Category Archives: Weather

The Tour Begins

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It was still raining, windy and cold but the Navel Museum was open. The young man in charge was kind enough to let me wait inside. Admission to the museum is free. I didn’t go downstairs to see all of the exhibits, I didn’t want to miss my tour, but I looked over the items on display in the main lobby.

There was a bronze statue of a family reunion, a model of the Yorktown and etchings  on the walls about other ships including the Coral Sea. My brother served on the Coral Sea and I think my brother -in – law may have served on the Yorktown. It sounds too familiar to not have a family connection.

The memorial itself wasn’t turned on because of the cold. I think there are a series of fountains. I’m told they bring in the water from “All of the seven seas” and have a huge ceremony with the admirals and top chiefs of staff when they turn  them on. Washington does like it’s pomp and circumstance.

More people began to arrive while I waited and all were welcomed into the nice warm, dry lobby. Finally at about 9:45 a nice young man with a clipboard arrived to check us all in.

The bus was parked about 2 blocks away so we all hiked up the street. Our tour guide was a super nice lady named Joey. The bus driver was Tony. Joey explained that tours never leave from the Capitol building on Sunday because there is always something going on that closes the streets. She just shook her head when I told her that I was first told to go to the Capitol Building, then the Naval Memorial and finally the text with the address for the memorial that never came.

While we waited for any stragglers the other guests began to talk about what they were promised. Even though we were all on the same trip, everyone has been given different expectations. My tour was supposed to be 10 am to 2 pm to see the  Cherry Blossoms. (I expected that to change since there weren’t any cherry blossoms) Others said their tours were 10 am to 1 pm and still another group was 10 am to 3:30 pm with a break for lunch and a boat ride on the Potomac.

Poor Joey had to straighten out the mess and keep everyone happy! She promised to work it all out while we were doing the first part of the tour. Her job looks like fun except for the part where she has to straighten out the “back office” mess. That would make me very grumpy!

Finally the fellow with the clip board found the last of the group and herded them to the bus. We were ready to start out.

Cherry Blossoms Galore Tour

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I wanted to do a photo safari tour of the cherry blossoms.

That’s where a photographer leads the group, offers help and hints, and just shares his professional expertise. They advertised sunrise and sunset tours but when I tried to book one I was told they were all filled up. I took the next best thing, a tour called Cherry Blossoms Galore by USA Guided Tours DC.

Turns out they were a bit disorganized in the “back room”. I was told to meet at the Capitol building at 10 am, then when I called to confirm the tour was still on since the cold snap had damaged so many cherry blossoms, they told me to meet outside at the Navel Memorial at 9:30 am. They promised to text me the address. (I never got a text)

So bright and early I headed down to the complimentary breakfast, toast, scrambled eggs, sausage, waffles, fruit, oatmeal, cinnamon loaf bread, cereal and the list goes on.

After breakfast I headed out into the cold and rain. I didn’t know how long it would take to get a train (Metro) on Sunday (in Boston you can wait for an hour) or how far I would have to walk from the station to find the Navel Memorial. Turns out, not far.

The train showed up almost as soon as I got there and when I came out of the Metro station I was looking at the Navel Memorial. It was only a little after 8 am and it was cold. 32 degrees with a wind chill dropping it to 28 degrees and it was a cold, icy rain! The Navel Memorial is an outside memorial. The Navel Museum didn’t open until 9:30 am. I was going to freeze! And my camera was getting wet.

I’d left the camera bag at the hotel because the girl I spoke with said no bags allowed on the tour for security reason. ( Another misdirection.)

All of the streets around the Navel Memorial were closed off. I didn’t know if there was a demonstration ( after all, it is Washington DC) or something else. I could see the police cars blocking the streets. It didn’t make me feel too confident that the tour bus would be able to get to us. Or should I say me. Maybe it was the early hour but I was the only one there.

I decided to do the only sensible thing. I went back into the subway where it was warm and dry to wait for 9:30 to roll around.

By 9:30 I was restless and ready to try my luck again. SO back up the escalator I went.

To Be continued…

Anatomy of a Nor’easter

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Ask any weather forecaster, there is a major storm on the way. 18-24 inches of snow, high winds with gusts up to 70 miles per hour and torrential rains once the storm switches gears.

Wide spread power outages are predicted.

6:30 am my alarm goes off. Is it snowing yet? Should I work from home or risk going into the office. I peek out the window. Nothing right now but there is a slight dusting. Must have snowed and stopped. I turn on the TV. Dire warnings. School closings. Stay off the roads!

8:30 am. The snow started up again. I’ve decided to work from home, not because it so bad now but because I’m afraid I won’t be able to get back home at the end of the day. It’s non-stop coverage of the storm… each prediction more dire than the last. Its like there is no other news in the world today. Even my bank has closed all of the branches!

9:30 am The  very fine snow has really increased. No fat, fluffy flakes here. The wind has picked up significantly. The forecasters are saying that the rain/snow line has changed so southeastern New England may get more rain than snow. Its raining on Cape Cod now. The blizzard warning from Boston south has been dropped.

10:30 am. Not much change. Still snowing. First plows just went by to clear the roads

11:30 am The snow is really starting to accumulate and the wind is howling now.

1:45 pm Looks like the change over to rain/sleet has begun.

3:30 I think the worst is over. The wind has let up and it’s just rain now. Coming down hard but still just rain.

No where near the 18-24 inches predicted. Just another day in New England.

What Happened to Spring?

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Massachusetts is in the Northern Hemisphere and that means that meteorological spring started on March 1. Anyone who lives north of the Mason-Dixon Line knows that you still get snow storms in March in Massachusetts, Heck, you get them in May! But we just had a week of record breaking heat. I’m not ready to go back to winter.

I really don’t like winter. I don’t know how I ever found playing in the snow fun, even as a kid. Does getting frozen and wet really sound like fun? Growing up in the Adirondack mountains we used to get some major snow storms. Often there’d be a thaw and then another freeze and we’d get an ice crust thick enough to walk on…until you broke through. I came home many times not only cold but bleeding from being cut and scraped on the ice crust. No I really don’t like winter.

So the warm weather has fled and the snow came in during the wee hours of the morning. I thought it would stop after an inch or two but it snowed all day.

It wasn’t until around 5 pm that the snow came to a stop and the sun came out. Just in time to set but it made the snow covered trees look golden in the afternoon light.

By the time I got home after work I was feeling a bit kinder toward the snow. It was really pretty.

I guess I have to get used to it. We are headed into a record cold weekend and another storm by Tuesday. I guess winter isn’t ready to give up quite yet.

Brrrr Its Cold!

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I’m not sure where all of you are from. I’m sure I’ve got some followers from  warm, sunny locations but here in New England winter has returned with a vengeance. Last week we had record high temps, beautiful spring weather. (Take that Punxsutawney Phil!) but the groundhog was right after all! This weekend brought an Arctic Blast that left us all shivering in our boots. High winds added to the cold temps by driving new record lows with the wind chill added in. Its been the coldest weekend of this winter.

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To go along with the miserable cold, I caught a cold. I’ve done so well this year too! This development left me with a dilemma. I wanted to get out in the area to find some new things to tell you about but I was sneezing and felt miserable so I didn’t want to be out in the cold.

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I considered (very seriously) driving to Essex Junction, Vermont for the Vermont Flower show. It would be inside so I’d be warm and I thought we could all use some flowers to offset this cold blast.

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My hesitation came from the fact that it would be a 4 hour drive and this cold was kicking my butt. It had drained so much energy that every time I sat down for 5 minutes I fell asleep. So after much internal debate I took a pass. I spent the weekend bundled in a fluffy throw in my recliner watching travel programs. Or maybe I should say sleeping through travel programs.

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(Sorry I can’t use a picture of me because my arm isn’t long enough for the selfie but this one pretty much sums it up)

I fell asleep watching a program about Hawaii only to wake up to Andrew Zimmern swallowing some horrible looking thing he consider food on an episode of “Bizarre Foods”. Sorry Andrew, I find your show extremely cringe-worthy.

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To make sure the weekend wasn’t a total loss I signed up for a webinar at 3 pm on Sunday about Travel Writing. At 2 pm I set up my laptop, got a pad and pen and a bottle of water. I was ready. I sat back to wait and promptly fell asleep! I woke up at 3:15 having missed the first 15 minutes. Luckily it will be posted online until Tuesday so I can watch it again to see what I missed.

Since this blog pretends to be a travel blog (most of the time) I thought I might get some good tips to improve my content. At the least it got me thinking. I got some good ideas about finding local things to share. So cold or not, the weekend wasn’t a total loss.