Anniversary Weekend Day 2 (Sunday Morning)

Sunday was another gorgeous day so we set out early in search of breakfast. We're always on the lookout for a breakfast place where we can get some good, solid cooking in a place reminiscent of your own living room, somewhere you can read the paper and enjoy a cup of coffee (or a glass of OJ, in my case). I'd read about McGlinchey's in Doylestown so we decided to check it out. As soon as we walked in the smell of breakfast filled our noses and we knew we were in for a treat. We settled in with the paper, enjoying a quiet Sunday morning.

SP ordered a mushroom and Swiss omelet, home fries, toast and a side of scrapple:


He really enjoyed the fresh mushrooms and the abundance of cheese in the omelet. We both thought the homefries could have been more evenly cooked. Some were bordering on raw while others were hard as a rock. And the onions that were sauteed with the potatoes were barely cooked. He enjoyed the scrapple and his rye toast with grape jelly. I ordered an omelet that came with ham, bacon, onions, peppers and American cheese, home fries and an English muffin:


As you can see from the two photos, my omelet was substantially larger then SP's. His turned out to be perfectly proportioned. Mine was stuffed too full. Next time I'll order an omelet with less ingredients. I asked for the muffin lightly toasted and it was perfect with the jelly as an after-breakfast dessert.

After finishing our hearty breakfasts we drove out to Nockamixon State Park for another long walk. The lake was gorgeous:



.. with the sun making the surface look like it was studded with diamonds. They have a plethora of picnic tables so we're planning to come back with a picnic lunch to enjoy the scenery:


Another shot of our shadows as we walked along the path:



... that led us to the marina where hundreds of boats were docked:




We sat on a bench on a jetty just enjoying the view and watching couples and families set off on day trips on their boats. The marina was packed with people taking advantage of the beautiful weather. The ducks were also out for a swim:


On the way back to the car we noticed this massive mushroom fungus growing on a tree:


And so ends our Anniversary Weekend Extravaganza. I was going to take pictures of our dinner last night, but the lighting was horrible and we were in close quarters with other diners and I felt funny whipping out the camera. You probably won't see restaurant photos for awhile since I promised SP I wouldn't take those kinds of pictures unless we were on vacation.

Anniversary Weekend Day 1 (Saturday Morning)

We’re back from our fantastic anniversary weekend extravaganza. I’m going to do two long entries with both food and scenery pictures starting with Saturday since I was a moron and didn’t bring my camera with me Friday night. I’m still kicking myself about it since we had amazing pizza that was incredibly photogenic.

Saturday morning bright and early we drove into Lambertville for our anniversary breakfast at the Bed & Breakfast where we got married. Laurie, who is a fantastic cook, and her husband, Mark, greeted us with big hugs. Laurie starts every breakfast with fruit in some form and we lucked out with fresh, juicy cantaloupe:


… served with a fruit “salsa” made with finely diced banana, kiwi and strawberries. But the star of the breakfast (and the reason we chose to go Saturday instead of Sunday) was the pumpkin waffles with homemade apple cider syrup:


… which are out-of-this-world good. She only serves them at this time of year even though people clamor for them year-round.

After chatting with other guests about our wedding and saying goodbye to Laurie and Mark for another year we set out for a long walk. Our plan was to walk into Stockton, which is about 3 miles down the D&R Canal. It was a gorgeous, crystal-clear day, not too cold or too hot. Perfect for a long walk.


Along the way I took a ton of pictures of things that caught my eye, such as this rusting railroad car hidden amongst the trees:




…a farmhouse barn:



…train tracks leading to nowhere:



…and our shadows as we walked along the path:




Once we got into Stockton we crossed the bridge into Pennsylvania and stopped at Dilly’s, a roadside stand that has excellent burgers and onion rings. After all that walking we wanted a snack (well, I did, but SP’s a good sport so he got something, too).


You order at the counter and they give you a random playing card that acts as your number. Once your order is ready they’ll call out “three of diamonds”:


… and you pick up your food and take it to one of the picnic tables. I ordered a burger with raw onion, lettuce, tomato and mayo:


… which was perfectly charred and layered with fresh, crisp toppings. But the real star were the onion rings:



…which are crispy and hot, fresh from fryer, coated in a thin batter. These are just outstanding and worth the 6-mile roundtrip walk.



On our walk back to Lambertville I took even more scenery pictures. My favorite is this one with the bench and the two trees:




Once we got back to town we decided to stop at the farm and get pumpkins to finish decorating our front yard:


SP also wanted to carve pumpkins so we spent the afternoon on the front porch doing just that. The finished product:


...along with an ornamental pepper plant I couldn't resist buying.