Sunday, August 02, 2009

Postcard from the Choptank

Mama Wordbones and I have been enjoying our mini vacations this summer. While we’ve scaled down our vacation spending this year we haven’t really scaled down the fun. Last weekend we were up in the hills of western Maryland and this weekend we’re down on the eastern shore on the banks of the Choptank River. We’re becoming a regular poster couple for Maryland tourism!
Our original thought was to go for a long weekend “downy oshun” but we weren’t able to get two weekend nights at any place we liked. Something about it being high season I suppose. Mama Wordbones mentioned the Hyatt Chesapeake in Cambridge as an alternative and I jumped right at it. We stayed here once before back in January of 2004. It was shortly after the resort was opened on the grounds of the former Cambridge State Hospital.

Staying in the summertime is an all together different experience. The place is full but it’s still very comfortable. Yesterday we went off reservation and took our bikes on short ride over to the town of Cambridge. Because of my crack navigational skills we ended up on the far side of the wrong side of town. We worked our way back into Cambridge from the southern end of High Street. There is a striking economic contrast between the southern end of High Street and High Street north of downtown.

At one point, when I finally broke down and asked for directions we had a remarkable encounter. We approached a guy for who was standing on the corner with a megaphone, cajoling passersby to help support the homeless shelter fish fry going on in the lot behind him.

He immediately zeroed in on Mama Wordbones John Carroll University baseball cap.

“Where’d you that hat?”

The man with the megaphone was Frank Stout. Frank is a Cambridge Commissioner for the Third Ward. He is also a fellow alumi. I don’t often run into fellow Blue Streaks so it’s always a kick when it occurs.

He got us headed in the right direction to get back on the reservation.

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