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Free Camping…Great Food…Incredible Surroundings!
August 15th, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
Free Camping…Great Food…Incredible Surroundings!
Western, Maryland
It rained and stormed all evening, luckily we were snug in our beloved Wide Body. This morning…more rain… and the forecast for the foreseeable future here in Northern Pennsylvania….Rain. Things were very drippy and muddy at the campground and we decided to head out of Tionesta today even if it meant missing the Tionesta Indian Festival (whenever that begins). We dumped our tanks and checked out of the Army Corp Site, then headed into town to do some laundry.
While we were watching the washers we studied the maps and our tourist info to decide where we wanted to head next. We don’t need to be in Connecticut till closer to the end of the month so we had some time to kill. Should we go deeper into the Pennsylvania Woods?….not with a week of rain ahead of us. How does New York strike you?…..Did that last year… What about Lake Erie? Too much water…..
Then it hit us…Look at the map! We are only about 175-miles from a terrific place! Free Camping…Great Food…Incredible Surroundings….HOME! Hey…how ‘bout we go home and then head back to Connecticut sometime next week? We can dust everything off; go through 2 ½ months of mail; relax….LET’S DO IT!
We spent the rest of the day enjoying Pennsylvania and Maryland back roads. Isn’t it great that all roads seem to lead you home?
So ends the Fools On’a Mission 2011 Summer tour.
Thanks For Riding Along!
Mak’in Moonshine
August 14th, 2011Sunday, August 14, 2011
Mak’in Moonshine
Tionestia, Pennsylvania
Last night we heard about the horrible tragedy at the Indiana State Fair. Could have been us….could have been anyone. We also keep thinking about all of the wonderful vendors and fairground workers who put their hearts into the fair – they must be devastated.
Well, we haven’t posted the last couple of days because, frankly, we haven’t done anything to write home about. On Friday, we decided it was time to start heading toward New England where we’re going to visit our Granddaughters! Yea! (and their parents). So we put pedal to metal and from Lake Loramie, Ohio we drove almost to the eastern state line – back roads of course. We really enjoyed the Ohio countryside…stopped at a couple of roadside farmer vegetable stands for lunch…and then headed to an Army Corp of Engineer’s Campground North of Canton, Ohio.
Saturday morning, we didn’t waste anytime…we were back on the road and soon crossed into Pennsylvania. Once again, our goal was an Army Corp campsite on the Shenango River Lake near Hermitage, PA. What a beautiful town…lots of Victorian Homes on quiet streets….mountains always in the background… pure Pennsylvania. We spent the afternoon enjoying the lake and hiking around the campground and then this morning, we broke camp and drove into Hermitage to attend Mass at the Church of Notre Dame.
After Mass we continued our Army Corp of Engineers Hopscotch route …this time we headed into Pennsylvania’s Great Forest Country and the Allegheny National Forest. Our goal today was the small mountain town of Tionesta where my tourist info told me we would be just in time for Tionesta’s annual Indian Festival Days. Super! We are ready for some fun and excitement after 3-days of driving. According to my information, the “Festival” takes over the whole town….lots of food…a carnival….exhibits…vendors…a Festive Occasion – and today was the opening day!
We drove into town and there was a banner over Main Street announcing the Tionesta Indian Festival and an empty Tee-pee standing on the town green. That was it. We drove up and down Main Street – not many people and no festivities. A couple of streets over (there are only a couple of streets in town) Ted spotted some Boy Scouts putting something up so we asked them when the activities started. “Might be something tomorrow but the Carnival starts on Tuesday. What the….even their banner over Main Street said that the Indian Festival runs from Aug. 14 – Aug 21. Oh well. While we were talking with the Boy Scouts we spotted a Lighthouse- of all things – in the middle of the forest overlooking Tionesta Creek. We decided to investigate.
The lighthouse sits on a beautifully landscaped hill on what is called Lighthouse Island. There are two large new looking buildings in front of the lighthouse that are completely empty except for the “For Rent” signs out front. Don’t know what they once were, but a sign explained the beautiful lighthouse in the forest. It is the Sherman Memorial Lighthouse – owned and operated by the Jack and Grace Sherman Family. The lighthouse was built as a beneficial Landmark for the Tionesta Community and to serve as a place to preserve the heritage of the Sherman family. The Sherman’s designed and built the 75-foot high lighthouse. It has 6 floors and a basement. This Tionesta Sherman Memorial Lighthouse is one of 4 Sherman Memorial Lighthouses in Pennsylvania – the other 3 are on Lake Erie.
Since there was noth’in do’in in Tionesta today, we decided head to the Army Corp Campground. Turns out, they were having a Heritage Festival of their own. We spent an enjoyable hour listening to very knowledgeable Park Rangers tell us about life in Pennsylvania’s North Woods back in the day. In particular, we learned how to start a fire with nothing but flint, steel and a bird’s nest….we also learned how to turn small bits of a t-shirt into charcoal. A very patient Game Warden told us about hunting, trapping and how to skin the pelts off a beaver or a mink.
But the most valuable bit of information received today was how to make Moonshine. We learned how to build and operate a backwoods still so that the revenuers will not find it. The still itself is a complicated apparatus involving crocks, barrels, copper pipe and a slops bucket. This is the kind of information I tend to store in my brain till it’s needed…and who knows when that might be.
Tionesta is a one-night stop.
Thanks For Riding Along!
Corn
August 11th, 2011Thursday, August 11, 2011
Corn
Lake Loramie State Park, Minster, Ohio
What a wonderful night for sleeping! The weather here in Indiana has been heaven after our 95+ degree month in the south. Last night it got down to 54-degrees! Perfect for sleeping. This morning was a near perfect 72-degrees when we checked out of our campsite and headed to the small town of Losantville, Indiana to ride the Cardinal Greenway Rail-to-Trail.
I’m not sure of the total length of the Cardinal Greenway because it is divided into sections. I think it is close to 90-miles in total (Peg, do you know?). It runs from Gas City – through Muncie – to Richmond, Indiana. This morning at the Losantville trailhead, we met another cyclist who told us that the Losantville to Richmond section was not “officially” open yet, but lots of people were already riding it. The trail looked new and fresh so we decided to head south.
Our new friend was right. In fact, there were workmen on the trail today painting warning lines and crossings at intersections on the newly paved surface. The trail is “Indiana” flat so the riding is easy. We passed through uncountable cornfields and very picturesque farms. A couple of them were Amish or Mennonite properties…you could tell by the “neat as a pin” look and the all black clothes hanging on the cloths lines. Now here’s a sign that we’ve never seen on any other trails we’ve ridden.
There were quite a few other cyclists on the trail, which is impressive for a Thursday morning. Many were riding recumbent cycles. I’d like to try one of those sometime. We rode through the small towns of Econony and Willimasburg and at 15-miles out decided to turn around and head back to Losantville. It is easy to get carried away on the ride out because you are seeing all new countryside – especially on a perfect weather day like today, but, it’s always in the back of our minds that we have to pedal the same number of miles back. So, with 30-miles under our belts (or should I say butts?), we loaded the bikes back onto the van and headed for Ohio.
We have no real destination in mind, except that we’d like to visit the Amish community in Northeast Ohio as we make our way northeast to Connecticut. So, for today, we just picked out a green spot on the Western Ohio map that had a camping symbol ….Lake Loramie. We set the GPS (mistake!) and away we went. We were just closing in on Lake Loramie when we came upon a one-of-a-kind rural road accident: A farm tractor somehow got away from it’s driver and ended up willy-nilly across the road. We were first on the scene but don’t know how it happened…all we saw was the frustrated farmer and lots of skid marks.
We sat at a respectful distance and watched (we couldn’t do anything else because traffic had backed up behind us and we couldn’t turn around) as the frustrated farmer summoned help to pull him off the road. Soon we were on our way…but not for long…the road ahead was closed – they were replacing a bridge. We had to take a gravel road detour which really through Dora (the GPS Lady) for a loop. Then, back on track she led us down country lanes…through farmer’s fields….past little towns …till suddenly – in the middle of cornfields for as far as you could see… she said, “You Have Reached Your Destination!” You’d think we’d be used to this by now.
Luckily, my smart phone was able to help. We found a street address and plugged that in …Dora was off and running again. This time I also tracked us with phone navigation – just to make sure she didn’t pull any more of her tricks!
Lake Loramie campground is an Ohio State Park. There are lots of families here and it’s really nice to hear kids playing and riding their bikes. Right now we are enjoying watching our neighbors… a young Mennonite family tent camping. They brought everything but the kitchen sink.
Thanks For Riding Along!
Red At Night…Sailor’s Delight
August 10th, 2011Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Red At Night…Sailor’s Delight
New Castle, Indiana
Last evening at the Indiana State Fairground Campground, about 8:00 pm as I was posting the log, Ted noticed that the sky looked funny. We had just had one of those fast moving, mid-western storms pass through. It rained hard for about 10-minutes and then the sun came out – bright and sunny – like it was noon. Then this really odd red glow came in our windows. Ted grabbed his camera, hurried out of the van, and caught these incredible roll clouds. The second photo made me nervous cause it looked like a funnel cloud forming.
It wasn’t too long after Ted took these photos that the sky returned to normal like they were never there.
This morning as we were unplugging, getting ready to head east, UPS came through the campground – delivering packages to some of the vendors. What was unusual is the size of this UPS Truck. We had also seen the trunk inside the fairgrounds yesterday. Ted actually stopped the driver to ask if he could take her photo…she said ok if he hurried…she was on the clock. She said they use the little truck for lots of “close quarter” events.
That old saying: “Red at night…Sailor’s Delight!” must be true. Today was absolutely beautiful. Blue skies, northerly breeze, low humidity and a very comfortable 78-degrees….couldn’t ask for a nicer day. By 10:00 we were on the road heading east toward Muncie, Indiana where a good friend, Peggy S used to live. She often talked about a bike trail she liked to ride. It’s the Cardinal Greenway – a paved Rail-to-Trail that goes from Marion to Richmond. Muncie is just about center on the trail. Along the way we stopped to do some grocery shopping and then, a little farther down the road in Fortville, we stopped to take care of laundry. By 3:00 we were pulling into a campsite at Indiana State Park: Summit Lake. Here at the Lake we are close to the town of Blountsville, where we’ll pick-up the Cardinal Greenway tomorrow. It’s been almost a week since our bikes have been off the rack ….we have to work off all of that State Fair Ice Cream.
Thanks For Riding Along!
The Great 2011 Indiana State Fair
August 9th, 2011August 8 and August 9, 2011
The Great 2011 Indiana State Fair
Indianapolis, Indiana
Monday morning we arrived in Indianapolis and, with only a couple of wrong turns, found the Indiana State Fairgrounds and the fairgrounds campground. The campground is pretty much what we expected; A big level field area divided into roughly 15×32 foot campsites….which means there is very little room between camper units…except for us of course. We are so small that we fit into our 15×32 site with room to spare. On one side we have a Soft Pretzel vendor (thought we could talk shop), and on the other side….well…we’re not sure about them – at least 5 guys coming and going – probably operating midway rides. All was pretty quite here in the campground.
As soon as we were hooked up, we headed to the fairgrounds. Whooowhooo!
We decided early-on that we would eat whatever we wanted at the fair – after all, that’s what fairs are for?? So the first thing we did, after wandering through the building where all of the “miracle” products are (someday I’ll tell you about the foot-detox guy …uck!), was to look for food. We decided there would be not regrets…just eat what you want! Even Superman was throwing caution to the wind!
That’s it! Lunch would be Indiana Pork! I got a Pork Tenderloin sandwich and Ted went for the Pulled Pork BBQ with kettle potatoes. Not the best choices…we both wished we had gotten something else…but there were just too many choices out there. Next we happened upon a FREE Turkey Hill Ice Cream booth so that kind of made up for our previous poor choices. In total, I had 2-small Turkey Hill cups of Mint Chocolate Chip; Ted had 6! Next, feeling like pigs, we headed to the animal buildings….Cattle, Swine, Poultry, Sheep and Elephant?
Ted grabbed a Giant Éclair to munch on and I had an Ice Cream Cone. We did it all…until…at about 3:00 when the skies darkened and a heavy band of rain came through the fairgrounds…we ducked into the Main Street Stage Tent to escape the rain and we were just in time to hear Ashley Wilcox And The Cosmos! We didn’t know our friend Ashley had gone on the road! Oh, turns out it wasn’t OUR Ashley Wilcox. We stayed for over an hour while the rain came and went. Half-way through the show a couple of really soggy people came in with thick milk shakes….Ted couldn’t keep his eyes off this lady’s shake. Finally, he asked her where she got it. She told him and then she actually gave Ted a coupon for a FREE Milkshake at the Indiana Dairy Association Stand (she had a bunch of coupons ‘cause her in-laws milk cows). Off he went into the pouring rain… and came back, dripping wet, with his milk shake.
The rain stopped about 5:00 and we still had not even seen a 3rd of the fair. We worked our way through more exhibits and then walked through the Midway just as it was getting dark.
It was after 9:00pm (late for us) by the time we made it back to the campground where all was quiet. After a good night’s sleep, we did it all again today…except, today we treated ourselves to Giant Italian Sausage Sandwiches with Onions and Peppers. We washed that down with a couple of those wonderful Indiana Dairy Milkshakes. We spent the day trying to see everything that we missed yesterday. This included: Puppy Races; The Early Farming Village; Elephant Rides; Clog Dancers; The Biggest Boar in America; and Musical Clowns.
I can’t even guess how many miles we walked over these two days. The Indiana Fairgrounds cover 250 acres and I think we toured, examined and inspected just about every exhibit and event on those 250 acres. We ended our afternoon at the stables where the professional racehorses are housed.
Tomorrow: We’re Out Of Here.
Thanks For Riding Along!
http://www.in.gov/statefair/