Travelog for: Cliff

Our first stop after picking up Jessica was to go to the mall (Colonie Center). Michele said that they needed to buy a Mother's Day gift for their mom. While at the mall they decided to get cheesecake for their mom as dessert. Michele was nice enough to let us out of her bag to help pick what kind of dessert to get. 

After leaving the mall in Colonie we drove to Halfmoon because Michele wanted to go to a local candy store called Saratoga Sweets.  Saratoga Sweets is famous for it's peppermint pigs, we were told that they are very popular around Christmas time. Michele helped us pick out something to remember the shop by.  Once we left the candy store we went to pick up pizza and headed back to Jessica's house.

Finally we returned to Jessica's house. Our little feet are so tired from all of the walking we did today. All we wanted to do was sit down and take a little rest. We got up on the bench in the yard and someone screamed!  There was a BIG bee sitting on the bench too. The bee was almost as big as some of us.  We ran to the nearest tree to hide! It turned out that it was a pear tree. Too bad it's too early in the season to have fruit on it. Other wise we could have had a snack too. 

We were up early this morning, as we couldn't wait to get the day started. It was such a nice day that we decided to wait outside in the garden.

The ride to Albany was kind of long, but it was well worth it. We had a hard time finding a place to park. Luckily Michele drove around until she found one. We walked down to Washington Park (where the Tulip Festival was being held). Right away we saw the tulips, they were beautiful!

There were so many different types of tulips, we don't know which one was our favorite!

These tulips are the most beautiful tulips we have ever seen. 

Tulips weren't the only thing we saw at the Tulip festival. We also saw the Albany Police Department Bag Pipers warming up. It was great!

It was getting late in the afternoon and we had a couple of more things we wanted to do before heading back to Rome. So we looked at a couple more tulips then left. We all really enjoyed ourselves and we were happy to be able to go. 

On the way back to Jessica's house, Michele's husband saw a car dealership with the car that he wants to buy. Michele said she was too tired to argue with him so we stopped to look at it. In the USA they call it a "Smart Car." We agreed that it's almost the right size for Toy Voyagers. 

Finally we returned to Jessica's house. Our little feet are so tired from all of the walking we did today. All we wanted to do was sit down and take a little rest. We got up on the bench in the yard and someone screamed!  There was a BIG bee sitting on the bench too. The bee was almost as big as some of us.  We ran to the nearest tree to hide! It turned out that it was a pear tree. Too bad it's too early in the season to have fruit on it. Other wise we could have had a snack too.

While we were waiting for Michele and her husband to load the car, we got to take a closer look at Jessica's bonsai tree. She got it at the Tulip festival today and we were so jealous! We all wanted to buy a bonsai tree to send home to our mentors. Michele told us that at $25 a piece it was too expensive plus she said she couldn't ship something like that all over the world. DARN!!!

While we were looking at Jessica's Bonsai tree she told us that she had found something that we might want to see. While she was playing in the grass (with Michele's dog) she found part of a Robin's egg. It was tiny and very pretty! We wanted to bring it to Michele's house but she said that we had to leave it here. We haven't been able to get our way at all this weekend! 

We returned to Rome last night and it was a long trip! Going to Michele's families house for one over night trip isn't long enough. We rested a lot and now we are refreshed and ready for some good food. Tonight Michele's husband made cheese burgers, onion rings, tater tots and macaroni salad for dinner. What a meal!  After dinner we were really thirsty so Michele said that we could share her water. We looked at the bottle and realized there was a problem.  So we put our heads together and figured out a way to each get a drink. What a challenge!

Before bed our host if we wanted someone ice cream to share. Yumm....Who can say no to ice cream! 

Today was Dirkie's last day in New York. He was heading to Spain to visit with a new host. We said our good byes and wished him well. Dirkie promised us that he was tough and that he would be just fine.  We all posed for one more picture then he was off to the post office with our host.

Bye Dirkie! (waving)