190 miles on I-95 and I-495 (around Washington). Cumulative distance: 1,134 miles.
STN Hop 5
If you want to take your RV rig out for a leisurely drive, I-95 near Washington – and I-495 (the “Beltway”) around Washington – is NOT the place to do it. These roads are always crowded and the drivers are always crazy. Just getting to any destination in the DC area is, in my book, a major accomplishment.
Our destination this time was Cherry Hill Park in College Park, MD. This was a major deviation from our original plan which had us staying 4 nights at Pohick Bay Regional Park, the park nearest Jett’s sons’ home in Alexandria and one of our favorite parks in the US. But there were two problems this time: (1) the park was unexpectedly heavily booked (a situation which we still find hard to believe as we have never seen the park more than 20% occupied in April), so we could get only a water-and-electric site and (2) we preferred to travel farther north, to avoid the need to refill the truck’s tank on Hop 6. Plus I had heard good things about Cherry Hill Park, so we decided to give it a try.
We are glad we did. I don’t know which park was #10 on our Ten Best Campgrounds list, but it just dropped off. Cherry Hill Park is reminiscent of Normandy Farms, in Foxboro, MA, in that it is spectacular. With a price to match. But for two nights we were very happy to pay the $65 rate. Jett did complain that I didn’t fork over the extra $10 that would have gotten us a “premium” pull-through which offers more private patio space – with wrought iron furniture – than the standard site with just a lowly picnic table. But I just didn’t see the need for lawn furniture. We didn’t even use the stinkin’ picnic table.
The inimitable Zachary
This was the only 2-night stay on our revised itinerary to MA. It was a welcome break after four straight one-night stands. Jett’s boys helped us out further by coming to visit us rather than having us come down to them – a saving of nearly 2 additional travel hours in the truck. And they brought Zachary, our seriously cute 5-year-old grandson, so we got some quality grandparent time.
He enjoyed his time with us as well. And why not? Not only are we fun grandparents but we were staying at an RV park that is a veritable playhouse for youngsters. The playground is large, with some interesting (unique?) pieces of equipment. There are two swimming pools – a heated one and an unheated one with a waterfall. A splash pool, a beautiful mini-golf course and – another unique (or so we thought) attraction – a goldminer’s panning stream. No, you don’t actually pan for gold but you can find gemstones and fossils in bags of sand sold at the café. Oh – the café has an arcade and ice cream, too. And a tractor-drawn cart that serves as a free shuttle around the park. And… just about anything your little upscale camping heart could desire.
Playground
Mini-golf
To top it all off, Cherry Hill has the absolute best laundry room that we have seen at any park, anywhere. Jett said, after seeing the laundry, “I don’t want to leave.” Funny what grabs her attention.
Splash pool
Campground shuttle
Air supply
The park also has free air – a place to inflate your tires – if needed. Not a big deal I suppose, but something that I have never seen at any other park. As for the dogs, there is no “dog park” but there are some very large, grassy areas designated for “dog run”. These were more than adequate for the dogs’ purposes. They also had a few cement turtles scattered around the park. I am not sure of their intended purpose, but Rusty saw them as fireplug substitutes.
Rusty using the turtle
Ready to go
Dripping water
We did encounter one… um… interesting problem during our stay at Cherry Hill Park: we had water dripping from a spigot located behind the left rear wheel. I had seen this once before, for just one day, about 6 months previously. But this drip was continuous, for two days, unless we turned the water supply off. This didn’t mean we were without water; it just meant we had to use the water from the fresh water tank. Not a real problem; just a bit annoying. But the presence of the drip indicated some kind of problem. The question, of course, was did it indicate a serious problem.
I subsequently learned that this spigot was the “fresh water overflow,” so the problem was that the fresh water tank was filling to overflowing. But I didn’t have the fresh water inflow valve on, so no water should be flowing in at all. I guess it is some kind of valve problem but not a particularly serious one. We will have to add it to the list of warranty items to be looked at. Which is, in itself, a problem. Our 1-year manufacturer’s warranty expires in a month, then our Camping World extended warranty kicks in. I can just see Camping World saying “You should have had this fixed under the manufacturer’s warranty.” Warranty wars. Oh, fun.
Anyway, despite the minor issues, we really enjoyed our two days at Cherry Hill Park. Highly recommended.
Jett by the waterfall pool