Santa Claus and Lincoln City, IN--Lincoln's Boyhood Home NHP

After leaving Joe's house, we headed to Abraham Lincoln's boyhood home.  First stop, however, was in Santa Claus, IN.  There is an amusement park and gift shop, and all the streets are named after Christmas things....Christmas Blvd., Rudolph Lane, etc.  In late November they will have a mile-long display of LED lights which will tell the story of Rudolph.  Even the post office was fun!

Lincoln's boyhood home is a National Park, not Grand Canyon or Yellowstone, but a treasure none-the-less.  It was completed in 1943!!  There are so many smaller national parks which are wonderful and should become better known. 

One of our favorite parts of this day was a trail of 12 stones......one stone was from the Anderson Cottage, where Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation.  Another was from the old Capitol Building where he wrote his 2nd Inaugural Address, another was from the Mary Peterson house in DC, where he died......and my favorite:  the rock that stood where he gave his Gettysburg Address on November 19, 1863:

The building itself was a gem, with five different bas reliefs depicting different moments in Lincoln's life:

We also visited the grave of Nancy Hanks Lincoln, Abe's mother, who died when she was only 35 years old.

After our visit, we were "On the Road Again" passing by many cornfields, farms and more!

So here we are now in Springfield, IL, where tomorrow we will visit the Abraham Lincoln Memorial Library and Museum, his homestead and more.  I am so excited to walk where he walked and actually be right where he once was!  Stay tuned!

--Karen

From Mike:

FIELDS OF POPCORN

Indiana and Illinois had corn. Lots and lots of corn, interspersed with Soy. On the way from Huntingberg we saw fields of corn with signs saying some of it was Wearever popcorn.  Nice!

      

   For lunch we stopped at an  Amish buffet (Stolls Country Inn) near  Evansville, IN.  It was great food, but there weren't any Amish-- the food was homemade from Amish recipes.   It definitely did not help my waist line. Piles of vegetables, sauerkraut, pulled pork, roast beef, fried chicken... the cherry pie was so good, with a bit a vanilla ice cream...and of course I had to try the blueberry cobbler.

These "Kentucky Fences" were actually in Indiana, just before we arrived at Lincoln Boyhood National Park.   Many early settlers, including Thomas Lincoln and his family, had moved to Indiana across the Ohio River from Kentucy as it was a new territory opening up with better taxes.

Lincoln's boyhood  National Historic Site was really interesting.  I never knew his mother died of milk sickness, which is when the cows eat too much white snake root and the poison passes to the milk.  Many settlers died of it before they figured out what was happening.   It was primarily during droughts when the cows ventured into the cooler forest to find shrubs to eat.   I forgot to take a picture....Google it. http://www.nps.gov/archive/libo/white_snakeroot3.htm
It was neat walking where Lincoln walked as a boy and young adult.
A rooster.	Real glass in the windows was a luxury.
The actual foundation of Lincoln's boyhood home	Walking on the actual homestead of Thomas Lincoln, Abraham's father.

Tomorrow we get to see where he spent much of the rest of his life in Springfield, IL:

--Mike

Over the mountains and through the fields.....

As we began our trip, Emily followed right along behind us as we headed to our first stop of Dickinson College.  I must say I did feel rather like Matt Damon at the end of "Good Will Hunting" as he headed west on the Mass Turnpike.  It was a pretty exciting feeling to realize that finally, this was IT!!

We went as far as Bethlehem, PA, but after dinner, Emily continued on her way, proudly getting to Dickinson College in less than two hours.  We stopped by to see her dorm room and joined her for a brief moment of rest on the famous red chairs of Dickinson.

We went to the most beautiful Mass the first morning.  Mike checked online and we found St. Joseph the Worker church.  When I first walked in, two things struck me:  one, was that the altar was bathed in golden light from the stained glass all around, and two, there was a small tapestry at the pulpit which was the exact replica of Christ the teacher that I had bought in Greece.  It felt like coming home!

We stayed in West Virginia that night. The next day was a beautiful, peaceful ride along Rt. 79 through the hollows of the Appalachian mountains.  At one point, Mike broke out into song: "West Virginia, Blue Ridge Mountains, Shenandoah River".  I thought John Denver had suddenly channeled him!  

The fields and fences in Kentucky were absolutely classic!  Unfortunately, driving along at 75 mph doesn't allow for great pictures!  Mike decided to stop at one bourbon distillery.....Buffalo Trace.

After a very long day, we arrived at Joe and Tammy's......where Tammy had a delicious, home-cooked meal waiting!  Thank you, Tammy, for the wonderful meatloaf dinner......my comfort food meal!  Our beds were ready and after a glass of wine, stomachs full, we headed to bed.  Hospitality at it's best!!

The next morning was Zoe's first day of school and she was so excited

And Thomas took it all in!
  --Karen

Following the Buffalo Trail

From Mike:

We learned today (you'll learn where later down) that the settlers making their way into Kentucky followed the trails made by thousands of migrating buffalo making their way to the plain.  Having to make their way through heavily wooded hills, the trails of the buffalo made the easiest path.   Quite a difference from the interstates of today.

   In Massachusettes, we made our way past the second highest point on Route 90.  We will be making our way back to Route 90 and  plan on taking a picture of the corresponding sign in South Dakota.

The first states flew by.   Although each state warmly welcomed us,  we barely got a chance to say hello.  

Pennsylvania had wonderful fields full of corn and haystacks.

Emily drove ahead of us and met us at Dickinson, which is known for their red chairs, and their attractive chair models.

Driving through Maryland on the National Freeway (Route 70, through Route 68) was absolutely spectacular.  I wish we could have stayed longer to ride our bikes on the Bike Trail.

When they talk about Wild and Wonderful West Virginia they must be talking of  Route 79 south from Morgantown to Charleston.  This was a route I would not want to do in the winter!  Hills and Hollows were an understatement.  What beautiful country!!  We wished we could have taken one of the very few exits to see what was behind the mountains we were going through.  The Blue Ridge parkway had fewer curves it seemed...well maybe not, but on the Blue Ridge you aren't going 70 mph down hill.

Kentucky felt like a gentlemen's state.  Karen wanted to take pictures of all the wooden horse fences, and hopefully we will get some, but I didn't want to miss the 3:00 o'clock tour at Buffalo Trace Distillary.  (Did you know to be called Bourbon a whiskey has to  have at least 51% corn, must be aged  a minimum of two years in Virgin Oak Barrels which can only be used once, and can have no added coloring or flavoring?  )

Here I am breathing the "angels share".  The air in the warehouses was sweet with evaporated Bourbon.  Roughly 4% of the Bourbon leaves the barrel each year due to evaporation. A 10 year old Bourbon has only 50% of the original amount left in the barrel.

And yes, the buffalo crossed the Kentucky River right near this water tower. 

      We arrived at Thomas, Zoe, Tammy, and Joe's house around supper time.  We'll post pictures soon.

--Mike

Rainy days and Wednesdays........

I love this video.....it's like: now you see him, now you don't!!  More than that, it really shows the wind and the waves of our walk that day.
I can only remember two other times when I came to Ogunquit and it rained like this. Once was about three years ago in October when there was a hurricane brewing. Another time was last summer when they actually closed the Marginal Way. Crazy weather........unfortunately for us, the sun will be out tomorrow and for the next week, just after we leave. Hopefully, next year will be better......or even when we come back in October!
As we strolled along Marginal Way, I decided to take a picture of my favorite house:
There were warning signs along the way, too:
I love this picture, too.......it looks like I touched it up by making it part black and white, and part color.....but it just came out that way!

One of the bright spots during this dreary week was going to lunch with Aunt Joyce and Uncle Jack.....we had a wonderful time catching up with them.  Mike's Clam Shack was delicious!  We highly recommend it!

We've had an interesting time here.....seeing "Spamalot", which I did not appreciate nearly as much as Mike and Emily......we went to see "Eat, Pray and Love" with Julia Roberts, which was good, but disturbing as it brought back some feelings which I thought were long gone.  We also went to see "Camille Claudel" at the Ogunquit Museum of American Art.  What a wonderful, but sad movie about the French sculptress who had a love affair with Auguste Rodin.  Beautiful, sad movie.

We're off tomorrow to get packed for the BIG trip!  Yikes, I can't believe it's actually here!

~Karen

Another Drizzly day in Maine...and another...and another....and another..

From Mike: One thing about rainy days, they force you to relax. Our trip to Maine has been definitely relaxing. Sunday night we saw an amazing production of Spamalot at the Ogunquit Playhouse. I have never laughed so hard. Yes, there was some irreverance, some bawdy humor, and the killer rabbit scene was quite graphic, but there were tender moments too, like when they collected "arms for the poor" or when the peasant was "not dead yet". Seriously, the two major themes, "always look on the bright side of life", and "find your grail", were inspiring. We were all dancing and singing to the prompts at the end. A wonderful time!
Walking Marginal Way with the wind at our faces was also quite inspiring. The nice thing about Maine weather is that it is all good, whether you are experiencing a beautiful sunny day on the beach, or feeling the chill of the fog as it rolls across the salty brine, or standing in awe of the pounding surf, you are brought to a calmer place within.

  The other thing about rainy days, it gives one a good excuse to work on research.  I added some technical musings to this blog, as well as figured out how to add tweetdeck to Ubuntu, added KDE, and did a few other fun things in Linux...well, they were fun for me...

--Mike