Delaware - Day 20 - Five Points for propane

Killens Pond State Park
Sunday, 20 January 2019

today's route

Even though it wasn't particularly cold this morning, I completely believed the weather forecasts that said it would be seriously cold tonight, so propane for heat became my top priority for the day.

I was aiming for a highway junction that the Lewes locals know as Five Points - from 5 roads coming together of course.  I knew from getting propane last week when I went to Lewes that an Exxon station there sells propane.  I will never willingly buy products from Exxon - left over very hard feelings after the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska's Prince William Sound (the spill was bad enough, but they didn't have any of the clean-up equipment they'd agreed to have and they performed clean-up operations in a haphazard fashion and then they tried very very hard to stiff the commercial fishermen who'd had their livelihoods taken away by Exxon's actions). 

I'll never forgive them but I seriously needed propane and didn't want to have to drive all over on a Sunday of a 3-day weekend trying to find another source, so I went back to them this morning.

On the way there, I passed a trucking company with the name Whipper Snapper Transport.  That name seemed a mis-fit so I looked it up.  The company seems to have its website on Facebook, which I can't access (I wish people who own businesses would make more business-like choices) so don't know if they explain why they chose it.  But I can say the meaning of the term doesn't inspire my confidence in the firm.   www.reference.com/whippersnapper

By 9 AM we were already getting blown around by some serious wind gusts, as predicted in the forecasts, and it made highway driving more challenging.

At one point I was overheaded by multiple flocks of geese flying south.  There had to be hundreds of them.  Flock after flock after flock.

I think I mentioned last week that I hadn't seen any adopt-a-highway signs in Delaware and it looked like prisoners did all the litter patrols.  Well, today I saw 2 of the signs so there are at least a few here.  But those are the only 2 I've seen so far this month.  Odd.  The state must not promote the program as strongly as other states seem to.

I drove through the town of Milford both coming and going.  Seems like a nice town - quite a few old houses with lots of gingerbread and a mansion that's now a museum that dates back to the early 1700s.  The side of the Salvation Army has a series of murals that show local events of the past.  I wanted to get photos of all this but, while I was walking the dogs, the wind picked up even more than it was before and it started raining, so I decided to come back another time with better weather.

The Milford Barbership Quartet is offering singing valentines and I wished I knew someone I could send one to.  www.capegazette/barbershop  This article is from a year ago, but I feel sure they're doing much the same this year.

I saw signs in town warning drivers: "Snow Route - No Parking After Snowfall Exceeds 1 Hour."  I think that wording is clearer than the wording I saw somewhere else a week or so ago.  Though I wouldn't have thought they'd usually get enough snow in an hour to cause a problem, but I guess they've got to cut it off sometime.

This morning when I was getting the propane I was able to stand outside in my shirtsleeves because it was comparatively warm.  But by our afternoon walk, the temperature had already fallen so much I was glad to be wearing several layers.  The wind continued to rise, making the wind chill a serious concern.  Thank goodness I got the propane so we can stay warm.