Randolph Center, VT

After an 80-mile drive down I-89 through the Vermont countryside, we checked into the Lake Champagne Campground in Randolph Center last Saturday. We spent the weekend relaxing and just hanging out. We had a great view out our windshield of our motorhome of the rolling hills and woods of Vermont.

On Monday, we drove about 30-miles up to Waterbury, VT and enjoyed lunch at a local café. After lunch we went to the original Ben & Jerry’s ice cream factory for a tour. It was fun and the ice cream sample was really good too. Ben & Jerry’s original idea for ice cream was to make “chunky” ice cream, that they still do today. I was surprised to learn that they only make one flavor of ice cream at a time on the line at this original factory. They have another, much larger factory in Vermont that has five lines and can make five flavors at a time. 

We also enjoyed walking through the Ben & Jerry’s “flavor graveyard” where they pay tribute to past flavors that are no longer made.

We left Ben & Jerry’s and drove up the road to Cabot Farmer’s Store. Cabot is a cooperative of 800 dairy farms that is famous for their cheese, especially the Vermont white cheddar cheese.

Yesterday we went into Montpelier, the capitol of Vermont, for lunch. We were surprised to learn that Montpelier is the least populous state capitol city in the U.S. with a population of about 7,500. However, the day-time population swells to about 21,000, as people commute in from outside the town, to work. The state capitol gold-leafed dome was beautiful.  

We leave Vermont, our 48th state to visit, tomorrow and head to the Boston area for a two-week stay.


Steve & Julie Cornelius

Grand Isle, Vermont

We arrived in west Albany, NY on Sunday afternoon and parked alongside the Cummins service center building and plugged into their 50-amp electrical outlet. It poured down rain most of Sunday night but we were snug as a bug in our motorhome.


The Cummins service center opened at 7AM on Monday and I checked in to see about getting our 10KW diesel generator looked at. We thought it might be Tuesday before they could look at it because we already knew they had three appointments for generator work on Monday. However, the service writer came to me around 9AM and said one of his technicians would be taking a look at our generator in a few minutes. 


Dan, our Cummins generator technician, spent most of Tuesday troubleshooting the generator. He couldn’t access the fuel pump because the frame rails blocked the fuel pump access panel. Dan had to take the generator completely out of the front of the motorhome and he found the problem. The problem was a kinked fuel line between the diesel generator fuel pump and the fuel filter. 

On Tuesday morning Dan finished repairing the generator and installing it back into our motorhome. We went for breakfast at a nearby diner. 

We got our motorhome back around noon and headed north up I-87 towards Plattsburg, NY. The Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York were beautiful. We took a ferry and crossed Lake Champlain to Grand Isle, Vermont. We arrived at our campground, near the ferry dock, and celebrated setting foot in Vermont, our 48^th state to visit.

We got settled in to our camp site in this very well-manicured campground. There were only a few RVs actually here, but several camping trailers which we thought may be used as summer homes. We had great views of Lake Champlain and could watch the ferries come and go as well as some fantastic sunsets.

We enjoyed lunch on Wednesday in nearby South Hope, VT where we both enjoyed a Maple Creemee for dessert. A creemee is similar to soft-serve ice cream, but with more cream and Vermont maple flavor. It was yummy!

We drove down to Burlington, VT, about 15-miles away, to pick up a few groceries. It is the home of the University of Vermont and the town reminded us of Boulder, Colorado with its university campus, several city business blocks of pedestrian walkway, and lots of people and students on bicycles.


We stopped for lunch before grocery shopping at Henry’s Diner in Burlington. It was established in 1925 and was very small but the food was very tasty.    

We left Grand Isle this morning and drove a short 80-miles down to Randolph, VT to another campground. We’ll explore more of Vermont from here.


Steve & Julie Cornelius

Cooperstown, NY

We left Hershey on Friday and headed north about 250-miles to Cooperstown, NY where we planned to stay over the weekend. We crossed the state-line into New York and stopped for lunch at the rest area and visitor’s center. As we were sitting in our motorhome, eating our lunch, Chubby Checker’s tour bus drove by in front of us. Wow, he’s still touring at age 77!

After lunch, we walked over to the visitor’s center and it was very nice, the best we have seen anywhere. Inside, they had a large area where various salad dressings, marinades, jams, and other locally produced items were for sale.

We stayed at the Cooperstown Family Campground, about 7 miles outside of town. It was a nice and quiet country setting. We met our neighbors next door in their motorhome from Castle Rock, Colorado.

Saturday, we drove into Cooperstown and were surprised at how pretty the town was with its many restaurants, gift shops, and baseball-related stores. It truly is the mecca for baseball fans.

We enjoyed lunch at a local café and then walked a block up Main Street to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. The price was right too…free admission for active-duty and retired military personnel. We spent about two-hours looking through three floors of baseball exhibits. It was well worth a stop!

We left the Cooperstown area this morning and drove about 90-miles east to Albany, NY to overnight at the Cummins repair shop. They are going to fix our 10KW diesel generator for us. I think the 12-volt fuel pump has gone out. We’ll know tomorrow when they take a look at it for us.

Steve & Julie Cornelius

Hershey, Pennsylvania

We followed Mike and Marcia in their motorhome up Interstate-81 on Monday on our short drive through four states to Hershey, PA.  It was funny to learn later that we all broke out singing “Country Roads” as we crossed into West Virginia.


We arrived about 1:30PM and got checked into the Hersheypark Camping Resort. We bought our Hershey Park tickets at the gift shop. We hopped the shuttle bus after dinner and headed over to Hershey Park. Our first stop was the new Hershey Chocolatetown at the entrance to the theme park. They had a ride that took your through the history and process of how they make chocolate, with sample Hershey bars when you got off the ride.   

Milton S. Hershey founded Hershey Chocolate Company in 1903 and and a town around it for his workers. He founded Hersheypark in 1907, as a “picnic and pleasure ground” for his workers. Over the years it has grown into the big theme park of today.

We spent all day Tuesday at the theme park. There are 14 coasters, but we chose to take some less stressful rides such as the steam railroad, a Ferris wheel, bumper cars (called the Fender Bender and sponsored by Geico Insurance). We also rode the monorail which went out of the park to downtown Hershey by the company headquarters. Notice the Hershey Kisses street lights in the photos. 

One new attraction that we did was the Reese’s Cupfusion, an interactive gaming ride. We were agents protecting the Reese’s Cup factory to ensure the world is never deprived of Reese’s Cups! On the ride, we used hand-held laser guns to protect the factory.

On Wednesday we spent the day inside the theme park at the Boardwalk water park area. We rented a Cabana for the day and it was right next to the lazy river ride. We went down to the lazy river, but the water felt cold. We decided to have lunch first. Later the water seemed cool but bearable.

Later in the afternoon, Julie, Marcia and I decided to ride the water coaster called Breakers Edge. We waited in the line for about 20-minutes but it was well worth the wait. It was a lot of fun. Okay, so we finished our time at the park riding one of their 14 coasters.      

Today, we went over to Lancaster County to see the Amish settlements. The Pennsylvania Amish of Lancaster County are America's oldest Amish settlement, where thousands still live a centuries-old "Plain" lifestyle and the horse and buggy remains their primary means of transportation.


It was very interesting and we enjoyed seeing the various Amish crafts after having an authentic Pennsylvania Dutch family-style lunch.

We head to Cooperstown, NY tomorrow for a weekend stay. 


Steve & Julie Cornelius