Lousiana, Florida to Baltimore & back home again!

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Hey everyone!

I must apologize again for the delay again in updating this. The more family we saw, the harder it was to drag ourselves away to work on this! So, we last left you off in New Orleans, the night before we left. One of Kim and Brian’s friends came over to make us dinner. We had the most amazing meal, Pakistani and all vegan, and mostly things we haven’t tried before. It was so fantastic, both Ang and I thought we might become vegan afterwards, just because it was so good. It was a wonderful evening filled with great food and even better conversation. The next morning we were up reasonably early to say goodbye to Kim and Brian, and leave New Orleans behind for Florida. It was very sad saying goodbye; it had been so fantastic catching up with family I haven’t seen in so long.

So, back on the road again, we left Louisiana for Mississippi and Alabama, and at long last, into Florida, where we drove a few hours south into the horse town of Ocala. We headed to our cousin Gina’s house, which was the cutest place. We had been able to see Gina and her son Jaime earlier in the summer, so it hadn’t been too long, but it was still so nice to catch up and tell old stories of good times at Oxford High. The next morning we got up and while Jaime went to school, we headed to the pool at the complex where Gina’s grandmother lives and spent some time just hanging out and getting a little sun. It was another one of the more relaxing days we’ve had on the trip. We went to go meet Jaime after he got out of school and took him to find two of our assigned geocaches. The first one was a bit too easy to find, but we all had such a good time finding it together. The second was a lot harder, but through some excellent teamwork, and Jaime’s newfound navigational expertise, we eventually found it. I started to rain on the way back to the car, but we felt we had accomplished enough. Later Gina took Jaime to Cub Scouts, and Ang and I went to the store to buy everything we would need to make them Eggplant Napoleon for dinner with a few sides. We spent the next few hours preparing a small feast, then enjoyed it with our cousins and one of their neighbors. Then again, we told old stories into the wee hours, and fell asleep.

The next morning was a rainy one, so we spent the day catching up on some television, including the first presidential debate. We ate some pizza and leftovers and it was absolutely fantastic to do absolutely nothing. Gina and Jamie were so wonderful to catch up with and we had such a blast with them that it was hard to leave. But we had another cousin to see, and hit the road after Gina had left to head to a wedding back in Massachusetts. We drove through the rest of Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and spent the night in Fayetteville, North Carolina. We made it into Baltimore the next day at around 6:30 and met with cousin Trisha and her friend Jim at her apartment. We hit the pavement shortly after, looking for a place to get some food and watch the beginning of the Orioles game. The Orioles were finally in the playoffs (wildcard single elimination game) for the first time since 1997. The entire town was dressed in orange and completely hyped up. It was one of the more exciting baseball games we’ve seen since 2004. We ate some crab cakes and drank some Natty Bo and joined in on the screaming and celebration when the Orioles won, sending them to the playoffs. They’re playing the Yankees next and we will now cheer for our new favorite baseball team and hope they will soundly beat those damn Yankees.

The next day, Trisha had made us a plan to go out for some El Salvadoran breakfast, which did a fantastic job of mopping up the left over Natty Bo from the night before. As we were walking to breakfast, we found that the Fells Point Fun Fest was happening! All sorts of games, food booths and crafts stalls were set up all through the waterfront area. After breakfast, we walked through all of the booths and grabbed a delicious Bloody Mary at a make-your-own bar in the middle of the festival. After walking for a few hours and staring at some rotating meat for a long while, we headed to the market to find goods for our dinner. Trisha had planned for our Iron Chef style dinner ahead of time, and had assigned us each a meat that we were going to cook for dinner that night right before we got to the market. She let us know that she would be collecting the vegetables we were going to cook with and would only let us know what we would be cooking shortly before we began. We ran around the market looking for what we needed to complete our only just decided upon meat selection. Trisha had assigned herself beef, as she doesn’t normally cook with it, Jim was given chicken, I was given pork, and Ang (drumroll please) was given rabbit. Yes, rabbit. It was originally lamb, but Ang and Trish both decided that that was too easy. We gathered our things and retired back to the house to start putting research into our main courses. Later, we were given our vegetables, chosen out of a hat. Jim got mushrooms, I got green beans, Trisha had sweet potatoes, and Ang had broccoli.

While Ang slaughtered her skinned, headless and footless rabbit, the rest of us started our courses by dragging out grills and raiding Trisha’s cabinets for everything they had. We set in with a frenzy, cooking away until the hour of 8pm, when the two guests/ judges arrived and dinner was served. Presentation was also a part of the competition and everyone had to bring out someone else’s dish, so the judges wouldn’t know who cooked what. Everything was excellent, and we really enjoyed ourselves trying new things. Ang really out did herself with the rabbit, Though I really can’t judge rabbit, since I’ve never had it before, it was tender and delicious. The judges made their decisions, and the chicken and the mushrooms won. We all don’t believe our judges were the equivalent of Gordon Ramsey. It was a blast and we ended the evening off with a karaoke contest and a banjo/guitar session. It was another amazing day and night for the record books. The next day was pretty low key, a rainy day in which we napped, read and got some work done. Trisha, Ang and I ended up going to a restaurant down the Avenue, where we lucked out getting to watch the entire Pats game without anyone making us change the channel due to a rain delay in the Orioles playoff game. We caught up again, just the three of us, and it was quite sad to see the night, and our trip, come to an end. We said our goodbyes to Trisha, and left the next morning on our final drive.



I won’t bore you with details of the scenery and states you’re all quite used to. Both of us, tired and a bit depressed, slogged through the rain back to Massachusetts. We got in at about 7 last night.



I want to thank you all for following our blog. I wish I had been a bit more religious with it, but the excitement of our trip and the great people we’ve meet along the way got a bit in the way. Thank you so much to Lane, Kim and Brian, Gina, and Trisha, who provided us with so many laughs and such wonderful hospitality. You are the biggest reasons we will not ever forget this trip. Thanks to all the new people we’ve met along our way. You have given us greater faith in the goodness of humanity. Maybe we’ll do this again sometime, and hopefully I get to have you all along for the ride next time as well. Signing off, and love to all of you.

Love, Di & Ang (It’s been an excellent adventure!)

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