Adventure 2

Yesterday Dad and I drove to the Eastern Shore of Maryland. I’d read about a driving tour of the places where Harriet Tubman was a slave. Until reading that piece I thought she’d escaped from the deep south, Georgia or something. The fact that she went back over and over to rescue other slaves confused me. When I found out she’d been enslaved in Dorchester County and walked ‘only’ forty miles to freedom it became much more conceivable how she was ‘Moses’ for her people and helped over 300 slaves escape north.

We drove over to check it out. As a glutton for adventure, I also brought the Mutt. In some ways it was a great preview of the cross-country drive we’re going to have to make with her in September. We kept having to consider the dog in the equation. Park in the shade and walk (so we could leave her in the car with all the windows open), ask the restaurant if we can bring a dog to the outside tables. Get creative with pulling a tiny outdoor table over to a spot with a bit of shade. Escort the dog around the big deck with everyone dining in splendor. Accidentally step on Muttola’s foot. Cause a yelp that makes all eyes turn. Pet the dog. Get her to sit under the table. Once situated, we ate soft-shell crab sandwiches (yum!).

The Underground Railroad museum was closed. Instead we found the visitor center there in Cambridge, which had info for the driving tour. Dad also wanted to rent a sailboat, but all we could find was a kayak rental place. The woman said we could bring the dog. If we rented a tandem kayak then Muttola could sit between my legs as I paddled. To my amazement, it worked! We didn’t capsize and she didn’t jump out of the boat. On the other hand, we didn’t see much wildlife either. All the calls of “Muttola, stay! Sit! Good girl. Dad, paddle right! Hard right!” meant none of the bald eagles ventured forth and we ‘only’ saw two blue heron.

As for the Tubman tour, as with many things in life, if you don’t do it you might regret it, but if you do check it out, it’s a bit anti-climactic. The plantation she escaped from is still a working farm, so there’s just a roadside marker. There isn’t even a place to pull off to photograph the sign. On the other hand, standing in the hot sun staring at fields of soybean enclosed by trees and swamps made it easier to imagine her world.

It turned out the woman who rented us the kayak owns one of the only remaining buildings from Tubman’s life. It’s an old general store where Harriet Tubman did her “first act of defiance”. She refused to help the shopkeeper corner an escaped slave and ended up ‘catching’ a 2-pound weight in her forehead as she blocked the entrance after the slave ran away.

Obviously it needs a lot of work! Our kayak is there to the left of the building. I must say I’m impressed that my 72-year-old father was willing to try kayaking for the first time with a very bossy daughter and an untried dog. He’s one of the bravest men I’ve ever met!