Oct 28, 2013
Flat Jenna’s East Coast Adventures
Flat Jenna came to visit us from Clear Lake, Wisconsin in October, and joined us on our travels up and down the East Coast.
Traveling by mail is quite affordable, but it turns out you can see a lot more when traveling by plane and don’t have to ride in an envelope the whole time.
Our first stop was Boston, where Flat Jenna got to ride the subway, “the T” everywhere.
Boston is the kind of city where you really don’t need a car because you can take transit and walk everywhere. The bus and subway system goes all over town.
This station is below the Prudential Center, one of Boston’s tallest buildings. The train took forever to arrive!
Out and about in Boston, Flat Jenna joined us at a lot of historic places.
Boston is on the Massachusetts Bay and has really great seafood. Flat Jenna wasn’t sure about the oysters, but we sure love them!
As we passed by the Boston Aquarium, Flat Jenna got to watch the harbor seals being fed.
On the way back to the airport, Flat Jenna hitched a ride on Alison’s suitcase so she could see better.
She even got a window seat on the plane. See ya, Boston!
In between trips, Jenna chilled out with Cooper the Cat at our house.
She also helped us and our friend Jill work on a game for a two-day programming competition, Rails Rumble. It’s called “Llama or Alpaca,” and the object of the game is to tell llamas or alpacas apart. It won 7th place among 500 teams, which we were all pretty excited about!
(You can play Llama or Alpaca for-real at http://llama-or-alpaca.r13.railsrumble.com)
Next, Flat Jenna joined us for a trip to Orlando, Florida, where she visited Sea World.
These flamingos were really pretty!
There’s been some debate about whether killer whales (orcas) should really be kept in captivity. This one’s plastic. Much easier to do a headstand on!
You do get to learn a whole lot about orcas and other marine life at Sea World, though.
The real whales splash a lot of water, so Flat Jenna had to wear a special wetsuit.
Flat Jenna got a little perspective on where she was on her travels …
The aquariums at Sea World are pretty awesome.
Flat Jenna’s new friends Nils and Maija, from Switzerland, toured the shark exhibit with her.
Flat Jenna tried to say hi to this ibis, but it wasn’t very friendly and was much more interested in eating crumbs from other visitors.
The Leafy Sea Dragon is a sea horse that looks like a bunch of leaves floating in the water. See it above Flat Jenna’s head?
Flat Jenna tried to go swimming with the rays, but they wouldn’t let her inside the tank, so she had to stay on the outside.
About as close as she could get to swimming was this little bubble on the bottom of the tank:
Back home in Williamsburg, Flat Jenna toured some more historic sites and went looking for the horse that had a little “misunderstanding” with Flat Gavin.
This house was owned by John Custis, a wealthy Virginia planter and father-in-law to Martha Custis. You may know her better with her second husband’s name: Martha Washington.
“Tenement” today means a run-down apartment building, but it just meant a big house back in those days.
In Colonial Williamsburg, people live and dress as in the colonial days. This nice shopkeeper recognized Flat Jenna right away and offered to take a picture with her.
They had some nice clothes, but all a little too big for Flat Jenna.
This is supposed to be the most haunted house in Williamsburg. We didn’t get too close.
Kids like to play in the stockades in Williamsburg — the same stockades that used to be used to publicly punish people who broke the law in little ways. Flat Jenna just fit through one of the arm holes.
Williamsburg has lots of awesome trees to climb, and the fall colors are just starting to turn.
There’s a statue of Thomas Jefferson in Merchant’s Square in front of the Kimball Theatre, and people can go sit with him and take a photo. So we did!
After a lot of looking, we found the horse … but he decided to stay focused on his grass this time.
We had a great time visiting with Flat Jenna!
