Crashing a Wedding, Visiting Family & Discovering a New Country in Europe!

Hallo, Bonjour, Hej Hej & Sveiki!

our first month in Europe has been full of surprises…not just for our friend, whose wedding we crashed.

The Hawaiian Wedding Crashers

We had our share of surprises, too:

• When we were in the train at the last stop before Stuttgart, we did not expect a 3+ hour detour
• When we arrived in Stuttgart, I did not expect to jump of a church tower the next day
• When we sat down in our aunt’s living room one afternoon, I did not expect to end up at a punk rock concert a few hours later
• When we booked our flights to see my brother’s family in Sweden, we did not expect to “discover” a new country along the way

We had been warned that flight delays and cancellations are very common these days. So we were very pleasantly surprised to make it from Boston to Frankfurt with no problem. We even caught our high speed train just in time and were one stop away from Stuttgart when a bird decided to fly into some electric wire at the main station in Stuttgart and caused train traffic to Stuttgart to shut down for several days! Our detour included three more trains before Sandra’s sister picked us up from the closest town we could get to. The last 120 miles of our journey took almost as long as the first 3,600 miles!

Looks like Emma wasn't lying when she told us
473 times how excited she was that we're coming

But our timing once in Stuttgart could not have been any better: The day after we arrived, there was a neighborhood festival. My favorite part was the “Abseiling” from the church tower. I thought it would be just a fun activity. I did not expect to be so scared after climbing over the fence looking down at Sandra more than 100 feet below. The most surprising part for someone coming from America: I did not have to sign a single waiver! It’s almost like they did not expect me to sue them, if I had fallen to the ground.

Free "Abseiling" from the church tower

Sandra’s sister Petra had given me a book to read last year. Even though I liked the beginning, I never got to finish it. But as I mentioned: Our timing was perfect: The theater right next to Petra’s place was performing “Achtsam Morden”. It’s a really funny play about a guy who is sent to a mindfulness seminar by his wife and ends up learning how to kill more mindfully. We loved it and it made up for all the theater plays we miss at the Iao and ProArts theaters back home on Maui. 

With our moms at my hometown Breisach,
viewed from France

Then we spent a week in my hometown at my parents with Sandra’s mom. We made it to France twice and went for a fun dinner and a walk in the Black Forest.

I want to look (and more importantly hike)
like that when I'm 83.

Usually, we would have also played a lot of games, but since my parents might be the only people in the world who actually want to see all of our 2000+ photos of our road trip so far this year, we did that. Good thing we are in Europe long enough, so we can still play some games with them later! We also looked through some old family memorabilia with my mom and found out that we are not the first ones in the family who emigrated to America. 

Does anyone know an "Oskar Tauer"
who lived in Indiana about 150 years ago?

We returned to Stuttgart the next weekend and went to visit our aunt. It was meant to be a “harmless” lunch followed by the traditional German “Kaffee & Kuchen”. 

Traditional "Kaffee & Kuchen" with our favorite aunt

Aunt Rose's granddaughter and her boyfriend joined us and when they mentioned that they were going to a concert that night, I innocently asked who was playing. When they replied “Die Toten Hosen”, I couldn’t believe my luck and immediately decided to join them. It’s only my favorite punk rock band that I had not seen in 27+ years. It’s surprising that they are still around after drinking and touring for 40+ years…and they seem to be more popular than ever! The 65,000 tickets were sold out. But here’s another silver lining of the pandemic: Someone’s son couldn’t come because he tested positive and that’s how I got my ticket right before the concert. 

Quality Time with distant family and a few strangers
at the Toten Hosen concert

It was such a hoot: I enjoyed the flashbacks to my teenage years during the old songs and catching up with what they have been doing since. I couldn’t agree more with Campino: “An Tagen wie diesen…wünscht man sich Unendlichkeit!”

Looks like the Toten Hosen found plenty of replacements
for the fans who moved to Hawaii...

More good timing: Our friend Barb from Oahu just happened to be in Stuttgart, too and we were able to meet up with her twice. Not totally coincidental, but still lucky that we were also in Stuttgart for Petra's birthday: One of those long, warm summer nights of eating Greek food and drinking German beer with friends until midnight.

Happy Birthday, Petra!

Stuttgart offered us even more: I will admit that we only went to the “Start Up BW Night” because Petra made us go there. It’s an event for young entrepreneurs in the area. That’s not usually something we seek out, but Petra was involved in organizing the event and wanted us to go. So we went ….and we loved it! We enjoyed listening to the wide variety of pitches. There were students competing with ‘imaginary’ projects: For example, we loved the idea of a shampoo that also works as a sunscreen or glasses that can tell a blind person what he’s not seeing. Then there were young entrepreneurs presenting very real companies, looking for investors. Our favorite was “Alphavan”: they build very high end camper vans. I went back to their demo model three times and if we were richer and lived in Europe, I would have ordered one right there.

Concert at the "Start Up BW Night"

We could not find a good time to see my brother and his family in Switzerland, so we decided to visit them in their cute vacation cottage in Sweden. The cheapest flight we could find was with a 16 hour layover in Riga, Latvia. We were excited to “discover” a new country in Europe. “Discovering” of course in the same sense as Europeans “discovered” America. There were already people living in Latvia before we got there. In fact, over the past millennium, they built a beautiful city. 

Town Hall Square in Riga

Outdoor dining options galore!

We enjoyed walking around Old Town Riga and had a nice Latvian dinner. Of course with the obligatory “Black Balsam”, which supposedly is a cure-all medicine. How often do you get to take shots and can claim doing so for health reasons?

"Dampfross", the most notorious board game in our family

We got to Sweden just in time for my nephew’s 16th birthday. Once united with my brother’s family in Sweden, the games quickly began. It’s always a friendly competition: I let him win in chess, he lets me win in Dampfross and we all usually let Hannes win in disc golf. But we played enough rounds of disc golf and came up with enough silly special rules that everybody got to win at least once, even Sandra and my brother. 

Hannes is smiling because he knows he's winning.
No idea why the rest are smiling.

Considering we were there in the middle of summer, it was surprisingly cold. We are also not used to the very long Swedish summer days, so when my brother suggested going swimming at the lake at 10pm, I wasn’t sure whether he was kidding. But when we got there, we weren’t even the only ones. 

At the lake just after sunset (which is also shortly before
sunrise; it was already light when we got up at 3:30am
on the last day on the way to the airport)

Another time, we felt pretty crazy going swimming in the Baltic Sea despite the frigid temperatures. I was proud to make it into the water for a very quick dip, but my sense of accomplishment was ruined by a bunch of Swedish kids, who playfully splashed around endlessly, as if it was just another sunny day on the beach. Luckily, Sweden is so sparsely populated that there are plenty of lakes and coastline where we were on our own and pretended to be the only ones tough enough to swim in the ice cold water.

The only way for me to get into the cold water

Enjoying the warm puddles afterwards

The Swedish Coast is very pretty and pretty cold

It’s a rare opportunity to crash a good friend’s wedding. 

Under normal circumstances, if you are good friends, you’d be invited and you can’t crash a wedding you’re invited to. But we got that rare chance: Sandra had a little hanai sister when she first moved to Munich. We were very close, but 26 years ago we moved to the other end of the world and 11 years ago Claudia moved to the other end of Germany, so we didn't even see her on our visits to Munich anymore. Even though we haven’t seen each other (or even spoken or written much) since 2008, we jumped at the chance when Marianne asked us to come to the wedding as surprise guests. Surprise guests sounds so much friendlier than wedding crashers.

The long lost sisters united again!

The surprise, the wedding and the party turned out perfectly: Claudia was as surprised as she was happy to see us. Sandra also had some salty discharge in her eyes. As uninvited guests, we got stuck with the most fun table at dinner. There are many things I prefer in America, but in general we find German weddings to be more fun. We like traditions like the games, the wedding newspaper and the dancing all night. But I have to admit that we were in bed before 2am, while the crazy Germans were dancing for three more hours... 

Bremen is Beautiful!

Bremen would have been worth a visit even without the wedding. Last time I had been there was as a teenager. I didn’t remember much and I probably did not appreciate the pretty and pretty old buildings back then. We got to climb up the church tower, I went to an organ concert, we had drinks under a windmill, we visited two museums and the “Bürgerschaft”. That’s the state capitol of Bremen. They had a great photo exhibition, but overall state capitols in America are way more impressive. Of course we also paid the Bremer Stadtmusikanten a visit since the Brothers Grimm fairy tale about them, along with Beck’s beer and the soccer team are pretty much the only things that every German knows about Bremen.

Bremen at Night

It's been too long!

But our favorite part about Bremen was crashing the wedding. In fact, we would consider doing this again some day, so watch out if you don’t invite us to your next wedding!

Aloha, tschüss, salut, hejdå & čau from Europe,

Chris, Sandra & Ohana

New England - It’s Good to Have Friends in Old Places!

Aloha all,

in the first week since the last post, we visited our imaginary friends. This included arguably the most consequential president in American history and his wife, an almost forgotten president, some famous artists and one of the richest families in American history. 

The second week we spent with real friends in New England. They are all Maui friends, but you don’t get away from us just because you are 5,000 miles away. The irony is that the average age of the three homes of our friends in NEW England is over 200 years OLD!

We spent two days visiting Eleanor & Franklin

I consider FDR the most consequential US president (elected as president four times and led the US through the great depression and World War II). Whether you like him or not, in his first 100 days in office, he probably changed America more than any other president before or after. There is enough to learn, love and dislike about FDR that we wanted to go back to his home in Hyde Park, NY. He was also the first president to have a presidential library and even though we had been there before, we did not manage to see the whole museum before they kicked us out at closing time. 

This time, we also visited Eleanor Roosevelt’s home, called “Val-Kill”. We had no idea that Eleanor was so much more than an influential First Lady; for example she was very instrumental in the creation of the United Nation’s "Universal Declaration of Human Rights". It sure sounds like they were quite the power couple, even though romantically, their relationship did not seem to have been equally powerful.

The Vanderbuilt Mansion - Money can't buy Gemütlichkeit

There are more mansions in the Hudson River Valley in Upstate New York than even we can visit on one trip. Frederick Vanderbilt was practically a neighbor of FDR, so we went there next. The original founder of the family fortune was Cornelius Vanderbilt. He left almost everything to his first born son. That caused enough of a family feud that when he passed away, he spread his wealth amongst all his children. There was enough that eight of them built a mansion or two each. Frederick was the only one of those siblings who grew his fortune rather than spend it. His Hyde Park mansion is very fancy and the ranger guided tour was excellent, but the mansion itself wasn’t our favorite. To be honest, I think we rather live in Kahana Villa and leave this cold, stiff building to the National Park Service. They do such a great job showing that income inequality is nothing new.

The whimsical "Wilderstein Mansion"

Just a little bit further up the Hudson River we visited the much more charming “Wilderstein Mansion". This one was owned by a cousin and confidante of FDR. In fact, Daisy was such a close friend that FDR told her secrets he would not tell anyone else. For example, he talked to her about his disability (which he usually kept very secret) and he told her about the planned invasion of Normandy before the actual D-Day (which was only the biggest secret in modern military history). 

The “Hudson River School” is described as "the first native school of painting in the United States". They are given credit for helping the first nature conservation efforts and national parks being established. The old black & white photos at the time would not have convinced many city dwellers on the East Coast that these landscapes needed to be protected. Apparently the paintings of the "Hudson River School" artists did. Thomas Cole is considered the founder of the Hudson River School. He had his home and studio in Catskill on one side of the Hudson River. His favorite student Frederic Church later settled on the other side. Luckily for us, the two places are now connected by a bridge with a “Skywalk” offering very dramatic views of the Hudson River and the surrounding mountains. It's not the Grand Canyon, but the area is so beautiful that I can see why it inspired these painters.

The Skywalk between Catskill & Hudson

I always find it a little sad when painters struggled during their lifetime, but then became famous after their death and never find out that their paintings sold for millions. For a while it was almost the other way round for these artist. Apparently they were rock stars for a while during their lifetime in the mid 19th century. Even Mark Twain was raving about paintings by Frederic Church and some of them sold for almost 100 times the average annual income at the time. Then came a time when the artists of the Hudson River School were almost forgotten, now they seem to enjoy somewhat of a renaissance. 

The eclectic & eccentric "Olana"

We are glad that some fellow travelers recommended visiting Frederic Church’s “Olana”. Little did we know that we would end up staying there all day and even all night. We took three different guided tours through the house, the studio and the gardens. Frederic Church considered his work designing the home and the landscapes around it his masterpiece. They also just happened to host a free summer concert by the Albany Symphony Wind Quintet that night. And by the time the fireworks across the river were starting, we had talked to the Managing Director of Olana often enough that she allowed us to park Joy overnight at a little roadside parking lot that is part of the estate. Olana really felt like Ohana!

Evening concert at "Olana"

There once was a very controversial president in America. He only served one term, but everybody seemed to either love him or hate him. If you are thinking of a certain more recent controversial one term president, you might take solace in the fact that the president I was talking about is almost forgotten today. 

There is one reason most people at least know Van Buren was a president: Many towns named their streets after the early presidents. And if your town has at least eight streets, eventually you get to Van Buren. But there is so much more useless trivia about Martin Van Buren: He was the first “American Born” president (all others before him were still born as British subjects). He is also the only president ever whose native language was not English (he was raised in Dutch). He also co-founded the Democratic Party. And he had a vice president who once suggested funding an expedition to the center of earth, which he suspected was hollow. It sure sounds like eccentric, crazy politicians are nothing new.

The National Park Service has restored Van Buren's home and offers free tours, yet as a sign of how few remember him, we were the only ones on that tour. I guess for a lot of people, Van Buren is just a street name. Maybe the day will come when another president is just known for a building in New York that is named after him.

A little hint, just in case you're not sure
whether you love or hate New York

The New York State Capitol in Albany was the 31st state capitol we visited. They were all very impressive. Most state capitols have enormous and ornate domes that remind me of the grandest cathedrals in Europe. But I have to admit that some of the state capitols start to blend into each other in our memories. For better or for worse, Albany is very different and we will probably always remember it. The Capitol building itself is square, confusing and spectacular.  

We especially enjoyed the
“Million Dollar Staircase”,
which was not designed by Escher

But the most striking difference to other state capitols are the surroundings: Governor Rockefeller had a whole low income neighborhood leveled in the 60s to build “Empire State Plaza”. Apparently all that concrete was so modern and popular half a century ago that they did not mind that the concrete blocks almost hide the pretty capitol building. I find the plaza a bit cold and sterile, but I give them credit for making the concert hall and the state museum two of the most impressive buildings in town and for putting a free observation deck in the tallest concrete block.

The Empire State Plaza,
(if you look carefully, you can still see the capitol)

Here are the other shenanigans we got into in the Albany area: In Schenectady we watched the fun “Mean Girls” musical. In Waterford we went to see and learn about the Eerie Canal. And when we were in East Greenbush to spend a night at Cracker Barrel and found out that our friend Jeanne grew up there, we went to see her childhood home. 

I "think" this was a Rodin

We find some of our favorite places not in guide books or from Google (not that there is anything wrong with that!), but from recommendations from fellow travelers. “The Clark Art Institute” is such a place. Usually, we don’t necessarily seek out “normal” art museums. Without the recommendation from people we met at Olana, we would never have found out that “The Clark” is anything but a normal museum. Their special exhibit about Rodin would have been worth a visit already. Their regular collection is very impressive for a little private museum in rural Massachusetts. I’m no art expert, but I have heard of Monet, Degas, Renoir, Pissarro and Van Gogh, just to name a few of their collections. Then they have a beautiful garden, including some trees that once grew upside down (long story, please ask if you want to know). To top it all off, they had a free open air movie night, showing the very gripping 1955 film “The Night of the Hunter”. And to ensure that “The Clark” becomes our favorite art museum, they let us stay overnight in Joy in the museum parking lot!

"The Bridge of Flowers" in Shelburne Falls, MA

With a destination in mind, we had to drive for most of one day to move forward. But we were still able to squeeze in something useful and something pretty: We got our second booster shot and visited "The Bridge of Flowers". This railroad bridge in the cute little town of Shelburne Falls, MA was abandoned almost 100 years ago. A local housewife had the brilliant idea to turn it into a community garden and local volunteers have maintained it ever since. It was prettier and had more interesting plants than some big botanical gardens we have been to.

Just one of the many unique plants
on The Bridge of Flowers

After a quick stop in Providence to re-visit the Rhode Island State Capitol, we drove to Rehoboth, MA to visit our friends Nick & Katy…or so we thought. Somehow we ended up at Katie’s parents home at first, but that’s another fun little story. When we finally made it to Nick and Katie’s house, we were enthusiastically greeted by their seven year old son. At first I was surprised that he even remembered me since they had moved away from Maui years ago. Then I quickly realized, that probably anybody driving an RV would have gotten that greeting. 

We agree, Joy is a pretty cool Toy!

We have toured a lot of old homes, many of them were not as old as the one from Nick and Katy with about 200 years. We have also had a lot of really funny tour guides, but not all as funny as when their seven year old started the tour of the house: “This is our living room, it is pleasantly messy”. We played games, threw a little frisbee, kayaked, met the family and went to a garden party with more kids and more games…we can understand why they left beautiful Maui. If we had decided to have kids, we might have moved even further back east.

Happy Maui Ultimate Reunion in New England

Next we went to visit our friends Trip and Dora in Westport, MA. We got to know them last year on Maui when they joined our Tuesday Night Ohana. They bought (or should I say “rescued”?) an old plantation style home on Front Street. We thought it was a pretty big project to turn this termite infested shack into a beautiful, historically restored, but very livable home. Little did we know that this was child’s play for them. Here in Westport, they brought several historical buildings onto their property and restored them in such an ingenious way that you know you are in an old building, but you are not lacking any modern conveniences. The restoration turned out so beautifully that we actually abandoned Joy and slept in the house!

Depending how you look at it, this house is
over 300 years, 188 years or about 5 years old

We arrived in Westport just in time for the 4th of July festivities, which started with a cute small town parade. However, I have to admit that my favorite “float” wasn’t even in the parade, it was the 1965 Lincoln Continental convertible in which Trip drove us there.

Guess which one Dora calls "The Floating Mattress"
Hint: it's not the one with an actual mattress inside

I could write a whole blog just about our few days we spent with Trip and Dora. But since I already wrote a thousand words, I’ll try to summarize our time there with a few pictures:

4th of July Party with fireworks, music, food and fun people

We also got a private tour of Wyndfield Studio
by the artist herself (www.wyndfieldstudio.com)

Cookout at the Point

The Best (and the most casual) Lobster Dinner
we ever had

They are no longer whaling here, but
New Bedford is still a very busy harbor!

The New Bedford Whaling Museum -
so much more than a whaling museum!

They don't just rescue houses,
but bee swarms, too

Seems like most houses around here have been moved
at some point, including several of Trip & Dora

Our last night before leaving, we got to sleep in this restored
1806 house in the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park

We really love our family in Germany, otherwise we just might have stayed with Trip and Dora until they kick us out. But with the knowledge that we will be back in Westport and back on the road in September, we were excited to fly to Germany to spend time with our family. 

I usually do not write as many blog posts while we are in Europe, but I already jumped off a 100 foot church tower, we found a European country I haven’t been to and we have reservations at my favorite restaurant in the world…so there might be enough to write another blog post after all.

Until then: Tschüss!

Chris & Sandra

Planes, Trains, Mansion, Hippies and the Half Way Challenge

 Aloha all,

for the first month of our trip, we had it easy: There was always a line on a map to follow, first the Blue Ridge Parkway and then the Skyline Drive. All we had to do was look whether there was anything close to that line that might be worth a detour. After reaching the northern end of Shenandoah National Park, we had to do a little research to decide which route to take to get to our friends in New England in time for the 4th of July festivities. 

Planing our trip to Trip & Dora

We usually plan one day at a time and had no idea what special places we would visit: 

• We’re not that much into airplanes, but if we can see the fastest plane in the world, we’ll check it out.
• We are no geologists, but if there is a a mysterious boulder field on our way, we’re happy to go exploring
• We don’t need to see every civil war battlefield, but after hearing about Antietam for years, we had to find out what that was all about
• We are no serious long distance hikers, but if we are a mile from the half way point of the Appalachian Trail, there is no stopping us
• We don’t like spending a day at repair shops, but if Joy calls for help, we listen
• We don’t need to see every old house, but we do if it’s the home of arguably the most important person for Germany’s prosperity
• We are no train buffs, but seeing the largest locomotive ever built was pretty impressive. 
• We also found the place and time I want to time-travel to and the place and time I most definitely do NOT want to time-travel to.

Here is what I learned about history growing up in Germany: There were two options what to do with Germany after World War II: The Morgenthau Plan and the Marshall Plan. Morgenthau would have sent Germany back to a pre-industrial time. Germans would have been allowed to produce food, but not much more. After the Nazi terror, who can blame him? We got closer to that scenario than most people realize: FDR had approved the plan; had he not died, the Morgenthau Plan would probably have been implemented. And after 1945, under President Truman, Morgenthau was the first in line of succession. Had Truman died, Morgenthau would have become president and would have had his way. Fortunately for Germany, Truman lived and chose the Marshall Plan, which generously helped most Western European countries (including the ‘guilty’ ones) to rebuild after the war. So you can see why we like Truman and Marshall: The world and our lives would have been very different without them. I can see why General C. Marshall is the only career military man to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.

Thank you Mr. Marshall & Thank you, Michelle!

The Dodona Manor was Marshall’s home in Leesburg, VA. It was about to be torn down in the 1980’s when local residents (and grateful German donors) stepped in to save it. Now you can tour the home and hear the stories about the man who had two positions that were both very significant for Germany: First, he was in charge of destroying Nazi Germany as the Chief of Staff of the US Army and then he was the inspiration behind the Marshall plan to help Germany rebuild after the war. And if you think we’re weird how much we enjoy touring old houses, you should meet our tour guide; she was at least as excited! I know she didn’t stretch the one hour tour to two and a half hours to make more money, since she was a volunteer…

As much as we enjoy traveling in Joy: Driving into big cities is not our favorite thing, so we had already decided to skip Washington DC on this trip. But after visiting Marshall’s home, we realized how close we were and found two interesting places on the outskirts of DC, which we had not seen on previous trips. First, we went to the Great Falls, because they looked pretty cool on pictures and because it’s a National Park Service site and we try to never miss any of those. They might not be the tallest waterfalls in the world, but for a feature in what is basically an urban park, they are VERY impressive and deserve their name:

The Great Falls Park by Washington DC

We had been to several of the Smithsonian Museums before, including the Air & Space Museum. However, most of the really cool stuff does not fit into their museum on the Washington Mall, so they built a huge hanger by the Dulles Airport. There, they show off pretty much anything that human’s came up with in two centuries of aviation. That includes the ‘Blackbird’, the fastest airplane ever built. On its way to its permanent retirement here at the Smithsonian, it shattered a coast to coast speed record: With an average speed of over 2,300mph (3,700kmh!), it took them just 64 minutes to fly from LAX to DC! That’s pretty impressive for a plane developed in the1960’s. Here is the surprising part: There is not a single modern plane that can fly that fast!

The Blackbird - the fastest plane ever

As fascinating as that and aviation history in general is, our appreciation (and understanding) of the technical details is limited, so we can’t look at old planes all day. We still spent the whole day at the museum, but we took a two hour break watching the new “Top Gun” movie on their IMAX screen. That was a very powerful movie experience especially after seeing all those planes…and the fact that I learnt from one of the docents afterwards which parts of the movie were totally unrealistic did not take away from the enjoyment, but rather added to it. I like feeling smarter than Tom Cruise.

Next we went to Antietam National Battlefield, even though the minute details of battles don’t really interest us all that much. But the civil war is such an integral part of US history that we try to visit at least the sites managed by our beloved National Park Service. They always do such a good job in explaining the historical context and the different perspectives of any historical event or place. Antietam was no exception. I love that whatever questions I come up with, there is a ranger to give a knowledgeable answer…usually leading to the next question. So I am glad we went to Antietam, not because it was the bloodies civil war battle, but because now we know more about the context. The Union victory against the first attack of the Confederacy in the North was the catalyst for Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. Did you know that the states in the South were given a 100 day warning to rejoin the Union? And since the proclamation only affected slaves in states in rebellion, they would have been allowed to keep their slaves had they re-joined the Union. As much credit as he gets (and maybe deserves), Lincoln was far from being an abolitionist.

Thanks to rangers like him, it's not just a field

Pennsylvania turned some of their former iron mining and furnaces into state parks. That part of the Pine Grove Furnace SP history was interesting, but I have to admit, I was even more fascinated by the somewhat random fact, that it is also the halfway point on the famed Appalachian Trail. I’ve been intrigued by the AT ever since I read Bill Bryson’s book “A Walk in the Woods”. I like everything about the Appalachian Trail: The history, the environmental protection, the community of through hikers, the scenery…if it did not involve so much walking, I definitely would hike the whole Appalachian Trail!

The Appalachian Trail Museum at Pine Grove Furnace SP

But because we are lazy and like to be comfortable, we do the trip from Georgia to New England in Joy. With all our side trips and detours, it takes us about as long as some of the faster through hikers on foot. There is an “Appalachian Trail Museum” in the park, which tells the story of the creation of the trail, serves as a “hall of fame” of notable record holders and gives lazy people like us an insight into the through hiker culture. 

I'm so proud we made it to the Halfway Point of the AT ;-)

If you hike the whole thing, tradition is to mark the half way point at a little general store at this state park by eating half a gallon of ice cream. And indeed, when we got there, several through hikers were working on their buckets of ice cream. Just to give you an idea how important that “Half Way Challenge” seems to be: When I asked one of the girls whether she was “doing the whole thing” (referring to the trail), she replied full of shame and disappointment “No, I just couldn’t do it.” The fact that she had just completed 1,100 miles of mountainous hiking did not seem to matter in light of her failure to eat half a gallon of ice cream…

The John Harris Mansion that wasn't a mansion
when John Harris lived there

When we find a historical home that offers guided tours, we often go there, not knowing anything else about it. So when we came to the John Harris Mansion in Harrisburg, it could have been a trap. It could have been that nothing notable ever happened there. But you know when people say “If these walls could speak…”. Thanks to all the dedicated docents, volunteers and tour guides, I feel the walls often do speak: The John Harris Mansion told a colorful story how it was built as a pretty simple farm house by the founder of the town and how it was expanded over the years to become quite the elaborate mansion. Most of the upgrades were done by the later owner Simon Cameron, Lincoln’s first Secretary of War. At one point the floors of the whole house and surrounding grounds were lowered by 4 feet, supposedly to accommodate the 14 feet tall mirrors he bought in France.

While in Harrisburg, we also went back to the Pennsylvania State Capitol, which is just slightly too spectacular to visit only once.

The Pennsylvania State Capitol in Harrisburg

The Hickory Run Boulder Field is pretty impressive by itself. The fact that it is surrounded by lush green forest makes it very intriguing. We’ve been driving for weeks through forest like this, but never saw anything like this. We are glad we came, because we did not only learn how it got there, we also learned that in about 5,000-10,000 years, it will be gone. That’s only a second and  a half in geological time, we were lucky to get there just in time!

I suggest you visit the Hickory Run Boulder Field before it's gone!

I’m glad that we skipped one day of exploring to take care of a light, but unusual vibration when Joy was going over 35mph. Of course those things happen on the weekend and the first four repair shops had different kind of excuses for not even looking at Joy. But at the 5th shop we found out that one of her tires was about to blow. That was a pretty important, but easy fix. The repair shop even provided us with a comfort dog while we waited. And even on that day, we still did a walk to a pretty waterfall in the morning and watched a movie in the evening. What felt like a “lost” day would still have been a pretty full day at home. I love road trips.

Jerry fixed Joy!

I like trains, but mostly to go places. We skip most train museums, but luckily made an exception for the Steamtown National Historical Park in Scranton, PA. Besides a large collection of old locomotives and train cars, they have a great exhibit about railroad history. To my surprise, the very first “rail roads” were wooden rails in Germany, out of all places. The only explanation I have for never having heard that before is this: The German word for rail road is “Eisenbahn” which means “iron rail”. So since those early rails were made of wood, we can’t claim to have the first “Eisenbahn”, we’ll give that credit to England. And of course the prize for the biggest locomotives ever built goes to the US. Here’s one of only eight remaining “Big Boys”:

Big Boy and his distant cousin Joy

Steamtown NHP has a large steam locomotive that is cut open, which makes it a little easier for laymen like us to see how it actually works. We also took a little train ride and we got to attend ranger programs about the Pullman history, about train safety during the industrial revolution, the variety of locomotives and a tour through the machine shop where the National Park Service maintains and restores trains from the past 200 years. 

Ah...that's how that works!

You wouldn’t know from just walking or driving around Scranton, but the whole area has many hundreds of miles of abandoned coal mine shafts under it. In large areas, they left just enough standing that it holds up the ground above it, sometimes not even enough for that. We took a tour through the Lackawanna Coal Mine in Scranton. Our tour guide was awesome, he gave us a better understanding of how coal mines actually worked…and how terrible the working conditions were. Thanks to him, I know now, that I never want to work at a coal mine, at least not in the 19th century. Those miners (some were just kids!) might think it’s a total fantasy that you can now make a living by driving other people around Maui or booking them in vacation rentals. I can’t say I disagree. We felt very blessed anyway, but even more so after learning about the work in a coal mine. I have mixed feelings about unions today, but I can see why it was (and probably still is) necessary to have them. 

Tour guide would be the only job I ever want to do at a mine

Here is a shocking quote from one of the lawyers of the coal barons who exploited children and men, including thousands who died in preventable coal mining accidents: 

“The rights and interests of the laboring man will be protected and cared for, not by the labor agitators, but by the Christian men to whom God in His infinite wisdom has given control of the property interests of the country”

The only reason for me to time travel to a coal mine in 1902 would be to shove this guy in a mine shaft, lock it and let him think about that for a while. 

On our way northwest, we stopped in the cute town of Honesdale. They have one of those breweries that lets you stay in your RV overnight “for free”. Unless you are hungry and thirsty, then it ends up being a $100 campground, but still well worth it.

We also spent almost $100 on two pickle ball paddles and balls at the beginning of this trip...and finally got to use them last week. But it was so much fun that I'm sure we'll get more use out of them sooner or later.

First ever Road Trip Pickle Ball for us!

We went back to Bethel, better known as the place where the “Woodstock Music and Art Fair” took place. When we were there in 2008, the museum was brand new. It would have been worth it to visit again just to remind us of all the things we had forgotten over the years. For example that not even 10% of the people who were at the festival in 1969 stayed to see Jimi Hendrix. He was one of the main headliners, but didn’t perform until Monday morning! They also added a few things, for example a new fancy outdoor amphitheater to bring back music to the old dairy farm. They currently have a special exhibit about the forgotten “and Art” part of the festival. When we were here in 2008, we talked to a guy who showed us the original site. We now learned that the guy’s name is Duke Devlin since there now is a video exhibit just about him in the museum. They say that Woodstock changed the life of many people who were there. This might be most true for Duke Devlin. In 1969, he hitchhiked from his home in Texas, not necessarily to the festival, but ended up there anyway. He enjoyed himself so much, that he just stayed there, long after the festival was done and long before the museum opened. But when the museum was finally built, 39 years after the festival, he became one of their first interpreters. 

The field where it happened

I have a pretty good excuse for not making it to the Woodstock festival, since I wasn’t born yet. But if I ever get the chance to time travel, August 15, 1969 seems like a pretty good destination. Hopefully, the crazy traffic jam, the lack of food, the long bathroom lines and the tremendous rain will not stop me from enjoying the peace, love & music…and hopefully I’ll make it all the way to Monday morning to hear Jimi Hendrix’s rendition of the Star Spangled Banner. 

Now we are off to Hyde Park, NY to visit a few more old houses. To be precise, the homes of Eleanor Roosevelt, FDR and the Vanderbilts. And just in case something interesting happened there, I might write another blog post in a week or two.

Aloha,

Chris & Sandra