This afternoon we visited Cape Henlopen State Park located in Lewes, Delaware (pronounced “Lewis”). What a cool place! Lewes is in the middle of the state. The term “cape” refers to a piece of pointed land that sticks out into a body of water. They are usually smaller and narrower than a peninsula. This cape was relatively small compared to something like Cape Cod, but was interesting to see. There were also a bunch of horseshoe crabs on the beach, apparently having come ashore to mate and lay their eggs.

The campground we’re staying in has a bunch of farm animals - chickens, turkeys, goats, peacocks, etc. Tucker keeps pulling us towards these guys! He seems to be very curious about them - I wonder if he thinks they are dogs to play with?

Some of what makes this life 100% worth the effort it takes to pick up and wholly move your home every week or two are the people you get to see. This week in Delaware, we are close to Kate’s aunt and uncle and so grateful that they could spend time with us!

Today we had lunch at Crooked Hammock Brewery (which was awesome!) and walked through Mt Cuba Center . Mt. Cuba was originally the estate of Lammot du Pont Copeland and his wife Pamela Copeland, with most of the property being purchased in 1935. They worked with husband and wife architect team Samuel and Victorine Homsey to design and build the mansion on property which is still in use to this date as a visitors and education center.

We took a couple hours and walked around the park in Milford, Delaware . The state of Delaware only has 3 counties and this city is in two of them! Originally a community centered around shipbuilding but now serving as an agricultural hub, the town of Milford is over 200 years old! In our walk through the park, we came across several art pieces that told the story of the town’s history. The downtown area is a quintessential small town downtown with active shops lining main street and wonderful, homey feel.

We made it to Delaware! The park where we are staying this week is quiet, except for the peacocks! So relaxing in fact, that Steve decided to take a nap after our travel day…
Doesn’t he look comfy?

As part of our travels, about 3 years ago we purchased a National Parks Passport book . Much of our travel evolves around seeing the public lands in our great nation. Washington DC was no exception! This year, as we celebrate 250 years as an independent nation, many sites have a special edition 250 stamp in additional to their typical passport stamps.

During our time in DC we collected almost 30 passport stamps PLUS 13 special edition 250 stamps (photo was taken after day 1 of 2).

Day 2 in Washington DC: we attempted to see a few things that one or both of us had on our bucket list. First, Kate collects Hard Rock Café pins, so we stopped to have lunch at HRC in DC on our way to Ford’s Theater.

A bit disappointing, but Ford’s Theater was closed and there was nothing on the NPS app about the closure. While we did not get to see inside the theater (Kate has been there several times), one of the docents was outside telling people the story of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. She was even great enough to bring out the cancellation stamp for Steve’s passport book!

Day 1 in Washington DC we decided to walk the National Mall . The view of DC from the hill where the Washington Monument stands is one of Kate’s favorites! Today we walked a circuit of the National Mall and Tidal Basin.

We spent some time at each of the following:\

• Washington Monument\
• WWII Memorial\
• Lincoln Memorial\
• West Potomac Park (this encompasses the path/park around the tidal basin - from Lincoln to Jefferson Memorials)\
• Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial\
• Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial

We walked over 15,000 steps today, so we’re pretty exhausted!

It’s been raining since we arrived in DC, but today, we finally got to venture out a bit! We used the Metro Rail system which was very convenient to all the places we wanted to stop. On the advice of the Cherry Hill Park staff we parked at Beltline station and rode about 30 minutes into DC. The Beltline station had plenty of parking while we’re there, even for our large dually pickup truck.