Rehoboth

One of the many alleyways off the Rehoboth Boardwalk

The beach

The boardwalk

Cool door back in Lewes

Steve has been busy picking my tomatoes back at home

Dahlias back at home

Butterfly 

Old Dutch church which is now a museum

Seafoods restaurant in Lewes I had crab cakes

Church with cemetery 

Lewes and Rehoboth are about 5 miles apart. There is an incredibly busy road connecting them and running parallel in the dense woods, a bike path which I've been spending plenty of time on either running or biking. The bike I have been provided with here is much nicer than the DC bike. It's been so hot here and more humid than Michigan. At least there we have a bit of coolness in the early morning before it gets steamy. No coolness here. We have also spent time in the pool in the evening. so a bit of time spent shopping and sightseeing. I've been enjoying myself

Cape Henpolen

Deer in the dense forest behind my friends house

Rehoboth farmers market where we bought supplies for dinner

Junction Breakwater trail between Lewes and Rehoboth. The coastal road running parallel is a traffic jam surrounded by outlet malls and tourist traps

Those concrete towers were used to try to spot German uboats 

Wild hibiscus plants all over

The state park trail goes over wetlands

Small dunes to the side

The canal separating the mainland from the barrier beach lands

It was plenty hot as we set out for our 18 mile loop bike ride. This area has many paths which is good as some of the main roads are extremely busy. The first half of our ride went through the nearby state park through dense forests, beaches, sand dunes and wetlands. we stopped at Gordon's pond, a bird sanctuary but I didn't see much. I did see laughing gulls, a southern species smaller than the common sea gull , with black heads. I was also surprisingly by the many hibiscus in full bloom growing wild. Wish I had stopped to photograph the denser stands of them. The sparse bushes I did photograph  were surrounded by poison ivy so no close ups. We were hoping to pick up supplies at the Rehoboth farmers market by bike but they weren't allowed to sell anything for 2 hours. We had biked a mile or two by Rehoboth beach mansions. Lots of money there. We returned later by car

My friends friend came for dinner. she recently dealt with breast cancer so it was thought we would have that in common

On the beach

Steve thought Allie would like a life sized bear for her birthday 

Georgetown row houses

Georgetown university 

Steep stairs that the priest in The Exorcist died on

Crape myrtle in bloom all over DC

Bridge across the Chesapeake Bay

New beach house where I will be staying for a bit

The beach

I started my mind numbing journey here early Sunday making good time to DC in slightly over 8 hours giving us plenty of time to walk the steamy streets of Georgetown that afternoon full of very upscale shops. I got up early yesterday morning to run through the semitropical cicada humming streets up one street down another. My friend wanted us to go on a bike ride before we went to Delaware, on the Capital Crescent trail which I have run on many times but is tricky to get to through the neighborhoods. Too many sharp turns on narrow sidewalks and rocky paths for me on a skinny tire bike that had dicey brakes. We took it on the unpaved part between Bethesda and Chevy Chase to a bike shop to make a few quick repairs. Turns out I will be riding a different bike here in Delaware  I can see they have paths going all over the place here. I am skipping my run this morning to have a long bike ride instead once my friend gets up

We drove through Lewes last night it looks very New England settled by the Dutch in1617   very cute.  My friend had this house built just last year. Although it is probably worth about what ours is, the taxes are one tenth of ours.  Not sure where Delaware gets its money but many are finding it a good place to retire. My friend will eventually stay here full time but as his partner is still working in DC they will have 2 houses. It is very nicely decorated and has a screened in porch overlooking dense woods. We took a walk on the beach as the sun was setting. Very nice

Mutant barn swallow nest

While waiting on Josh's porch he other day, I looked up in horror to see what I thought at first glance was a hornets' nest. But it was made from mud, not paper. His resident barn swallows have had bad luck building nests: two earlier attempts resulted in the nest falling down, the last time with young babies in it. With  this bizarre nest, they were able to raise 2 babies to adulthood. Never saw one like it before.

Daniel is to keep an illustrated diary over the summer. This is his entry concerning the mosquito larvae in my fountain. He is 6, soon to be 7.

my morning glories live for an hour tops

when pigs fly

By this time tomorrow, I will be half way to DC hopefully. I assume Monday, once the traffic clears, we will be on our way to the Delaware coast. Excited but I am always afraid I am forgetting something. I thought I was to be crossing the Chesapeake Bridge that goes on forever and disappears in midstream into a tunnel looking like you are diving headfirst in your car into the abyss but it turns out there are two Chesapeake Bay bridges and I will be taking the more boring one which isn't even as long as the Mackinaw Bridge.

The only chance for rain for a 10 day period dove south of us. Dry as a bone here but at least a bit of the heat cleared.

My nails are now a bright reddish orange with sparkles. I'll be stylin' on the coast.

Not sure of my internet situation outside of DC

Back to packing

The matzoh ball makers

The girls had a sleepover here last night. Here they are trying their hands at matzoh ball making. Note huge variation in size of finished products. Did they want to eat the find product? Nah. I took a quart of the soup over ot my friend battling  graft versus host issues

Yep is hot and humid here. I looked up the weather for my beach vacation next week: highs are 5-10 cooler but the lows aren't as low as here

Could you believe someone threw out this 7 foot  sailfish? After it is cleaned up, it will live on the basement walls

The girls love to play dress up

And play computer games

Very pretty Murano glass free form dish. yeah, it is pink but looks fine on top of the orange marble

How to entertain 2 little girls when it s too hot to play outside? Let them run wild in the basement, watch The Minions on TV, make matzoh balls, eat fun meals, pick grandma's squash and tomatoes, play dress up, play on the iPad. What they didn't want to do is sleep...it was just too exciting being with each other.

This has been the hottest summer in a long time. I don't think it reached 90 at all for the past 2 years. I have to run as soon as there is a little light so not to bake. And no rain.

Yesterday, Daniel told me I had tadpoles in my small fountains I have on the porch.  Ugh, not tadpoles but squiggly mosquito larvae. It takes 3 days from eggs to adult so I dumped all the water out. I regularly replace the birdbath water (birds gotta drink too) but my now frog free pond, no thanks to the snake, probably has wigglers in it too. I put in bleach and now am careful to aerate the pond so those things will die.

I got word today that my uncle, who I visited 2 months ago died at 92. Sad.

The color orange

my living room and dining room are mostly orange and blue

this used to hang outside at my old house. I don't have many places to hang things outside here

solar chicken ad one of the many patches of orange cosmos

orange glad though  swear I bought all red. The others seem to be orange too

Steve's bitmoji

I feel like I am playing hookie not exercising in the morning. But this afternoon I am meeting up with the bicycle posse in a state park near Josh's assuming my bike rack will work. Or I can shove it into my larger car. It will be hot but it is shaded and near lakes. I will wear my neck cooler, a cotton bag full of gel that holds water as an evaporative cooler. Plus if we go more than 15 miles, I will be surprised though I have to ride 2-3 miles from Josh's (and then back)

I have done nothing with my family tree awaiting cooler weather in which I don't have competing activities. Since they were able to correctly identify some of my 6th cousins just by little snippets of DNA, identifying a half sister should be no problem. I have a good friend who was adopted. Her parents went on to have 5 biological children. Her mom once told her that her adopted dad was actually her biological dad. He presumably had an affair with a woman who had no interest  in raising the resulting child. Her adoptive mom agreed to raise her as her own. Problem is, adoptive dad denied the whole story. Her sister is hesitant to do her DNA as she thinks my friend will be devastated if there is no biological bond. But my friend wants answers even though there is a chance she will be heart broken.

Sunflowers and others

Frains Lake early morning on my ride

my bitemoji looking annoyed

Dont'tae's experimenting with Snapchat

What is this? A safflower. A big sack of seeds is developing under the flower. As it is not near the bird feeders, I assume the chipmunk or squirrel buried the seeds and forgot about it. The bird store told me that cardinals love safflower (3x the price of sunflower seeds) and that rodents hate them. Not true.

Portuguese gelato flower. One of my nieces is in Portugal

Balloon flower

Momma turkey and her nine turkey teenagers on my bike ride

Purple loosestrife. Pretty but an invasive weed

This field of sunflowers was near my new friend's. I could see it off her deck

Well it finally did rain, which was badly needed, Saturday cooling things off for just a little bit but now, we are back to being in a furnace. I do not do well in heat. We still could have swam at our pool party that afternoon as the lightning had stopped but the cool air dissuaded some (I am sure the water was still plenty warm).

Instead we sat on the deck drinking and acting silly like designing bit emojis for each other well into the night.Still it was fun. Thunder and flashes of light were off in the distance. The Maltese Lost has two dogs, her babies. One of them is a 120 pound golden retriever who is extremely upset by thunder. His first reaction is to jump into a human's lap for comfort which is crushing. They bought a 'thunder suit' for him that compresses his body and provides comfort. The thunder continued most of the day and night and he really needed to go outside. It was fun watching her trying to lure him out with various treats (he does like to eat too). Outside is where the thunder is. But he finally peed a day's worth and was well rewarded for braving the outside.

She lives about an hour from me. Sort of scary navigating the very rural, unfamiliar roads in the rain and extreme darkness. My 'check tire pressure' light was on. Should I stop at a gas station ?(assuming I could find one? It didn't seem to affect my steering so I pressed onward. Do I take this car with the dicey tires to DC this week? It gets better mileage and better radio or do I take our older, but much less miles, comfortable big car. Maybe I will load up the big car with Italian tapes to refresh my skills.

Sunday morning, back on the saddle. I didn't do my 'big' ride sticking to the area for 22 miles. I got a late start as it was very late when I came home the night before. Later Josh and Allie came over. Too hot to stay outside but it is nice and cool in the basement and plenty of things there fto amuse Allie.