Dover AFB

I have to say I was a bit disappointed in the base in Dover. It is one of the smallest bases I have been on. The base is split... one side of the highway has the housing area, the other has the rest of the base. There is one main road that has most of the buildings on it. There is a shopette, bowling alley, movie theater, commissary, and BX.

The base has a Family camp. It has only 10 sites, 3 are electric and water, 7 are full hookups. It is way at the end of base... after you go past the archery range, and firing range. It sits right on the end of the runway. Where we were staying we could look out our window and see the huge planes sitting right next to us. There was also an aero-club that has small planes. It sat next to the campground as well.

When we were there, the weather hovered at around 95 degrees... with about 95% humidity. The campground had a couple of trees, but for the most part there wasn't much shade. We ran the air conditioning in the motor home constantly, and it wasn't much help. The sun beat down on the motorhome and it got so hot! UGH!

The one saving grace was the pool on the housing side of base. There was a pool for the housing itself, but you had to be living in housing to swim. The other pool cost $3 per person per day, but it was open to anyone who had access to base. The pool was huge and had a great big water slide. We went there 3 times during the week we stayed in Dover.

Sky in line for the slide

Sky ready to jump in the 5' area

Splash!

Skyler and Liam's swimming got so much better this summer. They both basically got over their fear of the water and actually started to swim, tread water, and float. The slide dumped into the 5 ' part of the pool, so Liam chose to wear a lifejacket while going down it... but he would take it off and actually swim as well.

Liam giving me the thumbs up

from the top of the slide

Liam hitting the water

"That was AWESOME!"

I loved that every 45 minutes they had an adult swim! They made all the kids get out of the water, and no-one under 18 was allowed in the pool. It was great because I got a chance to swim and go down the slide. The kids didn't think it was that great... but they made the best of it by playing in the kiddie pool.

I know we will find cool things to do while in Delaware, when we are there. I have always found good things about every state we have visited or lived in. So... goodbye Delaware for now. We'll be back to explore!

Row, row, row the boat... out on Lewey Lake!

Before we left the Adirondacks, I wanted to stay in one of the state parks we saw while driving around. I thought it would be a good time to test the motorhome while "dry camping". Since we had problems with the battery keeping a charge, I wanted to make sure it was fixed and that the battery would provide enough power to dry camp.

(For those of you who do not camp, dry camping is when you camp with no water, electric, or sewer hookups.)

We decided to stay at Lewey Lake State Park. It is between Indian Lake and Speculator. What a great campground! Originally I had just thought we would stay one night, but we had so much fun we stayed two. The first night we stayed at a spot on the river off of the lake. It was gorgeous but pretty close to the road. For the second night, I moved us to the next spot over. It still had the great beach access but was a bit further away from the road.


Campsites on the water

Since we were dry camping, I decided we had to at least make ONE of our meals over the fire. Here is the meal... corn on the cob, rice, steak and foil chicken. It was good (if I do say so myself) and the kids even ate the food.


Cooking over the fire

There is a beach at the campground (with a life guard). The water was nice and clear. The swimming area had a nice sandy bottom... although it didn't get very deep. We enjoyed swimming both days we were there.


Obviously the ducks think they are above following the rules!



Making friends wherever they go

The campground rents out canoes, kayaks, and row boats. . The boys wanted to rent a canoe, but I thought a row boat would be better. I remembering a certain canoe trip, in the rain, when we were going around in circles because I couldn't paddle well enough to keep up. (SORRY DAD!) We took the boat out to a little island and around the lake. We docked it at our campsite and later rowed it back to the beach and went swimming.

Skyler did a good job rowing

Liam - "this is harder than it looks!"

Docking the boat at our campsite

The ducks came into the weeds near our site to look for bugs. The boys wanted to feed them, so I let them. Obviously they are used to humans feeding them, because within seconds we were over-run with ducks!

What do you feed the ducks? Quackers of course!

Rascal didn't mind the ducks coming up to the campsite. He did, however, have an issue with the bull frogs. He really didn't know what to make of them! It was so funny watching him. He would hear them and he would whip his head around and look... then he would run to the end of his leash and stand there staring at the water.

Rascal trying to figure out where all the noise was coming from

The only complaint I had about the campground was that the available shower house was out near some of the campsites that lined the road and not in the main section of the campground. Other than that, it was really nice. I would recommend it and would go back again!

http://www.dec.ny.gov/outdoor/24475.html

I will close the blog with some pictures I took through the time we were there. Enjoy the view... we did!

Who turned on the heat???

UUGGHH! One of the things I actually liked about Albuquerque? NO HUMIDITY!


It has been very hot and humid in New York. I am really glad there is a pool at our campground!

The first few days we were here, it was fairly chilly. The kids still insisted on swimming. The water was SO cold! When I told Liam that he needed to come out of the pool because his lips were blue, he had this to say....

"The bottom of the pool is blue. What you are seeing is the reflection of the pool on my mouth."

What a kid!!!





Over the last few days it has been so hot that the water in the pool has warmed up. Two days ago I actually put on my swimsuit and joined the kids in the pool for a while. Of course it's been a while since I was swimming. I ended up with a nice sunburn on my shoulders and chest.

Today the water was almost 80 degrees... but it still felt a lot cooler than the 93 that showed for the temperature outside today. I decided to join the kids for a swim again... and this time? I remembered the sunscreen!