Amish Country -
In reflecting back on our time in Amish country, Mark and I discussed our overall favorite places since our journey began March 14, 2009, and we both concur that our time in the Lancaster, Pennsylvania Amish area has been our absolute favorite to date. Who would've thought? The area is just so beautiful and breathtaking that words and pictures just simply can't do it justice. We were actually in a tiny little suburb of Lancaster PA called Intercourse PA...(I know, hard to believe the name and apparently came about when established in 1752 since it was the first city in the area where two roads met, hence the name). There were countless wonderful little shops, boutiques and restaurants that made the town feel like you were home. And sitting outside in the evenings, listening to the Amish horse-drawn buggies trotting through the streets was just awesome.
We noticed the entire Pennsylvania countryside, lined with farms and older homes, were kept immaculate. What's amazing is we didn't see a single farm or home that wasn't kept neat and immaculate. Yards were freshly mowed with flowers prominently displayed. Amish buggies could be seen prominently displayed in their driveway or barns. Many of these Amish farms sold their home-grown goods, i.e., eggs, fruits, vegetables and pies, right off of their front porches.
Moving on to New York
We took our time getting packed up this morning as we only had a couple hundred miles to drive today. We pulled out of our RV Park around 10:00 a.m. this morning, heading to Flordia, New York. We've discovered the further East we go, the fewer RV Parks there are. There are only 3 RV Parks within 100 miles of New York City and one of those, is Blackbear Campground, about 60 miles from New York, NY.
We discovered it costs a Whopping $55.00 a "Day" to just park in New York city! In addition, almost all of the roads leading into and out of New York are Toll roads. So, we've decided it's most cost effective to take an actual Tour of New York. One of the reasons we chose this RV campground is that they have a New York tour company that comes directly to the campground and will pick us up and return us directly back to the RV Park here in Florida, NY. We had hoped on taking the New York tour leaving here Monday morning...unfortunately, we discovered when we arrived that Monday's tour is all booked up. So, looks like we'll be here a few days longer than we had initially anticipated as the first available New York tour from our campground is this coming Thursday. Hmmmmmm, that means we have 4 days to hang around or chill before getting to see New York. The tour includes all the key things we'd like to see including the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, The 911 location and many others...so we're really looking forward to it.
I'd wanted to go to Coney Island/Boardwalk area and though it's only 70 miles from our location, due to parking and toll road costs, it's ridiculously expensive and I can't see spending $60.00+ the cost of diesel, just driving there and parking! Uhhhhhhhhh, think we'll have to pass on the Coney Island/Boardwalk option. But, I've no doubt we'll find other things to do and explore. Our campground is in a very nice secluded area, way off the beaten path...a terrific place to just kick back and relax a bit--especially after the last few hectic weeks in Washington DC and Philly.
Oh yea, the Weather here is just awesome! The highs for the upcoming week are in the low-mid 70's and the low's in the 50's!! After the heat we've had the last several weeks, I'm really looking forward to some weather with a little 'nip' in the air! Well, that about wraps up the latest on where we are and what we've been up to. Check back Friday or Saturday and I should have our New York trip update and pictures. Stay tuned...!~
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Picture Updates
The RV Park we're in this week has DSL, which is much much faster than our internet speed via our dish on top of our RV. So I was able to get our pictures uploaded quickly. I've updated all 3 slideshows of the blog with our latest 3 sets of pictures as follows:
1) Philadelphia Independence Center
2) Amish Country
3) National Cathedral in DC
Enjoy!
1) Philadelphia Independence Center
2) Amish Country
3) National Cathedral in DC
Enjoy!
Philadelphia Independence Center
We got up early this morning and headed to Philadelphia, about an hour from our RV Park location in Intercourse Pennsylvania. We first headed to Independence Visitor Center to obtain tickets to see Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights were authored and signed.
The Independence Hall tour begins with a 30 minute film of the Independence of the United States and the fight with Britain. The tour then moves to the Supreme Court, which was originally officed in Independence Center in Philadelphia from 1791 until 1799, when moved to Washington DC. The other room was the Assembly Room, the actual location where the Delegates from each of the 13 states met, debated and approved the Constitution of the United States, along with the Bill of Rights 11 years later. Additionally, the US Congress met in Congress Hall from 1790 to 1800.
We also learned additional information about the initial establishment of Congress. We found out that one of the biggest obstacles for the new Congress was a debate and arguments between the larger and smaller states. The larger states argued that they should have more say than the smaller states and the smaller states argued that they should have equal say in matters concerning the nation. Apparently Connecticut came to the rescue by offering a resolution that there be two branches of Congress...one that provided representatives based on population, i.e., the United States Congress and the second resolution was the creation of the Senate, in which each state would be equally representatives, resolving conflicts from smaller states without large populations...and that's why there are two branches in Congress--the House of Representatives and Senate, with varying numbers of representatives by state. Isn't that interesting? Mark took lot's of pictures of both rooms.
On another important note, the room which housed the first and second Congress, also has the actual chair that Washington set in to conduct business for the 10 years congress was located in Philadelphia...it was also the chair he was sitting in when he actually signed the final draft of the Constitution of the United States.
We then went to see the Liberty Bell Center, where the Liberty Bell is housed. It summoned the Pennsylvania Assembly to debate the Stamp Act and other burdensome actions by the British Parliament. The original Liberty Bell actually cracked sometime between 1817 and 1846. It isn't known exactly when it cracked. It was recast by a local craftsman when cracked.
We also went to Franklin Square, the actual location of Benjamin Franklin's home while serving in Congress. There are remnants of Franklin's home that still remain and are encased for viewing. Just down the street from Franklin's home is a small cemetery where he's buried. The majority of that cemetary are graves from the 1700's...very few that died into the 1800's, it's that old! There were many other exhibits housed between the locations that we checked out, including 5 row houses that Benjamin Franklin had built as rental houses and one for his printing company...all of the homes are from the mid to late 1700's and remain intact, each are still private homes at this time.
Lastly, after a day full of exhibits, we made a stop a Pat King's Philadelphia Steak sandwich, which is the restaurant that originally created the Philadelphia Cheesesteak sandwich in the early 1900's. On our way to Pat King's, our GPS had us going up and down multiple streets within downtown Philadelphia and discovered that just about every street has Food Carts with various kinds of food for sell. I knew food wagons on street corners was popular in New York/Manhattan, but they're apparently just as popular in downtown Philly as well. It was good and I'm glad we made the stop for the historic cheesesteaks from the originator, but not sure it was worth the $8.00 a piece that each one cost! Overall, we had another wonderful day, though we were both exhausted from all the walking by the time we left.
Mark took lot's of pictures and I'll get them uploaded to the slideshow as soon as I can. We'll be here in Pennsylvania through tomorrow and will be heading to Flordia, New York Saturday morning. Looks like Florida NY is as close as we can get to New York city via an RV Park. We're hoping to take the NY Ferry to see the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. We rarely take actual tours as they're just too costly, when you can just go directly to most places for free, or nominal bus/train fares. But we might have to break down and take a bus tour to get to the New York/Manhattan areas. Well, that's the latest scoop on what we've been up to...pictures from today will be uploaded as soon as I can. Until later~
The Independence Hall tour begins with a 30 minute film of the Independence of the United States and the fight with Britain. The tour then moves to the Supreme Court, which was originally officed in Independence Center in Philadelphia from 1791 until 1799, when moved to Washington DC. The other room was the Assembly Room, the actual location where the Delegates from each of the 13 states met, debated and approved the Constitution of the United States, along with the Bill of Rights 11 years later. Additionally, the US Congress met in Congress Hall from 1790 to 1800.
We also learned additional information about the initial establishment of Congress. We found out that one of the biggest obstacles for the new Congress was a debate and arguments between the larger and smaller states. The larger states argued that they should have more say than the smaller states and the smaller states argued that they should have equal say in matters concerning the nation. Apparently Connecticut came to the rescue by offering a resolution that there be two branches of Congress...one that provided representatives based on population, i.e., the United States Congress and the second resolution was the creation of the Senate, in which each state would be equally representatives, resolving conflicts from smaller states without large populations...and that's why there are two branches in Congress--the House of Representatives and Senate, with varying numbers of representatives by state. Isn't that interesting? Mark took lot's of pictures of both rooms.
On another important note, the room which housed the first and second Congress, also has the actual chair that Washington set in to conduct business for the 10 years congress was located in Philadelphia...it was also the chair he was sitting in when he actually signed the final draft of the Constitution of the United States.
We then went to see the Liberty Bell Center, where the Liberty Bell is housed. It summoned the Pennsylvania Assembly to debate the Stamp Act and other burdensome actions by the British Parliament. The original Liberty Bell actually cracked sometime between 1817 and 1846. It isn't known exactly when it cracked. It was recast by a local craftsman when cracked.
We also went to Franklin Square, the actual location of Benjamin Franklin's home while serving in Congress. There are remnants of Franklin's home that still remain and are encased for viewing. Just down the street from Franklin's home is a small cemetery where he's buried. The majority of that cemetary are graves from the 1700's...very few that died into the 1800's, it's that old! There were many other exhibits housed between the locations that we checked out, including 5 row houses that Benjamin Franklin had built as rental houses and one for his printing company...all of the homes are from the mid to late 1700's and remain intact, each are still private homes at this time.
Lastly, after a day full of exhibits, we made a stop a Pat King's Philadelphia Steak sandwich, which is the restaurant that originally created the Philadelphia Cheesesteak sandwich in the early 1900's. On our way to Pat King's, our GPS had us going up and down multiple streets within downtown Philadelphia and discovered that just about every street has Food Carts with various kinds of food for sell. I knew food wagons on street corners was popular in New York/Manhattan, but they're apparently just as popular in downtown Philly as well. It was good and I'm glad we made the stop for the historic cheesesteaks from the originator, but not sure it was worth the $8.00 a piece that each one cost! Overall, we had another wonderful day, though we were both exhausted from all the walking by the time we left.
Mark took lot's of pictures and I'll get them uploaded to the slideshow as soon as I can. We'll be here in Pennsylvania through tomorrow and will be heading to Flordia, New York Saturday morning. Looks like Florida NY is as close as we can get to New York city via an RV Park. We're hoping to take the NY Ferry to see the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. We rarely take actual tours as they're just too costly, when you can just go directly to most places for free, or nominal bus/train fares. But we might have to break down and take a bus tour to get to the New York/Manhattan areas. Well, that's the latest scoop on what we've been up to...pictures from today will be uploaded as soon as I can. Until later~
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Amish Country
We left DC Monday morning and arrived in Intercourse Pennsylvania. Yep, that's right...it's not a typo. We're actually in the city of Intercourse. Lancaster Pennsylvania is Amish country. Intercourse Pennsylvania is just a couple of miles from Lancaster. And there really are numerous horse and buggy's around here. Amish people are everywhere. The men have very long beards and wear overalls. The women all wear long dresses and have their hair up in buns with little white lace tops around the hair buns.
The Pennsylvania countryside is just breathtaking. The last couple of days we've driven around the countryside and the farmlands and houses/barns look just like the quaint, serene pictures of the Pennsylvania Dutch country that you see in magazines. Yesterday afternoon we stopped by an old Dutch 'smorgasboard', as their called, and it was delicious. It's just good old fashion country food, as we'd say. It's served family style, but we were the only ones at our table yesterday. They served roast beef, chicken sausage, chicken and dumplings, corn, mashed potatoes, buttered noodles and for dessert: Shoe-fly pie and peach pie. We thought shoe-fly pie was a myth or from a fairtale or something...we had no idea it's a real pie. It's made of maple syrup, sugar and stuff and didn't think it would be very good, but it was. And I don't care for maple syrup. It wasn't too sweet either. It also came with homemade vanilla ice cream. And Everything is made from scratch daily. Mark said it's one of the Best Meals he's EVER had! I loved it too.
Today we went to a huge restaurant...41,000 square feet! It was a buffet of ALL homemade stuff and the buffet line was as long as a football field. The food was just wonderful. There are more than 100 separate homemade desserts alone. Needless to say, we loved that place. And downstairs was a 41,000 square foot gift shop. That place also had their own grocery store and even make their own spices and have two smoke houses. We spent a couple of hours just walking around and checking things out. We then drove to a little shopping center full of unique shops and Amish things. Just an overall wonderful day for sure.
We'll be here through Friday and will be moving on Saturday morning. We'll be heading to Philadelphia to check out all the historic sites like the Liberty Bell, Independence center, Washington's presidential office, the house where Thomas Jefferson wrote the draft of the Constitution, etc. Oh yea, we also have pictures from our last day in DC, when we visited the National Cathedral. It looked like a medieval castle or something. The beauty was just awe-inspiring. I still need to upload our pictures of the National Cathedral as well as our Amish pictures from the last couple of days.
Well, that's about it for now...more updates to come, stay tuned!~
The Pennsylvania countryside is just breathtaking. The last couple of days we've driven around the countryside and the farmlands and houses/barns look just like the quaint, serene pictures of the Pennsylvania Dutch country that you see in magazines. Yesterday afternoon we stopped by an old Dutch 'smorgasboard', as their called, and it was delicious. It's just good old fashion country food, as we'd say. It's served family style, but we were the only ones at our table yesterday. They served roast beef, chicken sausage, chicken and dumplings, corn, mashed potatoes, buttered noodles and for dessert: Shoe-fly pie and peach pie. We thought shoe-fly pie was a myth or from a fairtale or something...we had no idea it's a real pie. It's made of maple syrup, sugar and stuff and didn't think it would be very good, but it was. And I don't care for maple syrup. It wasn't too sweet either. It also came with homemade vanilla ice cream. And Everything is made from scratch daily. Mark said it's one of the Best Meals he's EVER had! I loved it too.
Today we went to a huge restaurant...41,000 square feet! It was a buffet of ALL homemade stuff and the buffet line was as long as a football field. The food was just wonderful. There are more than 100 separate homemade desserts alone. Needless to say, we loved that place. And downstairs was a 41,000 square foot gift shop. That place also had their own grocery store and even make their own spices and have two smoke houses. We spent a couple of hours just walking around and checking things out. We then drove to a little shopping center full of unique shops and Amish things. Just an overall wonderful day for sure.
We'll be here through Friday and will be moving on Saturday morning. We'll be heading to Philadelphia to check out all the historic sites like the Liberty Bell, Independence center, Washington's presidential office, the house where Thomas Jefferson wrote the draft of the Constitution, etc. Oh yea, we also have pictures from our last day in DC, when we visited the National Cathedral. It looked like a medieval castle or something. The beauty was just awe-inspiring. I still need to upload our pictures of the National Cathedral as well as our Amish pictures from the last couple of days.
Well, that's about it for now...more updates to come, stay tuned!~
Friday, August 21, 2009
The Capital & Library of Congress
*I've just Added another slideshow to add our pictures from today. Check out!
What a wonderful day we had yesterday! We took the early bus and subway yesterday into DC to get an early start since there's just not enough time in a day to see everything we plan to see. We started our day off at the Capitol. We arrived just in time to walk right up and grab a couple tickets for the next tour, which was just starting. After a 15 minute movie, a tour guide took us through the main and second floor of the Capitol building. Of course, the Congress isn't in session right now, but we did pass Speaker Nancy Pelosi's offices. The architecture is just amazing. There are full length statues of all Presidents as well as various key individuals from all states as well.
At the end of our Capitol tour, the tour guide explained that you can reach the Library of Congress by following the underground tunnels from the Capital. Though the Library of Congress wasn't even on our list of things to see, based on information from the tour guide, we decided to take a short detour over to the Library of Congress. WOW! It was awesome! I just thought there would be various books in this building...not! First of all, the architecture of this building was just amazing. We came in just in time for a tour of the building and joined in for the one hour tour.
We were shocked to discover all the things the Library of Congress had. There were more key documents and items from an historical perspective in this building than I ever remember seeing in any building any where. Everything from draft copies of the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights from Thomas Jefferson, to actual ship logs, diaries from the 15th and 16th centuries. There were so many historical documents from Early America as well as things from way back in the 5th and 6th centuries. In addition, Thomas Jefferson's entire library of more than 5,000 books were on display. BUT, in addition to all these historical items, there were also other really cool things, like a complete section dedicated to Bob Hope and included everything from his first contract with Vaudeville, to his Presidential medal of Honor from President Johnson. Bob Hope's dancing shoes, lot's and lot's of scripts from his shows, his Oscar from the 60's and so so so much more.
To top off this day, we were headed to the National Archives for a short visit to plan out our follow up trip there to check out what we wanted to see. But, we passed the National Museum of Art on the way. Now, for anyone that knows Mark and I, we've never been into the Arts, but we decided to stop in and check it out briefly. I almost decided to turnaround and leave when I found out we had to check our backpack...seemed like to much trouble. But, we decided to take a quick peek and oh my gosh! There's were numerous rooms with paintings that were just gorgeous. We actually saw numerous paintings from (I'll probably butcher these names, but here goes): Renoir; Whistler; Van Goh; Rembrandt, etc. etc. The majority of the pictures were in the 15th - 17th centuries! And many of them were Huge...like the size of a king-size bed. There were statues and other things, but we didn't really enjoy those too much. To actually see these paintings, that weren't even enclosed in glass cases, where we could get right up on them and view them...was, well--Awesome. Can't think of a bigger word than that. I so enjoyed the visit to the National Museum of Art. We didn't take our camera into the Art Museum because we thought pictures couldn't be taken, but after entering saw that was not the case. So, we may go back so I can get some pictures.
Whew! Sorry for the length of the explanation, but we just saw and enjoyed sooooooooo much. Our day of 1) The Capital, 2) Library of Congress and 3) National Museum of Art, made the day my absolute favorite while not only in DC, but any day I've experienced while on this journey. We're planning on going back tomorrow to spend the day at the National Archives. We leave DC Monday morning, but we're not really sure where we're headed quite yet. We're thinking about either Gettsyburg, Pennsylvania to see civil war stuff or Lancaster, Pennsylvania and Amish country. Well that about wraps up another wonderfully blessed day of this journey...stay tuned~
What a wonderful day we had yesterday! We took the early bus and subway yesterday into DC to get an early start since there's just not enough time in a day to see everything we plan to see. We started our day off at the Capitol. We arrived just in time to walk right up and grab a couple tickets for the next tour, which was just starting. After a 15 minute movie, a tour guide took us through the main and second floor of the Capitol building. Of course, the Congress isn't in session right now, but we did pass Speaker Nancy Pelosi's offices. The architecture is just amazing. There are full length statues of all Presidents as well as various key individuals from all states as well.
At the end of our Capitol tour, the tour guide explained that you can reach the Library of Congress by following the underground tunnels from the Capital. Though the Library of Congress wasn't even on our list of things to see, based on information from the tour guide, we decided to take a short detour over to the Library of Congress. WOW! It was awesome! I just thought there would be various books in this building...not! First of all, the architecture of this building was just amazing. We came in just in time for a tour of the building and joined in for the one hour tour.
We were shocked to discover all the things the Library of Congress had. There were more key documents and items from an historical perspective in this building than I ever remember seeing in any building any where. Everything from draft copies of the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights from Thomas Jefferson, to actual ship logs, diaries from the 15th and 16th centuries. There were so many historical documents from Early America as well as things from way back in the 5th and 6th centuries. In addition, Thomas Jefferson's entire library of more than 5,000 books were on display. BUT, in addition to all these historical items, there were also other really cool things, like a complete section dedicated to Bob Hope and included everything from his first contract with Vaudeville, to his Presidential medal of Honor from President Johnson. Bob Hope's dancing shoes, lot's and lot's of scripts from his shows, his Oscar from the 60's and so so so much more.
To top off this day, we were headed to the National Archives for a short visit to plan out our follow up trip there to check out what we wanted to see. But, we passed the National Museum of Art on the way. Now, for anyone that knows Mark and I, we've never been into the Arts, but we decided to stop in and check it out briefly. I almost decided to turnaround and leave when I found out we had to check our backpack...seemed like to much trouble. But, we decided to take a quick peek and oh my gosh! There's were numerous rooms with paintings that were just gorgeous. We actually saw numerous paintings from (I'll probably butcher these names, but here goes): Renoir; Whistler; Van Goh; Rembrandt, etc. etc. The majority of the pictures were in the 15th - 17th centuries! And many of them were Huge...like the size of a king-size bed. There were statues and other things, but we didn't really enjoy those too much. To actually see these paintings, that weren't even enclosed in glass cases, where we could get right up on them and view them...was, well--Awesome. Can't think of a bigger word than that. I so enjoyed the visit to the National Museum of Art. We didn't take our camera into the Art Museum because we thought pictures couldn't be taken, but after entering saw that was not the case. So, we may go back so I can get some pictures.
Whew! Sorry for the length of the explanation, but we just saw and enjoyed sooooooooo much. Our day of 1) The Capital, 2) Library of Congress and 3) National Museum of Art, made the day my absolute favorite while not only in DC, but any day I've experienced while on this journey. We're planning on going back tomorrow to spend the day at the National Archives. We leave DC Monday morning, but we're not really sure where we're headed quite yet. We're thinking about either Gettsyburg, Pennsylvania to see civil war stuff or Lancaster, Pennsylvania and Amish country. Well that about wraps up another wonderfully blessed day of this journey...stay tuned~
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