I am back. Honeymoon is over.
Aug. 24th, 2008 01:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
valis2The short version:
The accommodations were not great, the trip was rather low-key (perhaps a bit too low-key), and we generally had a pretty good time.
So we went to Cape Cod. Our original intention had been to vacation somewhere extremely inexpensive, like up in northern Michigan near my parents or perhaps in WI near![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
gypsyjolie, but a few months ago very dear friends gave us the use of their timeshare.
We talked and talked, and in the end decided to go to CC. I've been there before (I stayed with friends in a cottage in Truro) and it was a fantastic vacation. Our main dichotomy seemed to be that I wanted a do-it-all vacation in Boston, where we could go on historical tours, ghost tours, nature tours, i.e., city stuff and nature stuff both, but he wanted more of a nature vacation. So when I thought of CC I was delighted--it would have enough nature to satisfy him, and I could check out some graveyards and do some historical stuff and even shop as well.
Husband is not into scheduling, and mentioned that more than once, so I refrained from researching activities ahead of time, because I knew if I did than I would have an entire grid of activities planned out for the whole week.
I started looking at the timeshare properties that were available, and started getting a little worried because nothing seemed to be available. My first, second, and third choices were booked until November. So I tried all sorts of different properties all across the states (even in Seattle) and nothing was available for the week in July that we wanted.
I went back to CC properties and put in a date range of August and September. There was only a scant handful. There was only one property with a week available in August. The September properties were all rated one star by the other timeshare vacationers, so we decided to bite the bullet and go with the August property, despite the fact that it only had two stars.
Anyway, we left a week ago, spent most of Friday in the car, and all day Saturday as well, until we met up with the fantasticmarginaliana and her SO and had a fantastic meal and got to see their amazing place. We were both absolutely bowled over by how beautifully they've finished it--it rocks, utterly! And they're such wonderful people. We loved hanging out with them.
We got back in the car and drove the last couple hours to the southern edge of the cape, which is where our rental was. I was really worried about getting there in the dark because I remembered my other trip there, and how difficult it can be to navigate there.
Anyway, the directions I printed out from Google were useless. There are a million Main Streets in CC, and it gave me directions to 6A as Main St, when I was looking for Rte 28 Main St. So we spent ages fruitlessly wandering around in the driving rain, and it became dark quickly. After three calls to the clueless girl working at the rental, we finally got ahold of her mom, who told us we were on the wrong street. I had asked specifically if the property was on 6A, which direction it was, and other very direct questions, and the girl had answered all of them incorrectly. It was a miracle that we found the place. So we checked in minutes before they closed. It was quite clearly an old motel that had been converted to condos.
This is my set of requirements for motels/hotels/etc.: clean, decent tub, decent bed, fairly quiet, hot water. That's all I want. I can get that about nine times out of ten at most of the places I stay while I'm on the road. I've stayed in places with lots of eccentricities before, but as long as the main set of requirements is met, I am generally okay.
We were told we could park in a handicapped spot in front of our room, so we did, and as we were pulling into the spot, I suddenly had a flash of insight--that means this is a wheelchair accessible room. While I am quite glad that these are offered to the general public, I am not enamored of them for me personally. I have stayed in them before.
We walk into the front room, which looks fine. It has a couch, a TV, a big closet, ugly small couch, a tiny kitchenette with microwave, fridge, and sink (all of these are major bonuses). It looked like a million older motel rooms I have seen. No problem. So I go into the bathroom, which is handicapped-accessible, which means a higher commode, a lower and wider sink, and a bathtub that isn't your average bathtub. I was a little sad, because I could tell that the bathtub would be an issue to get in and out of (I know, that sounds weird, but it had a shelf protruding low from the opposite wall, and when you're big like me that ends up getting in the way).
So I walk back out and then it hits me.
There is no other room.
Where is the bed?!
I immediately glance at the couch, but it can't possibly be a pull out bed--it's much too narrow. It's nearly a loveseat. Then I look at the closet on the opposite wall.
Yep, you're right. A Murphy bed. It pulls down from the closet.
I am still trying to figure out how this could possibly be a part of a wheelchair-accessible room. There is no way that anyone in a wheelchair could reach the upper bar to pull the bed down.
Anyway, the hotel room was a bit of a damper on the honeymoon. Not only was the bed tiny (smaller than our full-size bed at home!), but it was not...er...sturdy enough for other activities. And the walls were paper thin. We could understand the words from the TV set in the next room. So there was no fun of that kind to be had on our trip. In fact, it was a bit of a misery to come back to the place in the evening, because it was small and there was no place to put our clothing, or even our luggage. No luggage racks. Only three narrow drawers in one cabinet. By the end of the trip we were like sardines.
The rest of the trip was very nice, except for a rather difficult morning we went through on the third day, where some relationship issues manifested themselves, and it wasn't pretty. I'm not going to go any further into it than that. I think we resolved it, and we seemed to regain our balance, and both of us have things to improve, as we all do as human beings.
I was also very sniffly throughout the entire trip, which I realized later was most likely due to ragweed. I'm already improving, even though I've only been home for fourteen hours.
One of the frustrating things about CC is the lack of signage. Many of the side streets have signs only for the side street, not a sign for the street you are on. We had endless difficulties navigating because I had only bare-bones tourist maps. There are lots of rotaries and five street intersections and confusing things about CC. There's one major road where at points you are going physically north on it while all signs say south, which is pretty weird.
Husband is laidback about things, and so we ended up having a laidback vacation, and thought we did drive a lot, we didn't do a lot of tours. We didn't even hit the beach, which I had expected to do, but honestly, I'm barely a beach person on my best day, so this was not a disappointment. My biggest waaah is that Provincetown was celebrating Pride Week and had its parade on Thursday at three, and we took a Provincetown tour the same day (unknowingly) and could not convince the tour guide to let us stay. We had to leave at two, and by the time we got back to our car and then turned around and drove back it would have been five--much too late. I am still grumpy that I missed the parade. The few pre-parade things I saw were fabulous.
We spent a lot of time in Hyannis, and I ate moussaka that was nothing short of heavenly. We also spent much time in Sandwich, especially at the glass museum and the Heritage Gardens, and that was a lot of fun.
I took lots of pictures (233) and will be torturing you all with them soon.
Please don't think that I am unhappy--honestly, I enjoyed myself very much and we saw many fun things and ate at fantastic restaurants. We did some shopping, and went a little nuts at Filene's Basement in Hyannis and bought Husband a whole stack of clothing for $100, which felt very good indeed. He doesn't often want to buy clothing. (I somehow ended up only buying one t-shirt, and it barely fits, so I'm nervous about shrinking it. I had difficulty finding 2X shirts that were cute and fit well.) We did have a lot of nice moments and overall it was wonderful to get him to indulge in a vacation, which he has only done once or twice in the eight years I've been with him.
He brought his laptop, which meant that I am not skip?=1000 right now, which is such a relief. Seriously. Sometimes I dread coming back because I spend three days catching up with the flists.
And now that I'm home I'm deliriously happy...I have so many things I want to accomplish! And I'm home for four months, except for a few weekend trips here and there. I am overjoyed. I've been looking forward to this for ages.
The accommodations were not great, the trip was rather low-key (perhaps a bit too low-key), and we generally had a pretty good time.
So we went to Cape Cod. Our original intention had been to vacation somewhere extremely inexpensive, like up in northern Michigan near my parents or perhaps in WI near
gypsyjolie, but a few months ago very dear friends gave us the use of their timeshare.We talked and talked, and in the end decided to go to CC. I've been there before (I stayed with friends in a cottage in Truro) and it was a fantastic vacation. Our main dichotomy seemed to be that I wanted a do-it-all vacation in Boston, where we could go on historical tours, ghost tours, nature tours, i.e., city stuff and nature stuff both, but he wanted more of a nature vacation. So when I thought of CC I was delighted--it would have enough nature to satisfy him, and I could check out some graveyards and do some historical stuff and even shop as well.
Husband is not into scheduling, and mentioned that more than once, so I refrained from researching activities ahead of time, because I knew if I did than I would have an entire grid of activities planned out for the whole week.
I started looking at the timeshare properties that were available, and started getting a little worried because nothing seemed to be available. My first, second, and third choices were booked until November. So I tried all sorts of different properties all across the states (even in Seattle) and nothing was available for the week in July that we wanted.
I went back to CC properties and put in a date range of August and September. There was only a scant handful. There was only one property with a week available in August. The September properties were all rated one star by the other timeshare vacationers, so we decided to bite the bullet and go with the August property, despite the fact that it only had two stars.
Anyway, we left a week ago, spent most of Friday in the car, and all day Saturday as well, until we met up with the fantastic
marginaliana and her SO and had a fantastic meal and got to see their amazing place. We were both absolutely bowled over by how beautifully they've finished it--it rocks, utterly! And they're such wonderful people. We loved hanging out with them.We got back in the car and drove the last couple hours to the southern edge of the cape, which is where our rental was. I was really worried about getting there in the dark because I remembered my other trip there, and how difficult it can be to navigate there.
Anyway, the directions I printed out from Google were useless. There are a million Main Streets in CC, and it gave me directions to 6A as Main St, when I was looking for Rte 28 Main St. So we spent ages fruitlessly wandering around in the driving rain, and it became dark quickly. After three calls to the clueless girl working at the rental, we finally got ahold of her mom, who told us we were on the wrong street. I had asked specifically if the property was on 6A, which direction it was, and other very direct questions, and the girl had answered all of them incorrectly. It was a miracle that we found the place. So we checked in minutes before they closed. It was quite clearly an old motel that had been converted to condos.
This is my set of requirements for motels/hotels/etc.: clean, decent tub, decent bed, fairly quiet, hot water. That's all I want. I can get that about nine times out of ten at most of the places I stay while I'm on the road. I've stayed in places with lots of eccentricities before, but as long as the main set of requirements is met, I am generally okay.
We were told we could park in a handicapped spot in front of our room, so we did, and as we were pulling into the spot, I suddenly had a flash of insight--that means this is a wheelchair accessible room. While I am quite glad that these are offered to the general public, I am not enamored of them for me personally. I have stayed in them before.
We walk into the front room, which looks fine. It has a couch, a TV, a big closet, ugly small couch, a tiny kitchenette with microwave, fridge, and sink (all of these are major bonuses). It looked like a million older motel rooms I have seen. No problem. So I go into the bathroom, which is handicapped-accessible, which means a higher commode, a lower and wider sink, and a bathtub that isn't your average bathtub. I was a little sad, because I could tell that the bathtub would be an issue to get in and out of (I know, that sounds weird, but it had a shelf protruding low from the opposite wall, and when you're big like me that ends up getting in the way).
So I walk back out and then it hits me.
There is no other room.
Where is the bed?!
I immediately glance at the couch, but it can't possibly be a pull out bed--it's much too narrow. It's nearly a loveseat. Then I look at the closet on the opposite wall.
Yep, you're right. A Murphy bed. It pulls down from the closet.
I am still trying to figure out how this could possibly be a part of a wheelchair-accessible room. There is no way that anyone in a wheelchair could reach the upper bar to pull the bed down.
Anyway, the hotel room was a bit of a damper on the honeymoon. Not only was the bed tiny (smaller than our full-size bed at home!), but it was not...er...sturdy enough for other activities. And the walls were paper thin. We could understand the words from the TV set in the next room. So there was no fun of that kind to be had on our trip. In fact, it was a bit of a misery to come back to the place in the evening, because it was small and there was no place to put our clothing, or even our luggage. No luggage racks. Only three narrow drawers in one cabinet. By the end of the trip we were like sardines.
The rest of the trip was very nice, except for a rather difficult morning we went through on the third day, where some relationship issues manifested themselves, and it wasn't pretty. I'm not going to go any further into it than that. I think we resolved it, and we seemed to regain our balance, and both of us have things to improve, as we all do as human beings.
I was also very sniffly throughout the entire trip, which I realized later was most likely due to ragweed. I'm already improving, even though I've only been home for fourteen hours.
One of the frustrating things about CC is the lack of signage. Many of the side streets have signs only for the side street, not a sign for the street you are on. We had endless difficulties navigating because I had only bare-bones tourist maps. There are lots of rotaries and five street intersections and confusing things about CC. There's one major road where at points you are going physically north on it while all signs say south, which is pretty weird.
Husband is laidback about things, and so we ended up having a laidback vacation, and thought we did drive a lot, we didn't do a lot of tours. We didn't even hit the beach, which I had expected to do, but honestly, I'm barely a beach person on my best day, so this was not a disappointment. My biggest waaah is that Provincetown was celebrating Pride Week and had its parade on Thursday at three, and we took a Provincetown tour the same day (unknowingly) and could not convince the tour guide to let us stay. We had to leave at two, and by the time we got back to our car and then turned around and drove back it would have been five--much too late. I am still grumpy that I missed the parade. The few pre-parade things I saw were fabulous.
We spent a lot of time in Hyannis, and I ate moussaka that was nothing short of heavenly. We also spent much time in Sandwich, especially at the glass museum and the Heritage Gardens, and that was a lot of fun.
I took lots of pictures (233) and will be torturing you all with them soon.
Please don't think that I am unhappy--honestly, I enjoyed myself very much and we saw many fun things and ate at fantastic restaurants. We did some shopping, and went a little nuts at Filene's Basement in Hyannis and bought Husband a whole stack of clothing for $100, which felt very good indeed. He doesn't often want to buy clothing. (I somehow ended up only buying one t-shirt, and it barely fits, so I'm nervous about shrinking it. I had difficulty finding 2X shirts that were cute and fit well.) We did have a lot of nice moments and overall it was wonderful to get him to indulge in a vacation, which he has only done once or twice in the eight years I've been with him.
He brought his laptop, which meant that I am not skip?=1000 right now, which is such a relief. Seriously. Sometimes I dread coming back because I spend three days catching up with the flists.
And now that I'm home I'm deliriously happy...I have so many things I want to accomplish! And I'm home for four months, except for a few weekend trips here and there. I am overjoyed. I've been looking forward to this for ages.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2008-08-24 09:05 pm (UTC)And any bad things will be eclipsed by all the good things.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-08-24 09:21 pm (UTC)At this point, having been away for 120 days this year, I'm ready to stay home. My head is homesick! lol.
And you're right--those are wise words.