RED HOT SUMMER

This week was been a scorcher in Washington DC.
Having finished editing the layouts for Waterside Cottages, I headed for the Maryland shore with my friend Karen, in a car (mine) with a broken air conditioning unit.

We packed little more than a couple of bathing suits, suntan lotion and a stack of magazines for our stay at Herrington Harbor in Rose Haven.

Advertised as “a little bit of the Caribbean on the Chesapeake”, the motel is painted coral pink, has banana trees planted everywhere, and tiki huts along the beach.

Their web site doesn’t do the place justice -- the rooms are much nicer, the pool bigger, and the grounds better landscaped.

Having said that, I must confess that the place wasn’t nearly as nice 15 years ago when I first stayed there on a photo shoot while photographing a now defunct Bed & Breakfast for Country Victorian magazine.

Our stay, in the pre-cell phone era, was especially memorable because the photographer disappeared.

He went to use the pay phone on the second floor of the restaurant and was still gabbing away when the place locked up for the night.

He eventually called 911 and was rescued by the local fire department in the wee hours of the morning. This trip was mercifully uneventful and relaxing.

I’ve been spending time at Herrington Harbor most summers and falls ever since.

It's about 40 minutes away from Washington DC, and near several good restaurants where you can get fresh steamed crabs and eat fresh fish. The adjoining towns, twin North Beach and Chesapeake Beach have a few antique shops and a boardwalk.

On our way back home, we stopped to visit Annapolis, the Maryland state capitol. We had lunch there at Cafe Normandie, a French restaurant, and reminisced how one year ago, on Bastille Day, we were vacationing in France.

This year’s mini-vacation was far more economical.