Detroit

Our first real driving vacation. We so enjoyed our fall color trips to northern Michigan, that we planned and took a longer circle through New England. We stopped for baseball games, presidential graves, the Baseball Hall-of-Fame in Cooperstown and Montreal. Bon Voyage!

Day 1

Detroit to Cooperstown, NY

Millard Fillmore Gravesite, Hollywood Cemtary, Buffalo NY

We left our house before 5am, and again underestimated how close we lived to Buffalo. We had breakfast in St Catharines, and were in Buffalo before 10am. The Forest Lawn Cemetery was amazing, with many strange and outrageous headstones. We quickly found Millard Fillmore and were on our way.

We drove across the New York thruway, stopping for lunch and dinner and arrived in Cooperstown, NY after dark. We stayed at a small mom-and-pop motel because "chains" (like the Holiday Inn) wanted $75 a night! We were so very young.

Our Links:

Forest Lawn Cemetery
Millard Fillmore

Day 2

Cooperstown, NY to Albany

We woke up in Cooperstown, and enjoyed free coffee and donuts. The motel was a few miles from town, overlooking a lake draped in spectacular fall colors.

We spent several hours at the Baseball Hall-of-Fame, walked ourselves weary. Then drove off toward Albany, using "blue highways" and enjoying the beautiful foilage.

We found a motel in Albany, and drove around town. Of course, Dave got us lost and Lyn was so young as to be totally panic-stricken. What a site we must have been.

We eventually found the "Rural cemetery" and Chester Arthur, then had dinner and headed to bed.

Dave at the Grave of Chester Arthur, Albany NY

Day 3

Albany to Boston

We were out the door early, and headed for nearby Kinderhook and Martin Van Buren's grave. We quickly found the cemetery, and took too much time to take a detail tour of his house, "Lindenwald". The guide was informative, but the information was not that interesting to us. Dave wanted to detour down to FDR at Hyde Park, but Lyn was insistant about heading for Boston.

We arrived in Boston in the heart of rush hour. Using only a small map and no experience, we accidentally headed to Lexington and stayed at an expensive flea-bag motel (and ate dinner at Dennys!).

We visited the Minute Man statue at the Lexington and Concord site during the filming of reenacters dressed in colonial costume. Years later, on a return visit, we actually got to see the film shown at the visitor center.