I have to say, I’m pretty impressed with the fact that we made it 24 days before we had to sleep in our car. Let’s just hope that it’s the only time! Mike’s an Eagle Scout – surely he had to earn a badge for putting up tents in inclement weather or something like that. If not, it’s high time that was added to the curriculum!
We were meeting up with Jen and Matt in Syracuse in the afternoon, so we decided to take the scenic route across the Empire State (which is apparently what New York is calling itself these days.) That meant driving through the Adirondacks. I had found a breakfast place that looked like it had potential in Lake Saranac, so we headed there first. When we pulled into the parking lot, a couple that was coming out of the restaurant told us that the food was awful! Wow! Thanks random strangers! On to plan B. We had seen this little place called DJ’s Rustic Restaurant a few miles back, so we headed there. We sure are glad that we did! It was definitely their house that had been (sort of) remodeled into a restaurant. It was clearly a mother-daughter duo, and the food was delicious and cheap. Awesome!
After breakfast, we headed for Lake Placid – to see where the Olympics had been. It’s really cute and pretty and the road only has two lanes and they were backed up on a Saturday morning, so it must have really sucked during the Olympics!
Here’s the thing about the Adirondacks; there are lots of lakes and forests, and after a while, they all look the same. Every lake has a town stretched along one of it’s banks, and it’s very cute and charming. The forests all look the same after a while. Yeah, we were kind of bored. Mike was tired and grouchy after sleeping in the car, and even the ice cream we got at Hoss’s corner in one of those random towns failed to cheer him up. Oh well.
We arrived in Syracuse a little later than Jen and Matt, so we went straight to downtown to check out the Niagara Mohawk Power building, which is this crazy art deco place that looks like something out of a Batman movie. It’s pretty cool. We took a lot of pictures.
Next on the list was Dinosaur BBQ, which Matt said was the best ever. I have to say, it was pretty darn good! We rank it second amongst the places we’ve stopped at so far. (First is that place that was in someone’s house, and third is Lexington BBQ in case you’re curious.) Yeah, it was awesome.
Stuffed with BBQ, we headed for Buffalo. We took a more scenic route than we had originally planned (that’s my way of saying we missed a turn somewhere) and arrived in Buffalo rather late. Jen and Matt were nice enough to let us mooch off their hotel room and so we got to spend a luxurious night on our air mattress on their hotel room floor. (Next time we travel around Memorial Day, we will make reservations for places to stay ahead of time!!!)
Today we’re going to see Niagara Falls and then crash a pig roast that some of Matt’s friends are having. It should be awesome!