I Want to Ride My Bicycle

Retiring to Lewes has opened up a slew of opportunities that we didn't have when we lived in The Mushroom Capital of the World. One of them is the ability to ride a bike  for miles and not encounter a hill. Those of you that follow me on Facebook will see my almost daily Endomondo posts of our bike rides. 3 miles is our minimum distance that we have to ride. We call it "Doing Bay Avenue."

Starting at the beach house we ride Cedar Street to its end at Roosevelt Inlet. Then turning around we ride back Bay Avenue, since it is one way going east. 3 miles. 210 calories. Boom.

When going on a longer ride we almost always "do Bay Avenue" first, then head off to where ever we are headed for the day. Today for example, after Bay Ave. We headed up and over the Drawbridge, down Pilottown Road to where it ends at Roosevelt Inlet. Pilottown parallels Cedar on the other side of the canal. From there we go out through the new park, past the wind turbine on UD's campus, then we head into town.

Since today's loop was about 9 miles and we were in town, we decided to Reward ourselves with a late lunch and a margarita at Agave, which is one of the many restaurants in Lewes. Agave at dinnertime is usually packed out with an hour and a half to two hour wait. Going in for a late lunch or very early dinner around 2 or 3 will usually get you a table without any wait. That was our fortune today.
We were seated right away. We both ordered one of their signature Margaritas and then got serious about lunch. The Wise and Wonderful Jillo ordered Chicken Enchiladas and I had Fish Tacos.  Both were excellent and we had great service.  After lunch we had a mile to go to get back to the beach house. Throwing our bikes on the rack we headed for home.

On Gordon's Pond Trail

On other days we will do the 18 mile Lewes to Rehoboth Loop utilizing both the Gordon's Pond Trail and the Junction and Breakwater Trail. This is another great ride that is nice and flat. The nearly 20 miles takes very little toll on our old retired bodies. The Jill and Bill Biking Rewards Plan allows for lunch at The Greene Turtle whenever we make the trek into Rehoboth.

The Junction Breakwater Trail

I am tempted to ride from home to the beach house a distance of only 8 miles. The problem with this ride is we have a couple of miles of back roads with no shoulders, a gazillion construction sites, and crossing Route 1 to get to the beach side. Maybe someday. But for now, it's easy to throw the bikes on the car and drive over there.... and probably safer too.... and I am okay with that.

The Boardwalk in Rehoboth

Today's lunch at Agave. Fish Tacos and Chicken Enchiladas

Whose Woods These Are?

In the 8 months that have passed since I last posted (the highway to hell is now several lanes wide) our lives have changed dramatically. Jessie and Garrett decided to put the Benjamonkey into daycare for the 2014-2015 school year. While we would surely miss him it was really a good move for many reasons. One of them being it allowed us to stay at the beach for the fall. The school year started and we changed our location to Lewes. We choose to stay in the little back house and decided to have new flooring put into the dining room and bedroom. We also decided to paint the walls, since they were paneled  back in the 70s and untouched since then.

The first of our many trips to Lowe's found us sorting through hundreds of paint chips, while Jill agonized over the correct shade of yellow or blue that would go into each room. Let me say here, that I hate to paint. Always have. Always will. So I am not an agonizer. I can be happy with white walls.
Needless to say we found the right colors, plunged into the task and realized that 40 year old paneling is as thirsty as a man lost in the desert. The second lesson we learned was to use a good primer.

As September and October passed, we painted and floored and fished our way through the fall. Then, as we approached November we realized that we really didn't want to go home. So we contacted a realtor and began our search for a house close to the beach that could become our retirement home. Since we share the beach house with my sisters moving there was not a possibility. We found that the further you were from the beach the less expensive the houses were. We also learned that if you were east of Route 1, the main highway here in Lower Slower Delaware, houses were $200,000 more expensive than for a comparable house west of the highway. We settled on west of the highway.

Thanksgiving weekend found us traveling to Lewes, meeting with a realtor and looking at 10 houses on that Friday. The list was narrowed to two houses, that coincidentally had the same floor plan. One had a sunroom and a deck. The other had hardwood floors and granite counters in the kitchen. Decisions, decisions. We had dinner at the Rose and Crown in Lewes and mulled over our options.

Saturday morning found us going back to look at our choices in a different light. After a slight detour from the plan, (we almost built in a new construction development) we chose the house with the sunroom, deck, and 150 acres of woods behind it. And after living here for 3 months, we have no regrets.

So whose woods these are? I think I know. I looked it up on the Sussex County Tax maps, and the 150 acres are divided between two large parcels. We have seen deer, foxes, wild turkeys, squirrels, and birds. My quest is to get a picture of the Pileated Woodpecker that frequents these woods, but is quite elusive. So while we are living near the beach, it is just 7 miles away, we love our little house in the big woods. Oh yeah, and I own the first 50 feet into them .... And I am okay with that.