Day 82 - "Where are we?" "New JoiZee"

Having shared a single curry last night, this morning I was ready to abuse the breakfast buffet. It didn’t let us down, it was delicious, possibly the best yet, English Muffins, cereal, fruit & decent coffee.

Whilst we were giving it our best shot, three lads turned up to join us (on another table). I thought I saw them checking in the night before with musical instruments. Two wore scruffy rock t-shirts & the third had long blond flowing hair & was wearing a black velvet shirt & black skinny jeans. It didn’t take much to work out who was the lead singer.

If confirmation was needed the receptionist, approached them & asked the necessary questions. It turned out it was Kyle Daniel & his band from Nashville, who were playing a couple of gigs in Annapolis. The other two were his drummer & bass player. Kyle has a few good songs to his name, check them out on Spotify or YouTube.

Having consumed as much as we could, we returned to our room to decide what we were going to do & more importantly, where we were going to stay for the next four nights. It wasn’t easy, because prices were exorbitant on the East Coast of America at the weekend.

After looking at hundreds of locations & permutations, we decided on going to Cape May in New Jersey. The plan was to find somewhere there, stay four days on the beach & then drive to JFK Airport on our final day.

Off we set, with Kyle Daniel on the stereo. We headed north crossing the Severn River Bridge, then very shortly we were on the understated ‘William Preston Lane Jr Memorial Bridge’, which crossed Chesapeake Bay. The SatNav was programmed to head north via Middle Town in Delaware, but it dropped out & when Jackie re-set it, it took us in the opposite direction to a ferry port called Lewis. Granted it was the ‘shortest’ route, but the ferry only sailed a couple of times a day, we hadn’t got a reservation & I’m not sure the front bumper of Doodle could cope with boarding a ferry.

Unfortunately we didn’t realise this re-routing until we were deep into corn 🌽 fields in the countryside of the border lands of Maryland & Delaware. When we did realise, with a few choice expletives, we drove through the arse end of nowhere to get back on to our intended route.

After passing through the sleepy Maryland towns of Denton, Greensboro, Henderson & the State Border Town of Marydel (Original name!) we arrived in Delaware. Our new route took us through Dover, Smyrna, Middletown (where we joined our intended route) then crossed the Delaware Memorial Bridge into New JoiZee. We followed the 55 south through Vineland (Jackie was hoping it was full of wine) to Cape May.

We drove around Cape May & it was delightful, an upmarket Worthing or Eastbourne, but with a sandy beach. Unfortunately it was out of our price range! By the way, it was our first glimpse of the Atlantic Ocean. We had ‘Historically’ driven from the West Coast to the East Coast of the USA & a lot in between!

After a bit of research on Booking.com & other such websites, we identified a possible suitable motel just up the Atlantic Coast in Wildwood Crest. Half an hour later, we pulled up outside & it seemed fine, next to the beach & WOW it had gone down $50 to stay for the next 4 nights. Result!

Alas, Jackie wanted to research all the other accommodation in the area, so I drove around in circles, while Jackie established that everywhere else was too expensive. We popped to a liquor store for some beers & eventually agreed that the original motel, Beau Rivage Beach Resort was our best option . We pulled up outside the Beau Rivage Beach Resort only to discover that the room we were looking at was unavailable & there was just one room now available, with a sea view for an eye-watering extra $125 per night. I was furious, apparently it wasn’t Jackie’s fault.

Jackie, possibly feeling slightly guilty, went into the reception only to be told what we already knew. We both sat in the car tapping furiously on our phones waiting for some divine inspiration, when suddenly our prayers were answered. The room we wanted was back on the market at the discounted price. I immediately booked it & I went into reception to get our room keys.

It was very confusing, but I think that the person who had booked our room had had some problem with payment. I paid up & we were in. Yippee!

It sounds like we had just secured bargain of the century, no, we are in the equivalent of Torremolinos in Spain or Faliraki in Greece. There are lots of chavs, but we will hopefully experience a true American summer holiday. By the way, literally everyone smokes & permanently has a fag in their mouth except me (& occasionally Jackie!). We have 3 generations of Mexicans in the room next to us! I am saying hello to absolutely everyone to avoid upsetting anyone!!

We ventured on to the beach, it’s wide & will enjoy our Walmart camping chairs. We then sniffed out the only decent eatery within walking distance, Fitzpatrick’s Crest Tavern. It was a proper American bar, that served food. We had a pint & an appetiser each. I had boneless chicken dippers & Jackie had a massive bowl of mussels. It was perfect & we have already planned to go back there every night.

Walking home we said hello to a lady out walking her dog, who informed us that at 10.00pm, there would be a Fireworks display at the other end of the beach. It wasn’t Newick, but it made for a nice end to the evening.

Song of the Day - Keep on Rollin’ by Kyle Daniel.Read more