Day 4 - 2025 East Coast Adventure - Intro to New England

 7/21 - Mahlon Dickerson, NJ to Devils Hopyard state park, CT

The morning started with the sun streaming into the camper.  After two damp evenings, this one started with teh cool brisk air that makes camping so great.  It actually felt like fall already!  

Breakfast was my favorite part of pop-up camping.  It was pancakes with chocolate and white chocolate chips off the griddle. This is a camping tradition and we all gather around the table with the griddle in the middle.  It warms us and then we get fresh pancakes right off the griddle. 

After breakfast, we packed up the camper and hit the road. Robinson asked for a zoo as our stopping point so we set the destination for Beardsley zoo. After finishing up with some beautiful rolling roads in New Jersey, we hopped onto the highway and into New York. We had given New York City a pretty wide berth, but even as we crossed the Hudson on 287, we caught a glimpse of the Big Apple. 

There appeared to be traffic on I-95 so Google routed us over to the Merritt Parkway (fine by me!). Thankfully we were towing a popup because one of the bridges had only 9'6" of clearance!  

Eventually we made it to the zoo.  The zoo is located in the middle of a larger park which, as we later learned, was designed my Olmstead. It felt like it, just an amazing layout.  Eventually the meandering road put us into the zoo parking lot and we put Rover and Dover in the back corner. 

The zoo was pretty good.  It had a variety of animals and, to Robinsons delight, a two toed sloth!  







They also had a very cool greenhouse full of award winning cacti and, in the middle, a pond with some very friendly koi!



After the zoo, we headed towards camp, but Sebastian was anxious to have some donuts so we diverted off the highway to Branford Beach donuts. They were closing in 20 minutes so we bought all they had left. 

We made it to camp and found it to be pretty primitive. There were picnic tables and fire pits for each site, but the rest was just a lot of grass. We found our site and picked a spot to put the camper. After a quick set up (and learning that there is no safe drinking water in the entire state park!), we started off to the hiking trails to explore the park. 

On the hike, we found the falls and then embarked on what would prove to be a fairly challenging hike to with over 600 ft of climbing over 2.5 miles. It included some scenic riverside sections, some technically challenging rocky sections, an amazing vista, and a number of downed trees. The boys kept s great pace and we made it back to camp for dinner. 
    


We pulled the griddle back out and had "not quite quesadillas". Trying to minimize water use, we were selective with the beans and other aspects of dinner. 

After dinner, Amy and Robinson started a fire while Sebastian wandered around a bit to find a place to set up his hammock. 

Before we knew it, the sun was setting and the stars were coming out. Taking advantage of a cloudless sky, we stood outside in the crisp air and watched as the stars came out. What a great way to finish another camp site. 

Trip Miles - 820
# States - 8

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