Then we left to go to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. We were there from noon until 4 PM. You could be here for days because there is a lot to read and a lot of videos to watch.
7/3/15 - Cleveland, OH
The lady we traded sites with came over to talk
this morning. She also brought us some
really yummy brownies with peanut butter icing. I only let Jim eat one today with his coffee so we could eat the
other one tomorrow morning.
Then we left to go to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. We were there from noon until 4 PM. You could be here for days because there is a lot to read and a lot of videos to watch.
We went to Platform Brewing while we were in Cleveland, then drove back to Akron
to Thirsty Dog Brewing. On the way home
we stopped at Wendy’s and got a baked potato and chili and a chocolate
Frosty. I talked to mom today and she
wasn’t having a really good day as far as her mind was concerned. She told me that yesterday she had gone to
north Texas and saw her mother and father.
This really upsets me when she talks like this. There’s nothing I can do, but it still
hurts. Elton told me that yesterday
while he was there she asked him when Elton was going to be there. He told her he was already there and she
just looked at him with that blank look she gives us when she doesn’t really
grasp what we say.
Then we left to go to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. We were there from noon until 4 PM. You could be here for days because there is a lot to read and a lot of videos to watch.
7/4/15 - Akron, OH
We took showers in the Casita this morning. The campground we are in does not have
them. This is one of the few times we
have showered in the trailer. I don’t
like to wipe the bathroom down afterward and it’s small so it’s hard to wash my
hair.
We left camp around noon and drove into Akron to Hoppin’ Frog Brewery and Mucky Duck Brewery. Mucky Duck is a combination winery and brewery. It is on Portage Lake, one of a series of interconnected glacial kettle lakes left over from the Pleistocene Ice Age. Then we made a stop at Walmart to get some items and food for our 4th of July supper tonight at camp. The camp is really full and there is lots of smoke from campfires. We decided not to go to Kent for the fireworks tonight but we can really hear them. Kent is about 4 miles away. This is the same Kent that has Kent State University. The famous song by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young - “Ohio” (four dead in Ohio) was about the shooting of four Kent State students during a demonstration against the Vietnam War.
We left camp around noon and drove into Akron to Hoppin’ Frog Brewery and Mucky Duck Brewery. Mucky Duck is a combination winery and brewery. It is on Portage Lake, one of a series of interconnected glacial kettle lakes left over from the Pleistocene Ice Age. Then we made a stop at Walmart to get some items and food for our 4th of July supper tonight at camp. The camp is really full and there is lots of smoke from campfires. We decided not to go to Kent for the fireworks tonight but we can really hear them. Kent is about 4 miles away. This is the same Kent that has Kent State University. The famous song by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young - “Ohio” (four dead in Ohio) was about the shooting of four Kent State students during a demonstration against the Vietnam War.
7/5/15 - Confluence, PA
We packed up and left camp after being here for
7 days and drove to Confluence, PA. On
the way we stopped by Fort Necessity National Historic Site. This was the site of the first battle of the
French and Indian war in 1754. This was
a war over the territory from the Ohio Valley to the Mississippi River. George Washington, a 22 year old lieutenant
colonel in the British Army, engaged a much larger force of French soldiers and
their Indian allies. Washington surrendered, but the British subsequently sent
additional troops and eventually won the war.
One of the roads we drove on today was Highway 40, also known as the National Road, National Pike, and Cumberland Road. It was the first improved highway financed by the U.S. government. We visited Mount Washington Tavern, an old stagecoach shop along the National Road. It was closed - we'll come back tomorrow to see the interior.
In Confluence we set up the trailer at Outflow
Park, an Army Corps of Engineers campground.
It is on the Youghiogheny River, just below the Youghiogheny Lake dam. We had leftovers from yesterday for
supper. Jim found a VFW near us and we
drove over there for a beer. The people
there told us about things to see in the area that we didn’t know about. One was the site where three rivers
converge. George Washington saw this
and said it looked like a turkey foot.
The area around here is called Turkey Foot. This morning Jim and I picked some blackberries in camp. Next to the campground is Soft Freeze, an
ice cream and burger store. We drove
there and got some vanilla soft serve in a cup and went back to camp and put
the berries on top.
One of the roads we drove on today was Highway 40, also known as the National Road, National Pike, and Cumberland Road. It was the first improved highway financed by the U.S. government. We visited Mount Washington Tavern, an old stagecoach shop along the National Road. It was closed - we'll come back tomorrow to see the interior.
7/6/15 - Confluence, PA
Jim made breakfast sandwiches for us this
morning and worked on the blog. I paid
mom’s bills. Our first stop this
morning was to see Mount Washington Tavern again to see the inside of it. It was built in 1827 on land once owned by
George Washington. Then we stopped at
General Braddock’s grave. He was
wounded and later died during the Battle of the Wilderness in 1755. He was buried in the middle of the road and
then the troops and animals walked over the grave to remove any indication of
it. This was done to keep the Indians
from digging him up and desecrating his body.
During the repairing of the National Road in 1804 they found his remains
and reburied them on the adjacent hill and erected a monument.
The other National Historic Site in the area was Friendship Hill, a house built by Albert Gallatin. We took a tour of the home. Gallatin was Secretary of the Treasury for 13 years, a U.S. Senator, U.S. Representative, U.S. Negotiator for the Treaty of Ghent that ended the War of 1812 with Britain, and U.S. Minister to France and Great Britain. He helped establish the Senate Ways and Means Committee. He reduced the National Debt from the Revolutionary War by half by reducing military costs and increasing import taxes. He planned the financing of the Louisiana Purchase and funded the Lewis and Clark Expedition. He helped found New York University and was president of National Bank of New York – now J.P. Morgan Chase. We learned a lot about him.
On the way back we took a different road and stopped at VFW 747 in Point Marion. The road took us into West Virginia and then back up into Pennsylvania where we stopped in Addison to see one of the six remaining toll booths on the National Road. It is run by the Daughters of the American Revolution and is open by appointment only.
The other National Historic Site in the area was Friendship Hill, a house built by Albert Gallatin. We took a tour of the home. Gallatin was Secretary of the Treasury for 13 years, a U.S. Senator, U.S. Representative, U.S. Negotiator for the Treaty of Ghent that ended the War of 1812 with Britain, and U.S. Minister to France and Great Britain. He helped establish the Senate Ways and Means Committee. He reduced the National Debt from the Revolutionary War by half by reducing military costs and increasing import taxes. He planned the financing of the Louisiana Purchase and funded the Lewis and Clark Expedition. He helped found New York University and was president of National Bank of New York – now J.P. Morgan Chase. We learned a lot about him.
On the way back we took a different road and stopped at VFW 747 in Point Marion. The road took us into West Virginia and then back up into Pennsylvania where we stopped in Addison to see one of the six remaining toll booths on the National Road. It is run by the Daughters of the American Revolution and is open by appointment only.
7/7/15 - Confluence, PA
Today we drove to Fallingwater. This is a house built by Frank Lloyd Wright
in 1937 for a Pittsburgh businessman.
It is built partially over a waterfall using cantilever construction
techniques. It is widely considered to be an architectural masterpiece. It was designed to blend in with the natural
surroundings. No pictures were allowed
inside the house.
After taking the tour we went into the town of
Ohiopyle and had lunch. This is a
center for whitewater rafting on the Youghiogheny River. This afternoon we went to the laundry and
washed clothes. We were going to have
dinner at the VFW but they ran out. We
drove to the dam before returning back to the Casita. If the dam breaks we are goners.
I fixed supper and we sat outside for about 15 minutes and it started to
rain so we went inside and watched the old Alfred Hitchcock movie, “Dial M for
Murder”.
7/8/15 - Milton, PA
We left Confluence this morning and drove to
Milton, PA. We stopped at three
national historic sites today. The
first one was Flight 93 National Memorial.
This is where Flight 93 was flown into the ground on 9-11. The names of the 40 people who died are on a
memorial wall. They are in the process
of building a really large visitor center.
I suppose it will house a lot of artifacts and information of that day. One of the victims was named Edward Porter Felt. Jim wondered whether he might be a relative - Felt was his grandmother's last name.
The next stop was Johnstown Flood National Memorial. This was a horrific flood in 1889 that wiped out multiple towns after a dam broke because of heavy rain. Over 2,200 people died and there was massive property damage also. The visitors center was on a hill overlooking the site of the dam that breached.
Lastly we stopped by Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site. This was the first railroad constructed through the Allegheny Mountains in Pennsylvania. It was a series of 10 inclines about 36 miles long in use from 1834 – 1854 and it connected two main lines of the Pennsylvania Canal from Johnstown to Hollidaysburg. Canal boats were put on railroad cars and pulled over the steep inclines using ropes pulled by steam engines. On the section we stopped at was the Lemon House, a tavern passengers stopped at on the trip.
The next stop was Johnstown Flood National Memorial. This was a horrific flood in 1889 that wiped out multiple towns after a dam broke because of heavy rain. Over 2,200 people died and there was massive property damage also. The visitors center was on a hill overlooking the site of the dam that breached.
Lastly we stopped by Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site. This was the first railroad constructed through the Allegheny Mountains in Pennsylvania. It was a series of 10 inclines about 36 miles long in use from 1834 – 1854 and it connected two main lines of the Pennsylvania Canal from Johnstown to Hollidaysburg. Canal boats were put on railroad cars and pulled over the steep inclines using ropes pulled by steam engines. On the section we stopped at was the Lemon House, a tavern passengers stopped at on the trip.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)