Movies

These are a few of the videos we took during the summer.

 

 

This high school choir comes each year to Ponderosa for a retreat to begin the school year.  They are from a public high school in Parker, CO, a suburb of Denver.  They are unique in that approximately 60% of the 1,500 plus students are involved in some form of music or drama.  They have about 200 in their choir. 

 

 

Some of the bear cubs at Bear Country in Rapid City, SD.

 

 

Mount Rushmore at night.

 

 

This is the first meeting of the group we would spend 23 days with touring New England.

 

 

Mystic Seaport, CT

 

 

Vermont backroads

 

 

Nancy on the carosel at Shelburne Museum in Burlington, VT.

  

 

Boarding for our dinner cruise at Lake George, NY 

  

 

Some of the sights on the dinner cruise.

 

 

A cute young entertainer.

 

 

A view from a NY winery where we had lunch.

 

 

The Aero Car Russ took at Niagra Falls.

 

 

A view of Niagra Falls from the "Maid of the Mist".

 

 

A common sight in Ohio Amish country.

 

Heading Home

When the organized tour ended, we left Niagara Falls and decided to spend a few days in the Amish country of Ohio.  Usually when you think of the Amish you think of Lancaster, PA but central Ohio has the largest group of Amish in the world.  There are approximately 40,000 living in the area.

 

We spent 3 nights in the area and would have liked to spend more.  The first day was taken up with travel, the 2nd was a Sunday and we knew the locals would be spending most of their time in church, but allowed for Monday to do the area.  Due to a problem with the motor home, (which caused Russ to worry and fret) we didn't have much time on Monday but were able to take a few pictures. 

 

 

An Amish taxi.  How do you know?  The lady and children in the front with bright clothes!

 

Monday must have been wash day because everyone had laundry on the line.

 

Man working the field.

 

School children at recess.  Picture was taken from a distance because the Amish do not want their picture taken.  As we got closer to the school, the kids stopped their play and watched us go by.  I guess we were as novel to them as they were to us!

 

The horses used to pull the carriages are usually coal black and very sleek.  This "bruiser" is a beautiful work horse - one of a team that helps the farmer  plow the field.

 

We were surprised to see many of the homes are quite nice.  Even though this is a modern-looking structure, they still do not have electricity or washers/dryers.  Neither will you see a car in the driveway!  We wondered how the price of hay compared to the price of diesel fuel!

 

The colors were still very nice in Ohio.

 

Wally World is where we stayed in the area.  It turned out to be "God" leading us in the right direction.  When we arrived we were escorted to our site by a gentleman in a golf cart.  When we pulled into our site he said it looked like there was oil leaking from the motor home steer axle.  It happened that he was a truck driver and worked at the camp on his days off.  Russ had noticed something on the tire earlier in the trip but thought we had been "visited" by a cat or dog.  In any case, he instructed Russ on how to replace the lost fluid and we found a Freightliner/Cat place only 80 miles away.  They were able to make the repair quite timely and we proceeded on down the road to our next destination.

 

 

When we arrived at the campground on Saturday, it was full of RVs; but when we returned from church on Sunday it looked disserted except for our motor home! 

 

On the way to the Freightliner/Cat place the leaves continued to show their Fall finery.  

 

The next day when we stopped for fuel and Russ was cleaning the windshield, he noticed about 18 inches of the molding on top of the windshield was loose.  He asked the clerk in the truck stop about any place where we might be able to get it fixed.  She sent us about 100 yards down the road where this gentleman made a temporary repair which enabled us to come on back to Phoenix.  Our trip was delayed...probably only 20 minutes.  Once again, the people we needed to help us were close by.  Isn't God good?

 

 

Of course we had to go through Missouri before getting to Oklahoma.



 

As you can see "green" was the color of the day.

 

Russ getting an Oklahoma cache at a rest area.

 

The green continued as we arrived in Texas.

 

In Wichita Falls, TX we found this cache.  Wasn't sure if it was a cache or a bomb!

 

Had a nice visit with Nancy's cousin, Corine Music, in San Angelo and then headed toward home.

 

 

When we reached New Mexico it seemed like we were almost home.

 

Here is Russ with a New Mexico cache.  As it ended up, we found 202 caches while we were gone including at least one in every state, and Canada.

After 7,075 miles in the motor home and approximately 5,000 in the Jeep, this was a welcome site.  It's always good to get home and see our family and friends, and to worship in our own church!

Once again, thanks to our kids for making our 50th anniversary Tour of New England a reality and not a dream.





Niagra Falls, ON

 

To get to our last stop we had to go through customs.  What we thought might be an ordeal was actually an easy, pleasant experience.   We were then in Ontario and on our way to the KOA campground in Niagara Falls, ON.

 

Of course we had to get a Canadian cache!

 

The first night in Ontario we went to this dinner show -- the third most popular attraction in Niagara Falls behind only the Falls and the Butterfly Museum.  It was a good dinner and very entertaining show.  I'm sorry we didn't get any pictures inside during the show.  Frankly, we didn't expect much but the food and program were great and we were sorry we had left the camera in the motor coach. 

 

You may remember in an earlier blog, we had found a sign in the Boston area that said "Thickly Settled" instead of "Congested Area".  We found this sign on a main street to be amusing.  Don't know why they didn't just say, "Look out for the old codgers!

 

 

The next day we toured Niagara Falls on this double-decker bus, a London original.

 

 

This functioning clock is decorated differently each year and is in one of the beautiful parks in Niagara Falls.

 

Russ took the ride on the Spanish Aero Car across the river gorge.  He was accompanied by several people, but not Nancy!

 

 

View from aero car.

 

Another view from car.

 

We went in a tunnel behind the Falls for a different view -- basically tons of falling water -- See below.

 

I actually got Nancy on the boat for an intriging trip and different view of the Falls.

 

 

This barge, just above the Falls, has been stuck there for almost 100 years.

 

 

The Skylon Tower is one of the tallest structures in Niagara Falls, ON.  It has a revolving restaurant on top.  For our last night, our tour group had dinner in the restaurant.  What a view!

 

This is not a very good picture but at night they light the Falls with red, white and blue spotlights. With the mist it is hard to see, but take our word for it, it is breathtaking.

 

The next morning we had breakfast as the final group activity of the tour.  This actually took place a week ago Saturday.  We are now on our way home.  We had a wonderful trip and want to think our kids who helped us financially to make this trip in honor of our 50th Wedding Anniversary last year.

Bath (Corning), NY

 

Another nice  campground in a beautiful setting.

 

The Glenn H. Curtiss Museum was amazing.  To be honest we had never heard of him.  He ia pioneer in motorcycles, and had more to do with early flight than the Wright Brothers.

 

 

Note the plaque below about the lady in the car.  We always heard of Amelia Earhart. 

 

 

He was also responsibile for the early RV's.

 

The museum has volunteers who not only lead tours, but also work on restorations.  The plane above was recovered from the swamps in Florida some 4 years after it crashed.  They have been working on it for 2 years.

 

This is an all wood replica of a biplane.  They actually disassemble the plane each year to remove it from the museum, then reassemble and fly it at an annual event in Bath.

 

Bicycles, car and motorcycles have come a long way!

This motorcycle was carved from wood.

This is a Studebaker sleigh.

 

After having lunch at one winery we toured the Pleasant Valley Winery Co.   It is the oldest winery in the U.S. and the first American winery to be bonded to produce wine.  The making of wine is a very long process  -- can't say we have ever been in a winery but it was interesting.

 

 

This is a wine tasting room for dignataries and other prominent visitors.  Notice that none of our group was invited to sit at the table!