July 16-19: The Hamptons, Long Island, New York

Day 1: 

We stopped at a real New York Deli on our way out of town.  Jess with his usual Italian and Lane with an egg salad sandwich.  They gave us a tuna salad sandwich for free which came in handy for dinner later.  We drove through South Hampton which has gorgeous home and business one right after the other. We stopped in South Hampton for groceries and a few campsite essentials.  We got to our campground around 4.  It was hot and the mosquitos were in full effect.  we quickly set up and got inside the screened in pop up tent to relax, read and eat our leftover sandwiches for dinner.  We headed to bed at a decent hour.  We were beat from all of our walking in DC/NYC!  

Day 2: 

Jess got up around 8:00 and got some coffee going.  Lane woke up about an hour later to find Leon curled up on Jess’s lap in the camping chair.  awwww.  Jess made eggs, bacon, fried potatoes, and toast for breakfast.  He outdid himself again.  Lane used the kitchen sink for the first time to help with the dishes.  very handy.  Oops.  We had left our sandwich bag from the night before out, and the raccoons had gotten in it and drug the trash all over the campsite.  This was our first of many encounters with the Hampton Raccoons.  We got geared up for a walk down to the beach.  We are about a football field away from the Atlantic Ocean and it is awesome.  We walked down to the Cedar Island Lighthouse which is old and abandoned and they are trying to restore it.  We want to restore it and live in it!  We were tired after the walk to the lighthouse (we were told it was about 1/2 mile away, but it was more like 2 miles away!), so we laid the blanket down on the porch of the lighthouse in the shade and took a little nap!  It was perfect.  We headed back to our campsite and collected rocks and shells along the way.  We want to make something when we get back.  The rocks are so abundant and pretty here!  We jumped in the cold water to cool off before we headed back to the campsite.  

Jess made some chicken, mango, and jalapeno sausages with peppers and onions for lunch.  Good stuff.  We sat in our screened in porch, listened to tunes, and caught up on the blog for much of the afternoon.  

Day 3: 

Lane got up this morning to make the coffee only to find that the raccoons had opened the coffee and ate it!  They are clever, annoying little things.  Jess got up not too much later, and he ended up going to the campsite store and buying us some coffee and ice.  We relaxed and made some breakfast.  For our wedding we got some instant breakfast packets from REI that are really for backpackers, but we thought we better use them or we never would!  This morning we tried the “Biscuits and Gravy”.  It turned out to be more like “Dumplins and Gravy” but it was edible.  We had some eggs on the side just to be safe.  

Lane wanted to get some more rocks from the beach for the future masterpiece.  We did not go as far as the lighthouse, but we found a great place to sit, swim (even Leon got in!), and collect rocks.  NOONE else was on the beach, and it felt like it was our own private beach.  We stayed longer than planned, headed back to the campsite, cleaned up a bit (we did not shower at the Hamptons...)  The raccoons had struck again.  As part of our camp kitchen, we have a big canvas type bag that zips up that you store your food in.  It is like the pantry.  We usually put this in the car each night, but during the day we just leave it zipped up, no problem.  The raccoons (In the middle of the day!) had chewed through the zipper and got our bread.  what!?  We headed to East Hampton to explore. 

Our first stop was at Rowdy Hall where we enjoyed some local beer and clams on the patio.  They had free wifi so we plugged in inside and did some blogging.  Their internet was super fast, so we were able to do alot.  Unfortunately, this place started to get too busy, and we were asked to clear the table inside so they could seat more people.  We used up the computer battery out on the patio, and headed out to find some oysters. 

 By this time, the storm that everyone had been talking about all day seemed to be making its way in to town.  We walked down to Nick and Toni's only to find out they did not allow dogs on the patio.  Jess ran back to get the car just in time to beat the rain.  Leon hung out in the car while we headed in.  We enjoyed a beer on the front porch area, watching the rain, and waited for our table.  Jess recognized the lead girl for CSI-Las Vegas, Marg Helgenberger (who Lane had already spoken with out on the patio because she thought Leon was so cute and pet him!)  We ended up meeting a few nice people at this place.  People were very friendly and wanted to hear about our trip.  They gave us tons of pointers, and it made us want to stay longer in the Hamptons!  They did not have oysters, so we went with Mussels instead.  We still wanted oysters, so the bartender told us a few places to go.  

Our last stop of the evening was the Bostwick's Chowder House.  We had oysters (finally!) and some Lobster Fritters.  We headed back to the campsite hoping the rain had not done too much damage.  We usually set our tent on on a tarp to help with wear and tear, but this is not so good when it rains.  The tarp makes puddles build up, which make the bottom of the tent get wet.  We laid a few towels down and went to bed.  Since we were packing up the next morning, it was not that big of a deal.  

That night all 3 of us were awoken by what sounded like what could only be the grunt of a large pig, a growling bear, or maybe...MAN BEAR PIG!   Leon was scared and crawled on the air mattress with us for the first time all trip.  Since Leon was scared, it made Lane even more scared, and Jess was also a bit freaked.  He kept yelling at it to go away and pressing the lock button on his keys to make his lights flash and horn honk.  He had to move on to Plan B when our neighbor across the way shouted “Alright you F***ing A**hole!!”  Plan B was to slightly unzip the tent and to shine a head lamp outside at the growling, grunting beast.  Jess did this and he saw about 4 sets of eyes shining in the dark....all under our patio tent.  They were raccoons!! We had forgotten to put Leon’s food away, and the head honcho, grunting, fat raccoon was devouring Leon’s food while the others watched. It was in a sealed tupperware container, and they took this lid off!  Raccoons are creepy and they had our number!   We joked in Manhattan that we conquered the town while we were there.  It is official that the raccoons conquered us in the Hamptons. 

Day 4: 

We woke up around 6 am.  We wanted to do some more exploring of Long Island before going to Bridgeport, CT for a music festival.  Since it had rained and we had flooding issues, it took longer than usual to pack up and dry everything out.  Luckily it was cool and breezy this morning.  By 8:30 we were heading out of the campsite.  We stopped off at the camp store for a coffee, and made the drive out the the very tip of the island, Montauk.  Since it was $10 to park at the tip and walk around the lighthouse, we just did a couple of drive bys.  We drove into the town of Montauk for some breakfast at Anthony’s Pancake House.  Then we drove back west down the long island to Bridgeport.  We dropped Leon off for 4 days of boarding, hit a Kmart for essentials, and we were setting up camp on the other side of the Long Island Sound by 4:00.