We woke up at our friends Kait and Brandon's home, and it was a rather chill day, walking around the neighborhood and catching up on errands. Since they live in a resort town, it's now much quieter as most visitors have left after the summer holidays.
We used the time to clean up the RV and do a lot of work. Michael realized that one of our tires was extremely flat, so he called for roadside assistance as we need a jack to raise the heavy RV. What we assumed would be a fairly quick fix ended up taking well over 2 hours. Perhaps because we're in Ocean City and not in a major city, there weren't many contractors who could come out, and the two men who could were taking forever and ever to arrive--Michael could track them like an Uber, and at some points it seemed that they disappeared from tracking view.
Eventually, however, a couple of guys finally arrived (we could barely understand a word they said, they mumbled and slurred their words so much) well after dark. We were doubtful at first when they arrived in a sedan, thinking they wouldn't have the adequate equipment to hoist and replace the wheels (it happened to us in New Orleans, prolonging the wheel change for hours), but fortunately they got the job done quickly and left. At this point, it was too dark and late to leave, so we decided to head out the next morning, giving us more precious time to catch up with our friends, and for Sheila and Molly to bond. They had shared toys earlier in the day (Sheila had hilariously even dragged the whole basket with her teeth to dig through to find a toy she wanted to play with), and they had even given each other adorable dog kisses! How wonderful.
Sheila Misses Molly!
We slept well overnight (for once, we weren't randomly near train tracks like 90% of the country!), so after breakfast in the RV, we were off! We had parked our RV right outside Kait and Brandon's place, and Lisette gave Sheila a quick walk before we headed out (our friends were working today). After 2 days of staying here and making a new dog buddy, Sheila went to race up our friend's front steps, expecting that we'd be going inside again, only to be ushered back into the RV.
As we drove away, Sheila whimpered and flopped mopily onto the her towel between us. It was obvious--she missed Molly! If only there was a way to communicate to dogs that we were leaving, and it was time to say goodbye. Lisette has always though that Sheila, because she is an independent breed, can be the only dog in a household. But after seeing her reaction to leaving, and how she's enjoyed staying in homes with other dogs (like our friend Meri who we stayed with in Bremerton who has 2 dogs), Lisette is now thinking that Sheila could benefit with a companion!
Wild Horses at Assateague
Assateague State Park (pronounced Ass-ah-teeg) is Maryland's only oceanfront park, located on Assateague Island, which offers visitors activities including swimming, surfing, canoeing/kayaking along the secluded coves, and fishing. There's also plenty of wildlife including deer and waterfowl, but perhaps the state park is best known for being the home of wild horses, which are common to see galloping along the beaches and around the marshes.
Since we were there in the off season, the park was pretty much empty--we didn't have to pay to get in as there were no attendants, and there were only a few stray campers parked in different spots throughout the park. We got out and headed to the beach to see if we could spot any wild horses, but it was so, so incredibly windy, with sandy flicking up into our hair, skin and clothes, and stinging our faces, that we unsurprisingly didn't see any wildlife on the shores.
We got back into the RV and started driving down the trail, and soon were lucky enough to spot a beautiful horse on the road! It was a gorgeous light brown horse with a sandy colored mane, strutting around by itself, somewhat sheltered from the wind thanks to the trees and marshes on either side of the road. While we didn't see herds of horses, we were happy to see at least one feral horse, considering the gusty weather.
We had a lot of driving to do today, but after leaving Assategue we had a brief stop to see the Highball Signal back in Delaware. The Highball Signal in Delmar, Delaware is one of the oldest surviving pieces of railroad signaling in the world, dating back to 1832. Before electricity, conductors were guided by stations that raised white or black balls to signal clear tracks or trouble ahead. One of its highball signals survived and continued to serve on other lines for more than a century before being retired in 1948. It was later moved to Delmar, a town split between Delaware (Del and Mar, get it?) and deeply tied to railroad history. The signal now stands alongside a historic guard shack and a 1929 B&O caboose.
Annapolis to Baltimore
We had included Annapolis in Maryland to stop at on our way to Baltimore, but upon further research as we drove towards it, didn't see anything that stood out at us to check out and spend a lot of time at. So we did a Trader Joe's grocery run (yay!), before continuing towards Baltimore, stopping at a Cracker Barrel located next door to a corporate office parking lot, where we'd spend the night.