Calgon, take me away!

This weekend we bopped out of town, up into the mountains of Maryland (well, hills really - if you've ever been out west for more than ten seconds, you realize that anything east of the Rockies is just a hill) for what we were hoping would assuage our need for vacation until such a time as I had more time to actually take a vacation. So...for the next two years or so I guess. (We find ourselves in an oh-so-delightful situation. Tim has more vacation days than he can shake a stick at and will soon find himself in a position where he needs to take a day off every month in order to not lose vacation. I, on the other hand, am lucky to scrape together enough vacation time from Dunder-Mifflin to take the 2 days off each semester that are required to go to Florida for classes. While they used to let you go in the hole up to the number of days you would earn in a year, they have changed their policy and no longer allow that. Cause treating your employees like people (instead of soul-less drones that are your property) is a bad thing.)

Anyway, we toodled to the Rocky Gap Resort - nestled in the Rocky Gap State Park, complete with golf course, hiking trails, beaches and lake. However, don't let the word "resort" fool you - it really should be "lodge" or something along those lines, because as far as the rooms go, we're talking fairly basic, perhaps even "rustic" accomodations. I was misled. And a little miffed. When I think resort, I think puffy beds, feather duvets, squishy carpet, and a bathroom that is big enough for two people to be in without one of them having to leave for the other to change their mind. I would equate the room to the kind of room you'd find in a Days Inn - clean, all the basics, but not somewhere you want to hang out. Unfortunately, when I think resort, I think hanging out in my room and reading for a while is definitely one of the options I want to keep open.

Despite the initial disappointment with the room, we had a good time. Saturday morning, after breakfast downstairs (included in our package) - made to order omelettes were part of the buffet (and while normally breakfast buffets don't ring my bell, their omelettes were delightful) - we headed out to hike around the lake. The map showed a trail, which turned out to be a single-file trail for most of the trek. It was about 4.5 miles and flatish (a few scrambles up and down various hills, but nothing horrible.) And other than a slithery creature at the very beginning trying to cross the path (Tim assures me it was of the garden variety), the trek was full of beautiful nature. We had the following conversation a couple of times:

Tim: Oh, look, a baby squirrel (no, I'm not joking, that's what he said.)
Me: Where?
Tim (pointing): There.
Me: Where? Near the chipmunk?
Tim: No, there, with the skinny tail and black stripes.
Me: Oh, you mean the chipmunk.
Tim: Same difference.

So for all you Chipmunks fans out there - Alvin, Simon and Theodore were actually baby squirrels. They just changed it to make the themesong better, obviously. I just simply hoped that his knowledge of reptiles was a bit more accurate than the whole squirrel/chipmunk differentiation skill.

After the trek, we chilled in the room for a bit before partaking of a massage in the spa. If you've never had a massage, I don't think I can recommend it highly enough. The only problem being that now I would sincerely like to experience this daily. Or at a minimum weekly. Tim said he'd be fine with twice daily. I think that massages may well be the key to finally establishing world peace.

Saturday evening, we headed over to Cumberland (maybe a 10 minute drive) to the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad for dinner and a mystery. Our mystery was mobster based - so we were investigating the death of Bigwig Broccoli (that's Broc-CO-li). The actors were great and seemed to be enjoying themselves immensely. The way it worked is that while we sat at our dinner tables eating, the actors in the current scene would enter, perform in the fairly narrow aisle (so not lots of room for action and they had to dodge the servers - that they were able to act in those confines at all was terribly impressive!), then move to the next car and repeat. Then they'd go back to the front and the fun would begin again. It worked well - and if I didn't mention it, the actors did a great job and seemed to always be in character, even during the "resets". Huge props to them. At Frostburg they turned the engine around and we had a 30 minute stop. They set up a crime scene evidence table for us to peruse and also had a memorial service for Bigwig. Then we reboarded the train for the trip back to Cumberland with a few more scenes and a chance to write down who we thought did it and what evidence we had to support it. I was one of two winners for our car and got a souvenier champagne glass as a prize.

Sunday morning we had breakfast downstairs again and then took a leisurely drive back home. We had thought we might stop and just toodle around Boonesboro, maybe see if the bookstore Nora Roberts' husband runs was open, but I wasn't sure how far off the beaten path it was and, well, I wanted to get home and see my pups.

We relaxed the rest of the afternoon at home with the girls (who don't seemed to have missed us at all - they have a good time with their grandparents.) And now I'm back at work and thinking that rustic or no, I needed a longer stretch of time away.