Day 5

Today I left Virginia, to head north. I first stopped at the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal in West Virginia/Maryland. Beautiful park!

The C & O Canal National Park at Williamsport, home to one swan...

one railroad bridge...

lots of turtles...

one lock...

one beautiful trail!

a  fuzzy caterpillar...

one Potomac river

yes, I followed this trail to the river just so I could touch it.

home also to one broken aquaduct...

with one pile of wood in front of the broken side.

I love the little streets with colorful houses!

Williamsport is also home to Tony's pizza, where I ate lunch.

BBQ chicken bacon ranch, and a piece of bacon cheeseburger pizza. The bacon theme was not on purpose, they were the only two they had today that sounded good.

The view from my booth. The pretty stone building is their town hall!

These babies are called Nutella Dots. Yep, they're yummy.

I continued on from there, and after only an hour got so sleepy I pulled off into a Bob Evans parking lot and slept for about 45 minutes. Kinda funny, since I haven't traveled for long amounts of time, and none of it at night. It was about 3 though, nap time.

Then I swung by Hershey Park, having never been there. I do love chocolate though, as my friends and family can attest.

The roads into Hershey are brown.

I did the Chocolate World tour.

There's a talking cow, much like the Billy Graham Library. I wonder who came up with it first.

There's also 3 singing cows.

for you mom.

After the tour, I traveled on and it took much longer than I planned. I was only an hour away from my destination, and there was a huge accident on the highway. All I could see was a giant plume of white smoke. They rerouted us through this small town, which took about an hour.  

My updates will probably continue to be every couple days. However, I am updating the Where in the World is Ramona? map on my blog. It shows you what current state I'm in.

Day 4

Happy 4th of July! 
A great big thank you to all the men and women who have spent their careers and their lives protecting us and giving us the freedoms we have. We appreciate you!


I spent my 4th hanging out with my grandparents. We went to a book fair in the morning. Very cool place.

It's in this warehouse style building. But it's 2 floors of books, for really cheap prices. They run it like a bookstore too, very organized.

They had this great map where visitors could stick a pin on their hometown. It was smothered in pins. Very cool idea! 

A fuzzy picture of the Barnes and Noble-esque layout.

After the book fair, we ate lunch and played card games til supper. For supper we went to my aunt's and had good ol' american hamburgers, baked beans and watermelon. 

It was raining, so no fireworks. But more games.

When we got home, my grandparents and I played Sorry. It ended up being an exciting game played in the dark, because the rainstorm caused a blackout. The power was down for a few hours, and we were in the middle of a game, so we played Sorry by flashlight. Riveting stuff. 

We also had a conversation, while listening to the radio, that went like this:

Grandma (to Grandpa): Did you hear that? That lady said the bikini was invented in 1947.

Grandpa: What about zucchini?

Me: No Grandpa, bikini, with a b.

Grandpa: Bucchini?

Me and Grandma: No, bikini (enunciating)

Grandpa: Oh, a bikini!

Day 3

Today Beth and I visited her church. Well, I'm visiting. She's a regular. It was great. Then we went home and had lunch, after which I left for Virginia. It was a gorgeous day, and the small highways of Virginia and North Carolina are so wonderful. I'll take the byways over the highways any day. 

On the way I saw Monster Bugs. Their names are Mudzy and  Bugzy. There is also the name of a towing company on the side, so I'm not sure what they are for, or why.

Then I decided to visit some caves on the way to my grandparents house. They were great!  I was 347 under ground! It was pretty dark, as are some of my photos.

This was the original entrance to the cave. You had to crawl through on hands and knees. I would have loved to go that way today, but I doubt the rest of the tour would have.

 I'm trying to get a good panoramic of the cave, to show how long and big it really is. I'm not sure you can tell though.

Me!

This crevice went up quite a ways, you just can't see it.

After that, I had a bite to eat, dodged the rain and went to the Wax Museum. Some of which are quite creepy if you ask me.

Take this guard for instance, if you're not paying attention, his fakeness will startle you.

Thomas Jefferson

So this guy apparently was Jefferson's servant, and he bought property on Jefferson's behalf, and a wife came with it. There's more to it than that, but you'll have to look that up for yourself.

Moonshine display. Oh Virginia.

Mountain bear-killing man, info is below.

I believe this was a display of General Lee and company. I've forgotten already.

This was a display of former presidents. Very well-done.

Laurel and Hardy. Random.

The Obamas, Inaugural display.

James Madison, left. Thomas Jefferson, right.

You better know who this is. Good ol' George.

It says:

Rules for the Tavern:

4 pence for room and board.

6 pence with potluck.

2 pence for horsekeeping.

No more than five to sleep in one bed.

No boots to be worn in bed.

No razor grinders or tinkers taken in.

No dogs allowed in the kitchen.

Organ grinders to sleep in the wash house.

Lemuel Cox, Inn.

Any guesses as to which rule was my favorite?

Lewis and Clark.

 Hard to see but its Da Vinci's Last Supper.

Everyone needs one of these.

Then I sojourned onto a Hot Air Balloon Festival. They were really late and disorganized, so they didn't all go up at the same time as I had hoped. But I did see some go from start to finish.

When I got there, all the balloon crews were doing this. Sitting on the right side of their vehicle, in the shade, doing nothing, past the launch time.

Then one crew went to work, and the others still sat in the shade.

It was beautiful to watch. They had the passengers help inflate the balloon.

They didn't tether it, so they all got in with it lifting off the ground. Then the crew let go and they were instantly  feet up in the air.

As I was leaving, the other crews got their act together. Unfortunately, I couldn't stay.