New Jersey - Garden State
We drove straight from New Hampshire to Rumson, New Jersey, where our daughter, son-in-law and four grandchildren lived. My arm was looking better, and I felt, well, great! When I woke up early the next morning, I felt incredibly energized. I went outside and saw Marnie’s vegetable garden, which was so inundated with weeds you could barely see the vegetables. She had been away for one week and the couple of weeks before she left, she had been busy. I started pulling weeds and was thoroughly enjoying myself. This was unusual because I am not a gardener and weeding was the last thing I usually wanted to do. Marnie came outside and expressed surprise. “Mom,” she said, “what are you doing?” I explained that I was trying to rescue her vegetable garden. By this time, it was about 8:30 am and the temperature was already about 85 degrees. She went to the garage and got gardening gloves, trowels, a wheelbarrow, a big trashcan and, best of all, a boom box. We began attacking the weeds, singing along to the music, and having a great time. It kept getting hotter and hotter, but we didn’t really care. Andy and Terry came out and remarked that it was getting very hot, which we already knew, of course. They brought us ice water and encouraged us to come inside. Kieran came outside about noon and looked at us as if we were crazy. He said, “Grandma, mom would never be doing this if you weren’t here.” I said, “Kieran, this is grandma on steroids. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be doing this either.” It took us six hours, we were sweating like crazy, but we pulled every one of those weeds, and the vegetable garden looked fabulous. We were quite proud of ourselves.
The next day, Andy and I set off for Freehold, a town that Marnie and Terry were fond of. The town was established in 1693 and the colonial architecture of downtown reflects its history. From there, we headed to Trenton, the capitol of New Jersey. We took a tour of the State House and were particularly impressed with the stained-glass windows, the colorful New Jersey State emblem and motto (Liberty and Prosperity), the chandeliers and the stained-glass New Jersey Senate dome. The State House is not in a park-like setting, as so many state capitols are. Instead, it is in a plaza in a very urban setting, right downtown.
Princeton University has one of the most beautiful campuses of any US college. It was founded in 1746 and is the fourth oldest institution of higher education in the United States. The architecture is in Collegiate Gothic style. The chapel’s size and design evoke a small cathedral from the English Middle Ages. Of course, there are sculptures of the tiger mascot in various locations around the campus, too.
The town of Princeton is charming, a college town but also a suburb that serves both New York City and Philadelphia. There are many boutiques, restaurants, pubs and an ice cream store called the Bent Spoon where we happily took a break from touring to enjoy ice cream cones as the weather continued to be very hot.
We took a road trip to the seaside resort Cape May, at the southern tip of New Jersey. The temperature got to 100 degrees that day, but I was determined to take a barefoot walk on the beach and put my feet in the water. Andy found a shady spot where he could sit down away from the sun. We took a trolley tour of the city and were impressed by the many large and stately homes in this historic city. There were many examples of gingerbread Victorian architecture as well as the ornate “wedding cake” style popular in Cape May. Some of these historic homes, built in the late 19th century, are now bed and breakfast inns. Most of them feature perfectly manicured gardens, wide porches with rocking chairs, and are colorfully painted in bright Victorian colors. Our favorite house was The Emlen Physick Estate, a Victorian House Museum. It was built in 1879 and its restored rooms provided insights into 19th century lifestyle. Before we left, we visited the historic Cape May Lighthouse, which was constructed in 1859. It was automated in 1946 and is operational to this day.
Heading north, we went to Atlantic City where we took a walk on the famous boardwalk. There are many hotels on the boardwalk, some new buildings erected to reflect the 1920’s past, painted in pastel colors that were popular at that time. Our next stop was Long Beach Island where we saw a plaque commemorating a massacre that occurred in 1782. An American patriot named Captain Andrew Steelman, along with his men, were sleeping on the beach when they were massacred by Tory raiders led by a man named John Bacon. Nearby was Barnegat Lighthouse, considered one of the most important navigational points for ships bound to and from New York Harbor. We climbed the 217 steps to the top, from which we had beautiful views of the surrounding area.
Further north, getting closer to Marnie and Terry’s house, we came upon a sandcastle construction competition at Belmar Beach. These sandcastles were fantastic and had clearly taken the artists hours and hours to build. Suddenly, the sky became very dark, and we decided we needed to flee the beach and run to our car. A giant storm ensued with thunder, lightning and torrential rain. We were glad we were close to our destination.