(July 2nd) Day 27 & 28 – No golf today! drove 32 miles

We spent the much of this day at Margaret's uncle Jack (her father's younger brother) and Aunt Helen's house. I did know Margaret had spent a summer with them a long time ago (after she graduated from high school) and she went east to work to earn money for college. What I did NOT know was she had a job in a sausage factory, yep stuffing sausages. She only lasted a day, the work was too gross for her.

Uncle Jack is quite unlike Margaret's father. He is loquacious and loves to tell stories where as Harold never had much to say unless the topic was hunting or another of his interests. It was also interesting to me that two boys who grew up in a remote town in upstate New York, both became aeronautic engineers. Jack told us things that Margaret knew nothing about and was as entertaining as he was informative. 

We spent the day chatting and then went to dinner where Margaret's cousins Shelley &  Bruce, and Bruce's wife Helen joined us.  I talked to Bruce quite a bit at the dinner table and he tried to describe for Margaret how to find her father's birth home in Stratford, NY and the family hunting camp about 25 miles to the west of Stratford. The tables were a bit segregated, boys & girls, with Margaret in the middle so I didn't really get to talk to Shelley or Helen, but Aunt Helen and I talked during the afternoon visit and she is a very nice lady. I also find it interesting that Jack was born in Stratford, NY, and now lives in Stratford, CT.

(July 3rd) Day 28 - No golf this day either. drove 368 miles.

This day was meant to be a search for Margaret's father's home and hunting camp. He and Rachel (Margaret's mom) were married in Stratford and spent their wedding night in Herkimer, NY at a hotel that no longer exists.

We found the hunting camp after one miscue. It's kind of amazing the back roads that are known to our GPS, because a couple of roads we were on were rather primitive. We had to have seen her father's home in Stratford, but we don't know which one it was (there aren't that many!) as we hadn't gotten enough concise information as to what it looked like now. It had to be within a quarter mile of the "old" school building and we were on every road in the area, so we saw it, but could not place it.

You may note by the mileage that we drove a lot doing the search and after we drove to Albany, NY to spend the night. We decided to have a pizza, after all New York is famous for it's pizza. We called 10 different places and found few with dine in options (we were tired of sitting in the car) and NONE that had beer! Imagine a pizza place without beer! Inconceivable (in the "Princess Bride" voice)! 

One place I called said, "You can bring your own". THAT was a bit stunning and I didn't bite, until we reached the conclusion there would be NO pizza and beer for us, UNLESS the gal on the phone wasn't kidding. I called them back and she wasn't kidding. There was a convenience store / gas station across the street. A purchase of a six pack of Yuengling and a 10 minute drive later we were at Cugino's Pizzeria in Rensselaer, NY. THEY LET US PUT OUR SPARE BEERS IN THEIR POP COOLER!  Capital letters for scoring extra points with the Hairs! Not only that, the pizza was GREAT! 

Turns out few places in New York state have beer licenses because of the added liability insurance and a hefty annual state fee for a permit to sell beer. Bring your own makes sense, just not something we are accustomed to. As a matter of fact restaurants (& golf courses) specifically DON'T want you to bring in alcohol from off premise so they can sell you theirs. 

We spent the night at a hotel on the south side of Albany since we were heading south to play golf in the morning. Tomorrow night we will be staying just northwest of Albany in a different hotel