Jamie Thingelstad

Just because I’m on vacation doesn’t mean that “geeking on the ‘puter” stops. I’m happy to report that I was able to successfully install Windows Vista RC 1 (Build 5600) on my MacBook using Parallels (Release Candidate, Build 1898). This is the first time I’ve been able to make this work. There was no magic involved, the latest release of Parallels offers Vista as an “experimental” option in the drop downs. I mounted the ISO image in the virtual machine, booted and installed.

It works just fine. You don’t get Aero Glass, but you do get Aero. Haven’t played with it much, don’t expect I will until I return from vacation. However, I’m glad this configuration finally works.

Here’s a big bummer.

Last night while driving back to the hotel getting ready to put Mazie down a car was trying to run the light as it turned red. The other car was turning left onto my street, I was going straight. I honked and the other driver slowed, but did not come to a complete stop. Luckily the other driver slowed to probably less than 5 mph. Very unluckily, the other driver was uninsured and I’m probably going to get stuck with the repair costs or face my insurance going up since I actually used it. [Insert rant here about the scam that the insurance industry is.]

The damage is to the rear lower panel on the passenger side. It’s totally drivable, thankfully. The other car hit the wheel and then scraped the crap out of the panel.

The even bigger bummer is that the panel that got dinged up is the entire rear bumper. I imagine they are going to have to replace the whole thing which will add up quickly.

Today we ventured out of Asheville again and went to Chimney Rock Park. The park was pretty cool. We did a short hike to the base of a 400 foot waterfall. Mazie did really good in the carrier, although we failed her by not bringing warm enough clothes. We had to bug out pretty quickly since Mazie was cold.

We also went to the North Carolina Arboretum in the afternoon. It was nice. They had a great bonsai exhibit that I really enjoyed. Mazie enjoyed running around for an extended period of time.

We have moved to a different hotel for this last night in Asheville. This hotel is much better equipped for Mazie and we are hoping she gets a good nights sleep. I didn’t need to put tinfoil on the windows here. 🙂

Lastly, I updated the Google Earth file with our Asheville adventures. Load the Great Adventure KMZ file to check out where we’ve been.

Add link.

Go to day: 3, 4, 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37 or East Coast Adventure collection.

Today we left Asheville and headed into the mountains. We drove about 30 miles northwest of Asheville to Hot Springs, NC. Hot Springs is one of the cities that the Appalachian Trail goes right through the middle of. The sidewalk that is on the main street of Hot Springs has “AT” trail blazes embedded right into the cement. Our visit was more to the AT than to Hot Springs, so Mazie loaded up into the kid carrier and we headed out for the trail.

I knew we weren’t going to get much of a hike in. I figured Mazie would make it an hour in the carrier and she did just about that. She did a great job walking by herself on the flats. She navigated the roots like a star and looked smashing in her bright green fury jacket.

It was fun to be on the AT and hiking with the white “blazes” of the AT in sight. Honestly the trail was no different than any other hiking trail we could have been on. However, this one could take you all the way to Maine if you just kept on walking. How cool is that?

Go to day: 3, 4, 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37 or East Coast Adventure collection.

Ever since we’ve arrived in Asheville, Mazie has had a horrible time sleeping. She’s just screamed all the time in her crib and for the first time ever she has been waking up in the middle of the night and we’ve had to bring her to bed with us where she proceeds to kick us and wake up constantly making everyone unhappy.

The sleep issues have driven her father to the brink. I left the grocery store tonight with two 50 foot rolls of tinfoil. You bet, tinfoil! I’m determined to get this kid to sleep better. The room she was trying to sleep in was too bright. So there I was at 7:00pm tonight slapping tinfoil on all the windows to black out the room. I have to admit that I felt a little crazy while doing it.

So far it’s worked. She went down on her own (first time in Asheville!) and is still asleep. I only hope that she makes it the whole night. Oh please, oh please…

Update: While the blacking out of the windows did get Mazie to go to sleep on her own, it didn’t solve the problem of sleeping through the night. She woke up at 3:30am and would not get back in her crib. After 30 minutes of attempting to calm her I brought her back to bed with us.

It’s now the 25th day that we’ve been “on the road”. For me, this now marks the longest I’ve ever been away from home. While it’s not a huge deal, I do miss the creature comforts and the simple familiarity of your own domicile. Traveling is always a bit stressful. Yes it is fun and all, but I find that I never really relax. Even now, sitting in the hotel unwinding and tapping on this laptop it’s not like if I were at home doing the same thing.

However hard the travel may be for me though, it’s peanuts to what it’s like for Mazie. We are still just getting going on the vacation part of our trip but Mazie is taking a while to get used to it. The biggest problem by far is sleep. She just isn’t getting enough of it. And as anyone with kids knows, a lack of sleep results in a very unhappy baby, and equally unhappy Mom’s and Dad’s.

At home Mazie is a great sleeper. You put her in her crib at bedtime and she just goes to sleep. On the road, she screams. And screams. And screams. Getting her to sleep is an accomplishment of it’s own. Tonight we let her cry for 10 minutes (blood curdling, shaking the other hotel rooms kind of crying) and after that I went in and held her in the bed while she fell asleep and then moved her to her crib. Last night she woke up at 2:00am, ready to go. Wide awake. Oh, and screaming. I brought her to bed and she finally went back to sleep in our bed, but it was a long night for everyone.

She has refused to take a nap anywhere other than her car seat since we left Minnesota. This issue highlights one of my pet peeves on toll roads. While driving on the toll roads Mazie would be sleeping away, ever so happy, then we’d have to stop for a toll. As soon as the van came to a complete stop she’d wake up and it took some extra special quiet to get her to go to sleep again. Usually she was then up and ready to complain about the car seat. Toll roads and sleeping babies do not mix!

The hotel we are staying in has three rooms, but unfortunately the only door is to the bedroom. Tonight we put her in our bedroom to see if that works better. I sure hope it does, the meltdown that took place at 3:00pm today doesn’t need to be repeated. This afternoon’s meltdown included a full on screaming festival followed by rubbing food into her hair. Tammy’s looking at other hotel options now, just in case.

We have arrived in Asheville! We got going quickly this morning and clicked off the last 4 hours of the drive pretty fast. Mazie was kind enough to sleep for nearly two hours, so it all went pretty fast. We arrived in Asheville around noon and decided to head straight to the Biltmore Estate before getting into the hotel.

The Biltmore Estate is pretty amazing. Imagine 8,000 acres of lush landscape with the largest private residence in the United States hidden away in it. We toured the estate itself, which took about 45 minutes at a fast clip and spent a couple of hours walking the grounds. There is a hotel on the estate and at first thought the idea of spending a few days there sounded kind of boring, but after visiting I would be up for that trip with no reservations. If you are in the area, you should definitely try to take it in. The amount of wealth necessary to create something like that, and even more, to keep it in the family still, is simply astounding.

After our afternoon at the Biltmore we checked into our hotel. We are staying at the Princess Anne Hotel. We are in #207 if you look at the floor plan. This is a very old-world hotel that is listed in the national register of historic places. It only has about 25 rooms, but each room is spacious with a living space, separate bedroom, and small kitchen. The elevator is a trip, it will fit me and about two suitcases as it creeks up. We are in a good location, with a number of things within walking distance.

Go to day: 3, 4, 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37 or East Coast Adventure collection.

We’ve ended our three weeks in the New Jersey/New York area. I find myself pretty eager to get away. We are going on vacation. It’s the next step to going back home. But mostly, there are just too many people around here! I’ve never really thought of myself as a “country mouse”. I enjoy the city. However, after three weeks of dealing with lines at every checkout line and jammed traffic all over I’m happy to get away from it.

Today is a driving day! I’m catching up on the Big Adventure from our hotel room in Roanoke, Virginia. We drove a little over 6 hours but I feel like we put in a lot more hours than that. The first 3 hours were in very busy traffic along the eastern corridor. Six lanes going each way with ridiculous traffic wears on you quickly. Add to that that Mazie had a pretty horrible day in the car, spending at least 3 hours of it crying. Oh, and one more thing, Tammy has an ear infection that is causing her a lot of pain. She went to the urgent care on Friday and got a prescription for some anti-biotics. She’s feeling a little better, but not much.

While we were driving I saw a road sign for Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. I knew about this road from A Walk in the Woods. Bryson’s book highlights this as a bit of a travesty. The national park is amazing, and the Appalachian Trail goes right through the park. The 105 miles of Skyline Drive were more than we could explore with our time, but we could do a part of it. Now, you could argue that with a screaming baby and a wife with an ear infection, taking an unplanned detour through a drive at elevation was not a smart idea. You could argue that, and you would be right, but I still took the detour.

Bryson makes the point in his book, and this is the travesty, that something like 95% of the visitors to this amazing national park never even leave their cars. They simply drive through it on Skyline Drive. I’m happy to say that we at least stopped at one lookout point. But, with the conditions being what they were, we quickly boogied down the road and resumed our path on the Interstate as soon as we could.

We made it to Roanoke, Virginia and had dinner at Macado’s (truly, everyone does have a website now). We are going to get an early start tomorrow to finish the drive into Asheville and hopefully see the Biltmore Estate.

Go to day: 3, 4, 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37 or East Coast Adventure collection.