Ohio Amish Country

Rain. When I left off the last blog entry I mentioned rain. We hit the interstate and the skies let loose. My-oh-my am I glad Mark is great at towing a trailer. As chief navigator and ride attendant I could not help noticing that he was wiggling the steering wheel a lot. For Pete's sake, how long does he need to "get the feel" of the trailer? I "queried" him about this. "I am NOT doing this on purpose!" he stated. Hmmm, this could be interesting.

We arrived at the Walnut Creek RV park without incident. This is in huge part because Mark's brother, who lives in this area told us exactly where to go. Rural Ohio is full of little roads called SR (state road) and CR (country road) and township road and then the names change when the county line is crossed. I am convinced we would still be wondering around. We hooked up in the rain and then hightailed it over to the family homestead in Sycamore, Ohio. It had been over 25 years since we had been out "to the farm" and this was a first for the boys. We played, ate fantastic food, laughed up a storm and settled on the next day's travels. To the Amish Country or bust. My brother-in-law and sister-in-law lead the charge as we ate our way through little towns called "Hope" and "Charm".

Amish country was and was not what I expected. It was beautiful and pristine, that I expected. What I did not expect was the fact that the Amish houses were manicured looking and relatively modern looking. The only way to spot an Amish house was to look for the absence of telephone and electrical wires and to look for a clothes line that contained a lot of dark clothing. The food was amazing! I start to drool just thinking about it, even days later. We ate lunch at Ms.Yoder's in Hope. Family style and was it ever good. Next stop a bakery were I had the best peppermint patty I had ever eaten. We all spent a lot of time staring at the Amish and then wondering what it must be like to be stared at all of the time. It was a thrill seeing a lot of the farm equipment we had seen in an Elmore, Ohio museum working away in the Amish Country. It took a our city boys a few minutes to figure out why there was a brown line down the middle of the roads. After following behind a horse drawn wagon, they figured it out.

We Meet Our Airstream

Heading South from Elmore Ohio we reach Jackson Center. We know the folks at Airstream are not quite finished servicing the unit, but we plan on staying in their on site trailer park until it is. It is a pretty neat setup. They work on it during the day and then move it back to the trailer park at 4:00 pm via a little tractor.

We arrived at 2:00 pm, just in time for a factory tour. No pictures allowed, but I am here to tell you, it was pretty spiffy watching them assemble the trailers. Lot's and lot's of aluminium and rivets! "Is this one ours?" Will would ask. From the outside, they do look a lot alike. Our trailer was NOT on the factory side of the operation. Our trailer was located in the servicing building with all of the other oldies but goodies. The tour was over and we descended upon the service department for a quick walk through. There are a bunch of service bays and our "Discovery" was located at the far end. That meant a lot of "is this it?" We finally see it, in all of its silver splendor. The boys started jumping, bouncing, high fiving and then crashing inside. I handled it with my usual, natural good humor. "Stop!, Slow Down!, Be Gentle!, Let Me See!" We had seen countless pictures so everyone knew what to basically expect, but it was even better. Discovery was beautiful. The trailer was moved to the trailer park where the service guys showed us how to "hook up". Being "hooked up" is always a good thing! That being taken care of we began the job of moving stuff into the trailer. We brought a lot of stuff with us to outfit the trailer. For those of you who know us, I am sure this is not a surprise. For those of you who actually saw our loaded truck, it was a sight to behold. We were tired, hungry and PILLOWLESS! It turned out that no one was willing to sleep on their little itty bitty buckwheat travel pillows, me included. Our trailer park neighbor, Bette, noticed the glazed look in my eye and showed me how she had organized her trailer. Wow, I felt like a babe in the woods. So off we raced to WalMart to pick up a few things . Three grocery carts later (pillows do take up a lot of room) we raced back and began setting up house. It wasn't pretty but we all eventually got to bed. The next morning we are all hungry, had no pots or pans and horror of all horrors, we could not find our 5 lb coffee stash. Did we forget to bring our coffee?! This was a huge problem! Off we went again for breakfast. I only mention this because we have eaten out more since we got the Airstream than the entire trip to date and I thought this a bit ironic. Airstream service finished giving us our tutorial, helped get the hitch all attached and adjusted and we were off, headed for Tiffin, Ohio and more family visiting. Did I mention it started to rain. . .

Exploring Ohio. Day 1 -3

It was a huge relief to get to Ohio. I am sorry Iowa was a blur and Illinois was not much better but Ohio meant Airstream! Our first stop in Ohio was to meet the wonderful people we bought the trailer from. These folks were so wonderful that we drove all the way to a little town called Mentor (northern-most point on the US side of Lake Erie). By the way, Lake Erie was just like the Pacific Ocean on a really calm day. Huge sandy beaches, seagulls and no land in sight on the horizon.
Meanwhile the tension was building, we had yet to actually see the trailer(it was undergoing servicing at the Airstream plant in Jackson Springs.) Next stop, Elmore, Ohio were we had a terrific visit with Mark's Aunt and Uncle. They have a friend who collects vintage farm equipment and he gave us a tour. Mark's family homesteaded in Ohio and had used most of the equipment featured at the museum. He had also restored a 1907 car called an "Elmore" and is the featured picture.

It is safe to say that we began officially eating our way across the country. I believe I could live quite contentedly on Ohio cheese and sausage. In Elmore we found a place called "Tank's Meats." I don't believe I had ever had such a yummy sausage and sliced bologna! We of course bought some for later. The cheese is amazing and don't forget maple syrup.

We are surrounded by farms and fields and grocery stores and restaurants are a rare commodity. We have found that asking people for recommendations is the best bet. Lot's of really small towns, more like villages, have pockets of unbelievably good food. It is nothing for people to drive 15-20 miles for a good breakfast spot.

Seven States So Far

Our mad dash across the country to from Washington to Ohio is almost over! We are averaging 10 hours a day on the road and I am getting a bit cranky. We drove 12 hours starting Wed at 10:30pm and arrived in Billings, MT on Thursday afternoon. It was really cold with snow flurries pounding us whenever we got out of the car. The boys finally got their snow and where lobbing snow balls the moment the got out of the truck. Montana was beautiful, snow, wide open rolling hills. We bribed the kids great behavior by promising hours and hours at an indoor water slide park. They had a super time, I felt like a shriveled raison. We all dropped in our beds and that was that.

The following morning, it became clear that we are not going to be the early morning launch types. Let's just say we were still there for the continental breakfast. We visited Little Big Horn, the boys did the Jr. Ranger Program and received a badge. We left Montana and zinged into South Dakota. Mt Rushmore was a lot different than what I remembered. The four guys were the same, but that was it. A lot changes in 27 years. The boys did the Jr Ranger Program here as well. Two Jr. Ranger Programs in one day is a true test of indurance. When you find yourself thinking, big whup that it took 14 years to complete the face of the mountain, it is a case of too much good stuff to appreciate. We drove through the Badlands and caught the sunset off the hills. It was amazing! Just like seeing a firework show. We all oohhhed and aahhed for miles and miles.

We are listening to books on tape and severly limiting movies while on the road. Mark and I both agreed that seeing our boys eyes glued to the screen was not what we wanted. The books on tape are working like a charm. Carry on, Mr. Bowdich read by Jim Weiss was a huge hit and we would recommend it to others.

Late, late arrival to our South Dakota hotel, a late start in the morning and a long drive through the rest of South Dakota and Iowa. Illinois was dark as we crossed the state line. Looking forward to the day!

Happy Mother's Day from Illinois!

This blog article is devoted to the Mothers out there, especially MY mother. In my humble opinion, my mother is THE best of the best. Amazing, kind, funny starts off the list and it continues on and on.

I realize now that being a mom is not easy. Until I joined "the other side" I really lacked in empathy. Frankly, the little stinkers can drive me crazy. Who do I go to for a sanity check? My mother. In moments, we are yucking it up over the hilarious things the kids do. In moments my mother can bring me from the brink of a precipice to a true "Erma Bombeck moment." Her favorite response is "hmmm. . . that sounds familiar! Do you remember when you. . ." Just as when I was a kid, she helps me bring perspective and see things on the funny side. She always had a story at the ready about her childhood. I realize now that my mother gave me an incredible gift. Not only does she love me unconditionally, but she really listens to what I say and hears me. My hope is to give the same gift to my kids.

Thank you so much for being my mom. Susan Maffett, Happy Mother's Day from all of us who love you dearly.

Airstream, Here We Come!

Fast and furious packing, tiding up the house for the house sitter, trying to get myriad of little details straightened out. We have not left yet, and we are already exhausted!

Food
For those of you who know us, food is a big, big deal. We talk about lunch during breakfast. The first leg of the trip will be a lot of driving with just a few stops so this means a lot of eating in the car. Since my kids descend on food like locust, the food portion takes a lot of planning. Long ago I was nominated the designated "food attendant" and have yet to pass off this dubious role. That means "food in the car coordination" falls to me. In the past I have done this with clumps and bags of food unceremoniously staged around my legs and lap. This time my goal is to create food packs by meal that are pre-assembled and can be served up with minimal effort. At this moment I am feeling oh so proud. I have visions of daintily plucking a bag from a little soft sided cooler, clearing my throat slightly and announcing "snack is served." We will see if that happens, but the freezer does contain breakfast burritos and bean/rice burritos, hummus, and even some pre-cooked oatmeal. I figure if they get hungry enough they will eat the oatmeal. Soon I will be cutting up cheese and dry salami, apples, carrots and broccoli into family snack sized packets. No more will I try to cut the 2 foot long salami with the outback knife! We do have some really yummy treats that we picked up at Trader Joe's that will gone after just a few hours.

The World4UAdventure website
The website has been loaded with a lot of the resources that I wished that I had had on previous trips. It is a work in progress that I hope to populate as we go along. My goal for this time around is to limit the amount of educational materials we had to bring by using the Internet as much as possible.

Stuffed
The truck is stuffed! We have been collecting things for our Airstream for years and are of course trying to take it all to Ohio. My parents are long time RV'ers and have been super helpful giving us the low down on what we need and what we should be thinking about. My Mom keeps mentioning, "do you realize how much room you don't have?" Mark feels everyone needs to bring at least 5 different pairs of shoes (that is 15 pairs of shoes), I feel we need to bring everyone's school materials, guide books, field microscope and 3 laptops. We each have a single suitcase full of clothes. It is the bedding and cooking accouterments that will hopefully gracefully disappear into the trailer once we pick it up.

Right now I have stars in my eyes and am blissfully ignorant. . . though I did watch "RV" with Robin Williams and the "Long, Long Trailer" with Lucille Ball.