Where in the World is Rebecca Today?

When we were planning Tim’s visit, we decided to go away for a week of sightseeing outside of my local area. Our choices were pretty wide, but we needed to be able to move around via public transportation, since I knew we wouldn’t be able to borrow my mom’s car for a whole week away (I sold my car in July 2008), and a rental car would have been too expensive. We settled on taking a trip down to the nation’s capital, Washington,DC since we could take a train from Lancaster to Philadelphia, and then Philadelphia to DC. We also entertained the idea of going down to Orlando to visit my cousins, but I think the heat intimidated Tim a bit!

Anything in DC was going to be expensive, so I put on my research hat. I first loaded the Washington Metro website and then opened my regular search engines for hotels (Travelocity, Priceline, Orbitz, Hotels.Com, etc.) I cross referenced the search results with the Metro map to help find a hotel near a Metro stop, and the name Vienna stuck out at me. My friend Maggie used to work in Vienna (and as it turns out, we stayed at a hotel directly across the street from where her wedding reception was! I completely forgot!), so I started checking Vienna hotels.

The Vienna Wolf Trap Hotel stuck out at me, because I’ve been to concerts at Wolf Trap (for BNL, I know you’re not surprised!). A check on Trip Adviser gave out mixed reviews, but it still had an overall customer rating of 4/5. Then, I checked the hotel’s website directly and I was pleasantly surprised to find a summer special - rooms for $69/night! WOAH! So, we booked it. The person I spoke with on the phone was a really nice man named Jeff who answered all my questions and told me the Metro stop was about a mile away, and I was able to book us a room with a mini fridge and microwave to help save on food costs, too.

The hotel itself is pretty standard. It has a motel set up where the doors all lead directly to the outside. Two buildings of three floors. No attached restaurant, but there was a Mexican place next door, and several other restaurants all within walking distance. There also was a 7-11 and a grocery store nearby. We were told our stay included breakfast in the morning, which was served from 6am until 9:30AM.

The room was pretty basic. Two Queen-sized beds, a large TV, a table/desk, a fridge, microwave, and coffee pot…but only one chair. The toilet and shower were in the bathroom, but the sink was at a separate vanity outside the bathroom. The sink was a little dingy and miscoloured with cracked enamel, but fortunately the shower was clean. And boy, did they have lots of TV channels! The hotel had more channels than Comcast in Lancaster has!

The air conditioning really worked overtime in our room, too. We finally learned to leave it set somewhere between the cold and hot dial in order to make it comfortable, otherwise we started to freeze overnight!

Other hotel amenities left something to be desired. The cleaning service wasn’t all that great and several times they failed to replenish the cups for the coffee pot. Fortunately we were able to make do with what we had. But they did make the bed and provide clean towels every day, so that really was my only complaint. Breakfast….left a LOT. They converted the hotel room next to the lobby into the breakfast area, with 2 tables to sit at and a long table for the food. Our choices? Coffee, Sunny Delight (yes, Sunny D. Not OJ), bagels & donuts from Dunkin Donuts, bread (for toast), and a few sad looking pieces of fruit. They also provided cream cheese, butter, and jelly. Not exactly the greatest breakfast in the world, but it was enough to keep us going until Lunch, so really, that was all that mattered. It’s just funny comparing it with the hotel breakfasts I got used to in the UK (a hot breakfast, usually full English).

We only had one problem during our stay. There was a really bad thunderstorm, and it managed to knock out the keycard system at the hotel. There was only one person on desk, so he had to run around to let everyone back into their rooms each time someone wanted in. He also had to create new keycards for every single room that was occupied and had to call each room to tell the occupant when to come pick up their new key.

The walk to the station was long. Longer than one mile, I don’t care what they said. My pedometer (now lost in DC) said 1.46 by the time we got to the station. Fortunately, in the mornings there is a Fairfax Connector bus you can take, and it also runs in the evenings, but more about that in a different post. A taxi ride was just around the $7 mark. There also were several Metro busses that passed near the hotel, but none of the routes and times seemed to work for us. The Metro busses also seemed to take the long way around to get to the stations, and we really didn’t want to spend 45 minutes on a bus, when the Metro ride was about 40-45 minutes into DC.

If we were going back to DC again, I think we’d probably stay there again, now that we know what times the Connector runs. The price was right, and the addition of the microwave/fridge meant that we saved on food 2 days (which was good, considering one of our days we ate out with friends twice!), and had a place to keep a gallon jug of water cold to refill our bottles in the morning.

Our total bill for the 4-night stay including tax was $303. I’d say it was a pretty good deal!

As some of you might know, Tim is traveling across the pond to visit me for three weeks in July and August. Being a British bloke, he’s not used to the really hot summers we can have in Pennsylvania, so I’ve been trying to prepare him. Today, for example, it was 30C in Lancaster, PA. While we were on the phone (Skype), I googled “average temperatures july lancaster pa” to try and give him a decent taste on what the weather would be like.

I stumbled upon the “World Guide to Lancaster, PA”. Where do I begin on how inaccurate this website is? We can start with the website suggesting that Zoo America is located in Lancaster, when it is in fact located in Hershey, PA, about a half-hours drive. Or how about how it claims that you’ll get views of the countryside, but most of the hotels are downtown. No, I know. Let’s look at the photos. You know, the main item on the webpage that is supposed to grab people’s attention and make them want to visit the town your site is showcasing.

Photo 1 - The center square in Lancaster, PA. Nothing wrong here.
Photo 2 - The side of Central Market, the oldest market in the United States. Again, nothing wrong.
Photo 3 - “Lancaster Castle Prison”

Uhm, what?

That castle you’re looking at? Is this castle:

(image provided by Wikipedia)

That castle is in fact, Lancaster Castle. In Lancaster. However, it’s not in Lancaster, PA. Heck, it’s not even in the United States. Nope. It’s in Lancaster, United Kingdom.

The “Lancaster Castle Prison” is this building:

(image provided by Wikipedia)

Which is an actual county prison. The only way you’re visiting it is if you’ve broken the law.

Now, both Wikipedia entries for Lancaster Castle and Lancaster County Prison as well as the Lancaster County Prison’s website claim the Lancaster County Prison was modeled after Lancaster Castle. Personally, I can’t really see it as being an “exact replica”, but it’ll do nicely as a homage. Still though, I can’t quite justify showing an image of a castle on a tourism website that is located in another country.

I can see tourists wanting to see “the castle” and being directed over to the prison and soon being disappointed that it’s not the castle pictured on the website. Uh, sure, just drive to the Atlantic Ocean, swim for about 3,000 miles, then travel halfway up the UK to get to it.

Today (well, Friday), my mom and I went to apply for her first passport. The only traveling outside of the US she had done in the past was to Canada, which formerly only required a driver’s license. I’ve had a passport since I was a minor, and was able to renew my passport as an adult since my former passport was less than 15 years old, so I was unfamiliar with the process for applying. To assist my mom, and so I’d know what to expect, I started reading up on all the current requirements on the Department of State’s website. A few things I learned today I thought I’d pass on to you, some of which are not on the DOS webpage:

1. Make sure you have a valid birth certificate. Your birth certificate needs to have a raised seal on it and most likely comes from your state’s department of health. If you do not have a certified copy, you’ll need to get one. It will cost about US$10 (fee varies by state), and might require you to drive to an office to apply in person. We went to Harrisburg last year to get a certified copy of my mom’s birth certificate. It took us about an hour between filling out the form and waiting for it to be processed. (please note: this only refers to US citizens born in the United States. For details on how to apply as a naturalized citizen, you will need to check the Department of State website.)

2. Get your passport photos taken. If you are a member of AAA, you can get passport photos for free with AAA Plus, or for $6.99 as a regular member. This seems to be the cheapest way to get passport photos. Walgreens, CVS, etc. charge between $8-12. (Note: AAA price may vary by region, as a friend of mine has AAA Plus and was charged $8.99 for her photos two years ago in Upstate NY. We’re part of Central Penn AAA, so check with AAA first!)

3. Know your parent’s birth dates and birth places. We were shocked to find out that even as an adult, you still needed to fill out that section. We had to make an emergency call to one of my aunts because neither of us were positive we knew the town my Nanny was born in. Turns out, you only needed to know the county or state. The woman working behind the counter told us that some people just make a random guess because they don’t know and don’t think to call a relative.

4. If you are divorced or widowed, you still need to provide information about your former spouse. Their name, the date you got married, and the date you were divorced or became a widow. You do not need a copy of your marriage certificate, divorce decree, or spouse’s death certificate. Even if your birth certificate has your maiden name and you are applying in your married name. As long as your married name is also on your driver’s license, you do not need your marriage certificate for your first passport. You will, however, need it if you are changing your name on your existing passport after marriage. (Thanks to mirrajay on UK-Yankee for answering this for me!)

5. Your driver’s license needs to be at least six months old. If it’s new, then you either have to bring along your expired license, your social security card, or another form of ID. The woman behind the counter was explaining to the people ahead of us that this is to make sure people aren’t just getting an ID for the sake of applying for their passport.

6. You must apply in person for your first passport, and you have to pay a $25 fee on top of the $75 application. These fees are paid in separate transactions, and the $75 needs to be paid either by cheque or money order. Conveniently, the post office sells money orders if you do not have a chequing account.

And that’s about it. It literally took less than 15 minutes after Mom filled out the application to hand it in. We were told to expect her passport in 4-6 weeks. We’ll also get back her birth certificate, and apparently it might even be mailed out separately.

For more information about applying for a US Passport, please see the Department of State’s website.

Please note: All information in this post is current and valid as of 6/2009. If you are reading this post as an archived post, requirements may have changed, so please check the above website for more information.

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Today, I received this in my inbox:

Dear Ms. S,

I apologize for our vector security guard asking you to check in empty plastic bags at the customer service desk. I talked to the security guards supervisor, and made sure he covers with all of his guards, the necessary policies Weis Markets has, which doesn’t include empty bags.The next time you visit our store ask for me, Carl Zartman. I would like to meet you, and apologize in person. Thank you for your continued patronage.

Carl Zartman
Store Manager Weis #41
Phone [717] 392-6511

Good to know that barring reusable bags is NOT Weis policy and was just the security guard being a moron. I haven’t gone over to that Weis since the incident happened, but I suppose I’ll go over there next time and ask for Carl since he wants to apologize to me.

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This morning, my mom and I went to the Bird in Hand Farmer’s Market to pick up some vegetables. Since we were on that side of town, we decided we’d go over to the Strasburg Railroad and take a ride….only, we got to the parking lot and discovered that neither of us had managed to bring along a camera, so back home we went. We weren’t really planning on going back out today, but I was checking the Strasburg Railroad website to see what times the train was running on a Sunday, and discovered tonight was a Wine and Cheese train. I also discovered the Wine and Cheese train would be running on both our birthdays, but since Mom’s birthday is near Independence Day and my birthday is near Labour Day, we figured it’d be busy on those days, so we called up and got tickets for the 6PM train.

We boarded at gate “0″ and were at the back of the train for the ride over to Paradise. They brought around trays with cubes of cheese, grapes, and strawberries for us to get what we wanted. I think we had four choices of cheese, but by the time the tray got to us, there was only Gouda, Cheddar, and an herb cheese to pick from. Our crackers were from a small basket sitting on our table. 4 Carr’s Wafers and 2 wheat crackers for the two of us to share. We had a choice of 4 wines - Riesling, Chardonnay, Merlot, or Strasburg Red. I was a little disappointed there wasn’t a blush/pink option. A Zinfandel would have rounded out the choices nicely! We picked the Riesling for starters.

The train got going and it’s a fairly straight 20 minute ride through the Amish countryside between Strasburg and Paradise. We passed the Red Caboose Inn and the site of the Amazing Maize Maze (currently being grown), as well as several Amish and non-Amish farms. in Paradise, we briefly meet up with the Amtrak line and the engine loops around to hook onto the back to pull us back in the other direction, so for the ride back, we were now the first car.

While the engine was being moved, we were offered our second glass of wine (this time we picked the Strasburg Red) and the platter of grapes and cheese went around again. We happened to be in the middle of the car, so by the time the trays came by this time, it was really slim pickings! We each managed to find a few pieces of cheese and some grapes. We were not offered seconds on the crackers. The group sitting across from us decided to order non-alcoholic drinks. 2 colas and a bottle of water. I was surprised when the gentleman on the end got out his wallet and needed to pay for the drinks. I think it would have been nice if they offered the non-alcoholic beverages for free (or at least, offer free water) since you pre-paid for your wine and if you weren’t going to drink the second glass, why not?

The train soon re-attached and we were headed on our way back to Strasburg. They came around for a third time offering wine, and I decided to try a bit of the Chardonnay. Mom opted to skip on her third glass. This time, the grapes and cheese were not offered.

We made it back to Strasburg a little before 7PM, which leads me to believe we must not have left right at 6, since it’s supposed to be a 45 minute ride total.

After a visit to the restroom (I had to, I had too much wine in me!) and some more photos, we headed to the car and decided to round out our little trip with dinner at Willow Valley.

Amish Farmland

Shadow of the Engine on the way back.

More photos are available at my Facebook page, which can be found here.

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Tonight, my mom and I went over to the Weis Market in the Manor Shopping Center (Lancaster, PA). We usually grab one of the mini-carts and put our reusable bags on the bottom half while we shop. As we walked in the door, the security guard stationed by the door tried to tell us that we needed to leave our bag(s) with the customer service desk while we shopped. We explained to him that they were our grocery bags, and his comment back to us was “people still could use them to steal stuff”. The overall impression I got off this security guard was that he somehow thought Mom and I were going to steal groceries and that’s why we were bringing in bags. I’ve never felt so offended before going grocery shopping. If this is going to be a trend with that store, we simply won’t shop at it anymore!

And then when we were checking out…it seems to me that if you bring in your own bags, the cashier doesn’t make any moves to assist you with packing up your purchases. Even if they have finished ringing you up and you have paid and the remaining items are out of your reach. No, you must stretch yourself to try to push them down to where you can reach them.

I compare this type of service to the service I regularly received at Tesco in the UK. Never once were we stopped by anyone for bringing in reusable bags, in fact, they encourage reusable over plastic and offer you 3p off your order for every bag you bring in. If you need plastic bags, you need to ask the cashier to give you some. Also, as soon as you start packing your groceries, the cashier always asks if you need help packing and will do their best to ensure that you can reach all your purchases.

I could be looking at grocery shopping in the UK through rose coloured glasses, but I never came across a rude cashier or stocker in any of our trips to Tesco. Matter of fact, I even received help finding an item in the store from an employee who was off-duty doing her own shopping when she heard me tell Tim I couldn’t find an item off our list!

I wish Weis was more like Tesco (and I wish they didn’t charge over $7 for the tiniest bottle of Ribena you can get for under £1 in the UK!). I’ve also sent in a complaint via the Weis Market’s website. I had wanted to speak with the store manager, but there was a long line at customer service and only one woman behind the counter. I didn’t want to cause a huge fuss asking for a manager to complain to when clearly, they needed help dealing with all the customers.

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