result will be Subway offering fresh baby greens for their sandwiches.

Naturally we passed a prosperous frozen custard stand a scant five miles away in Egg City Harbor...

Now satiated by chemicals and cooled by Patsy's refrigeration, we drove northeast on Highway 563 through Jersey's pine barrens.  As the name implies, it isn't particularly interesting country---but compared to the alternative of tollways and suburban sprawl it is a pleasant short cut if one needs to head due north.

Flowering weeping cherry trees.  Bordertown Fire Department.

At Pemberton, we turned onto US 206---where infamously bad Jersey drivers preferred my ass over the left lane.  There was too much to see to pay them much attention, though---from funky old motels to this pairing of lovely, large weeping cherry trees at the Bordertown fire department.

After settling into our Days Inn equipped with a supersized Dunkin Donuts, we drove off to meet my baby sitter of some forty years ago for dinner.  She's a Lesbian, just so you know it's contagious...  While not quite the far out forty year reunion---I had reconnected with her for awhile in my twenties---there was a lot catching up to do.  It was nice to see her happier and well established in the East after a series of SoCal misfortunes some twenty years ago.

"You look about the same," she said upon our meeting.  "Only grayer."

At least she didn't say gayer...