John

Hospitality when I went there was very selective. Remember the big Denny’s lawsuit back in the 1990s? Well, there were other restaurants here that could have been hit by the same complaint back in the 1980s or 1990s.

Facilities are not readily available like you would expect them to be from visiting other cities. In other words, think you might want to go to the restroom while you are visiting? Good luck!

You will be fine if you are staying at a hotel right on the beach. Just run back there.

You will do okay if you find one of the restrooms along the beach proper and it is open.

In one case when I visited there, we had a big dinner at a restaurant right on the main strip or one street over. After our meal, they informed us that their restroom was out of order. We tried the hotel we had stayed at on a previous trip, they only let patrons use their restrooms.

The weekend after I visited there one summer in the late 1980s there was a huge riot. There is no excuse for rioting. On the other hand, there was no difficulty remembering some things that could contribute to some people being upset.

But hey, if you do not like a place – just leave and do not come back. Do not trash the place.

If you go up north the coast a state or two, you will get to Ocean City in Maryland, and Dewey Beach Deleware. These are much nicer, friendlier beach towns in my opinion. I recommend them if you are considering a summer vacation on the US mid-Atlantic coast.

Baltimore is a blast!!

For a great shopping experience, you can check out the Harbor Place. It is a very big mall, right alongside the waterfront. A full range of dining experiences there. Also all kinds of small shops there, as well as little kiosks.

When you are there, with the water at your right walk a ways and you will get to Little Italy. A culinary heaven. I have eaten at a wonderful Italian restaurant there several times – it is called Sabatinos.

If I recall correctly, if you walk further, you will eventually get to Fells Point. Fells Point is where the cool bars in Baltimore are. Not that there are not cool bars elsewhere in town. At Fells Point though, there is a big concentration of them. As well as some good places to grab a bite, in case you don’t want to do one without the other.

There can be a lot of panhandlers out at night in Baltimore. At least I remember that distinctly being the case one night. It was about a decade ago. Hopefully, it is not that way anymore.

It is possible to go see Edgar Allen Poe’s grave. You can see it at midnight – the only proper time, really. I rode a bus there to go see it once. Originally, it was under an old church, beneath it. Later, they think, it was moved to a new grave above the ground. Since he died broke, on the street in Baltimore and was originally in that uh group facility for skeletons under the church for a while – who knows if they got the right one.

I attended a Science Fiction convention called “Worldcon” that was held in Baltimore that year back in the early 1980s – about 1983. It was my first real vacation, as a worker and not a student, and also out on my own all by myself. It was pretty cool. I got to do all those things – except Fells Point. I really had a blast.

The city is very photogenic. Especially if you are in the areas I described. The lighting is pretty good there in the afternoon too. Deeper in the city you have tall buildings that might block the light with their shadows. Along the waterfront you are not completely blocked in and lots of the buildings are not all that high either.

So make sure bring take a camera. These days, that probably means a digital camera, with lots of free space on your camera’s media card. You will want to take lots and lots of photos!!

I spent a week or two in Reading in the early 1990s. English food is actually pretty good.

I enjoyed walking around the town, which has nice homes, trees, and gardens in the residential area, and places to eat and listen to music in the downtown part.

If you live in the former you can walk to the latter. The people I spoke to in Reading had spirit, were cheerful, and had that great British accent that is a treat for Americans to hear.

It seemed quiet but not boring.

I do remember being struck by the number of surveillance cameras downtown. I walked past quite a number of them just walking down the sidewalk downtown.

However, a few years later, ourdoor surveillance cameras becoming more common in the US – so I see them here too.

Though in the US, there seem to be greater numbers of them but they are mostly inside the shops and they are almost always somewhat hidden. Quick to observe yet shy to be seen. In Reading, back then at least, they were very much out in the open. Kind of like you were supposed to see them, not just the other way around.

Walking around in the neighborhood by the town is very relaxing. It seemed very tranquil. Beautiful on a nice day.

Walking around downtown Reading is fun too. The buildings are interesting and varied. Not just a bunch of boxy things. All the restaurants I visited in Reading were classy, charming and neat. The wait staffs were extremely cordial.

I have lived in Germantown since 1990.

It is part of the Maryland suburbs of Washington D.C. It is your typical suburban neighborhood. Lots of townhouse communities, some single-home communities, some appartment complexes, etc.

Drivers here are pretty bad, so watch yourself. My car has been hit twice while stationary. Once in its parking space by a hit and run driver and once from the rear while I was stopped at a red light.

Although Germantown is not replete with tourist attractions, you can probably pick up some tourist guide books at the Upcounty Center at the intersection of Germantown Road (local route 118) and Middlebrook Road (exit 13 off of I-270).

There are tourist attractions in old town Gaithersburg, in Rockville, and of course Washington DC. You should be able to find out more in the guidebook – or, just look these places up online.

Germantown has many restaurants and shopping centers. If you need in a shopping mall, try Lakeforest Mall in Gaithersburg (one exit south of Germantown, on I-270; take the route 124 exit).

There are recreational facilities. Nothing huge like amusement parks. We have:

• Bretton Woods Golf Course
• Black Rock Center for the Arts
• Germantown Community Center – weights, etc.

• South Germantown Recreational Park
• Ridge Road Recreational Park
• Waters Landing Golf Park
• Germantown Square Park
• Fox Chapel Park
• Germantown East Park
• Clear Spring Park
• Gunners Lake Park
• Gunners village Park
• Gunners Branch Park
• Waring State Park
• Great Seneca Park
• Plumgar Park

Just north of Germantown there is the Monocacy River NRMA which is a huge park for hunting and horseback riding.

There is a very nice, clean, large, well-kept, movie theater. I have never found it to be crowded. If you find yourself in Germantown with some time and money to spare, relax and watch a movie there.

There is fine dining at the Jaspers restaurant/bar across the street from the theater, plus a Taco Bell across the parking lot from Jaspers. Plenty of other places to eat in walking distance all around it, in fact.

Germantown has an incredible number and variety of restaurants.

It is possible to receive DC broadcast TV stations here, though reception varies with the location of the TV set. Clear over-the-air reception of Baltimore and northern Virginia TV stations does not seem possible.

Fortunately, there is a cable TV company for Germantown: Comcast (local office in Gaithersburg). They offer traditional analog cable TV. In much or all of Germantown you can get digital cable TV from them for a higher fee – with more channels.

Traffic on Germantown’s roads is much lighter than in Rockville, which is a ways down I-270 to the south. Within Germantown, there really are not traffic jams.

During rush hour, you see maybe 15 cars or so queued up at traffic lights. Pretty light, really. However, there are not that many large businesses in Germantown.

Next to the Upcounty Center in Germantown you will find two large shopping centers with many popular retailers, restaurants, and a Giant and Safeway.

At the other end of Middlebrook Road, across on the other side of I-270, there is another large shopping center with a good gym, a Giant, and some more restaurantss and shops.

On route 355, north of 118 – at the Millstone shopping center, there is a Kohls, Petsmart, Walmart, Target, Best Buy, Borders bookstore, Giant, and lots of restaurants. It is quite huge, like 3 or 4 shopping centers adjacent to each other.

There is a local community college in Germantown.

There are some technology companies based in Germantown. Mostly small and medium sized businesses.

Mostly, they are situated at the north end of town, a ways north of the local community college. There is what looks like might be the beginnings of a technical industrial park up there. Plenty of room and a few big buildings.

There is a small MARC train station in Germantown. It is suitable for commuting if you want to go into DC or other locations on the line towards there or north of Germantown.

There are some commuter busses too.