Around the World in 365 Days: Daytona Beach, FL to Atlantic City, NJ

Day 72, Dec. 28^th: We spent a relaxing day getting things organized, utilizing Uncle Gene’s printer and doing errands. John got a new tire and an oil change (it turns out the slow tire leak was a small nail near the wall) at the Wal-Mart. We enjoyed breakfast at another local favorite called Heiffer’s (their grits are very good). The rainy day made it hard to find much to do outdoors, so I spent the day blogging and getting my fake horses squared away for my stable at simhorseracing.com. We finally made it to John’s favorite place for pastrami outside of NYC – DB Pickles, a few blocks from Gene and Cathy’s. After dinner, Cathy and I made shortbread cookies. I finally got some holiday baking in! Unfortunately, I forgot to get a picture. We watched a cute Indian movie about a young mute girl from Pakistan who gets lost on the India side of the border and an extremely honest Indian man who works to get her home. We finished the evening watching Die Hard, I had forgotten the movie started with a Christmas rap song.

Day 73, Dec. 29^th: I did get in a jog before the rain started again and then packed up for the road. John has this amazing almost Tetris like ability to fit and pack the trunk.

We again drove through rain, stopping only for coffee and gas in Georgia and drove as far as Santee, South Carolina (which is about an hour south of Florence, SC). Of all places for dinner, we went to the Mexican restaurant called Armando’s – they had a happy hour with $2 margaritas. The corn tortillas were pretty good, there was spinach in the veggie fajitas, which was unusual, unfortunately no jalapeno’s and the salsa had zero kick. John enjoyed their ribs – the ½ rack was near the size of most places full rack.

Armando’s covered every flat wall surface with TVs, with every football game showing on at least two of them. We saw the end of the Green Bay game where the Packers beat the Lions in the closing seconds by a field goal. Back at the hotel we watched TV and movies. The Super 8 in Santee is getting renovated, so new floors – the nice heavy-duty vinyl ones that look like wood, hard surface shower surround that looked like marble, and a good TV. Overall, the room was easily twice the size of the cabin on the cruise ship. As a travel stop, Santee is a good one -many good, inexpensive restaurants and hotels close to the highway, and friendly locals.

Day 74, Dec. 30^th: Santee is on Lake Marian, but with rain showers continuing, we decided not to try to hike/ jog along the lakefront, and John was in “get going” mode. We planned to stop around Richmond for the night, possibly Fredericksburg. We drove through Richmond on I95. The skyline is very different from what I remembered from the mid 90’s.

Coming out of Richmond we started getting into traffic, and once we got to Fredericksburg it was already bumper to bumper at 3:30PM. We decided to call it a day and stayed at a Days Inn in Woodbridge/Dumfries area. By the way, it is a particularly nice Days Inn, very clean, lots of cable channels, comfortable bed with good blackout curtains. The Montclair Family Restaurant was steps from the motel’s door, and had good reviews. It was only 5PM on a Monday, and there were already several locals at tables.  The shrimp fradiovolo is good but not very spicy, at least not to me, and the French fries are thick cut with skin on, with a little bit of crispness. Overall a thumbs up if you end up in the area.  

Day 75, Dec. 31^st: Happy Birthday to me! I did start the day with a Birthday jog – there was a lot of new housing construction near the hotel, so John and I meandered through the subdivision. The houses are big, around 3000+ square feet, on approximately ¼ acre lots. We got in quick showers and back on the road. It took about four hours or so to make it to Atlantic City – and we paid $16 in tolls on I95. Now I am going to sound like an old curmudgeon. Why do I need to pay a toll on an Interstate that was built with my tax dollars? That seems to be double dipping – they get federal funds to build the road, then they turn around and make you pay a second time for the same road. I get Florida charging tolls on a lot of state roads – they don’t collect income tax, so the tolls are a way to get that revenue, but on a federal Interstate! OK, end rant. We had no difficulty finding the air bnb, a room in a home with shared bath, about 6 blocks from the Hard Rock and Ocean casinos. Our host was Karalin, a lovely young woman who is a massage therapist. She has three little Yorkies, very friendly and love to snuggle up on the couch. John and I walked to the casinos before getting ready for the big evening.

Online, I had found a big to-do at the Showboat, a hotel but no longer casino on the boardwalk near the pier where the fireworks would be.

For $129 each, we got “VIP” tickets, which included a dinner buffet (not very good), “top shelf” drinks (they did have Grey Goose), and seats, along with DJs and a band. We parked ourselves at a little table in the Diamond Lounge (where the buffet was) and ended up hanging out all night.

I danced with a group of women, John danced a little, we sang karaoke (I did “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”, and just after midnight I sang (with John and a few other attendees) “Don’t Stop Believin”). We did not make it out to the fireworks due to the crowd, but overall, I had a great Birthday.

Day 76, Jan 1^st: John snored, loudly, in the early morning hours. I went downstairs to the couch, but could still hear him.  When he quieted down around 7AM, I went back to bed and slept for a few hours. We got up at about 10:30. By the time we showered, dressed, and finally ready for the day it was noon. Karalin recommended a restaurant called “Gilcrest” but nothing but the Tropicana parking lot was at the GPS location (we found out later that it had two locations, the main restaurant was in another part of town, and the other was inside the Tropicana). We did find the Chelsea Inn and pub. They served breakfast. Both John and I ate their French toast, which were pretty good. John enjoyed a Bloody Mary made with liberal amounts of horseradish. The most interesting part was listening to the bartender talk about life with a few of the men at the counter. We walked along the boardwalk,

and into Caesar’s to warm up. John found a table he liked, and I found Invasion from Planet Moo-lah! Two of them – with a couple playing on them. I sat nearby, hoping to swoop in when they left. The entire two hours at Caesars, the same couple played that game (which I can’t blame them – it’s so much fun). And I did come out ahead by $101 dollars playing varying “Cash-man” games. We made it back to the air bnb for the very exciting afternoon of doing laundry. We looked online for dinner options, and Bill’s Bar and Burger at the Golden Nugget was touted as having among the “top ten best burgers in the country”. John said the burgers were good, not as good as the Port Authority in New Orleans. They had an Impossible burger as well, which I added jalapeños and guacamole. It doesn’t matter what kind of sandwich – adding jalapeños and guacamole will make it better. John did great at the Nugget – me not so much, but I had fun and we gambled until 11PM.