We just passed 9-weeks and 10,000 miles of this current adventure and while we are getting an oil change on the truck, I can take the time to update the blog.
After leaving Pennsylvania 10 days ago, we have been geocaching like crazy. If you have been keeping up with our travels, you know that we are on a mission to find geocaches in counties wherever we go. We have many blank spots on our county maps for the midwest so we have meandered quite a bit. We finished the counties in our 24th state, Ohio, then concentrated on being tourists in the Lake Erie Islands part near Sandusky. On two separate days, we ferried across to two different islands to sightsee.
We have been able to camp 10 nights in a row with the back of the camper open to the night air and often without needing our mosquito netting. I wake up every morning just before sunrise and go to sleep with fireflies dancing around our campsite.
In our wanderings through Ohio, we passed through Wapakoneta, Neil Armstrong's hometown and made a visit to the Armstrong Air & Space Museum. We viewed an excellent film about Apollo 11 moon landing. (We were very busy with family reunion on July 20 and were not able to watch any of the 50th-anniversary shows.)
Gemini capsule was not designed for a 6'4" person.
We spent three nights at East Harbor State Park near Port Clinton, OH and used it as a base of operations for day trips to South Bass Island to visit Perry's Victory and International Peace Memorial
and Kellys Island.
Approaching on the ferry - Perry's Victory Memorial - 352 feet tall - word's largest Doric column
I have to admit that I didn't know very much about the War of 1812 beyond a few facts about Fort McHenry and Francis Scott Key. The Battle of Lake Erie was pivotal to the outcome of the war.
A few days later, we visited River Raisin National Battlefield Park near Detroit and learned more about that period in our nation's history.
Oliver Hazard Perry
Views from the observation deck of the column:
Put-in-Bay
looking north over South Bass Island
If you have ever been to Key West, this might make you chuckle . . . we did!
A different island - Kellys Island - we heard about the Glacial Grooves and had to check it out:
Kris standing on the bridge to give the photo some scale
Everyone gets around the island by golfcart and Brian had a bit of trouble getting in the driver's seat each time. When we returned the cart at 11:30, a long line of visitors was waiting to rent one. Another time when we "early birds got the worm" and beat the crowd on an early ferry.
Marblehead lighthouse
Sometimes you have to climb a tree - here Brian is signing the log
for a geocache named 'Hummingbird'
We just can't pass up the "world's biggest" anything we come across.
(Very often there is a geocache nearby)
I read about the "Point of Beginning" obelisk in a book by John McPhee titled Annals of a Former World and had it on my to-do list. (What can I say? I am a geography/geology nerd.)
It was purely a coincidence that there is a geocache here and the clock made its display of music and moving figures while we were searching.
In Bellefontaine, Ohio - oldest concrete street in the U. S. and the highest point in Ohio:
Some portions of the concrete date from 1891
Our altimeter reading was 12 feet too low - the posted elevation is 1549.
Another interesting sight was this 12-sided walled cemetery in Lancaster, Ohio. Quite an interesting backstory here: https://www.ohioexploration.com/cemeteries/stonewallcemetery/
The wall wasn’t started until 1838. The sandstone probably came from a quarry on nearby Allen’s Knob in Shallenberger State Nature Preserve. The stones, about 18 inches thick, were shaped at the quarry to fit each into the other. At the corners, the stones were shaped with angles, thus avoiding mortar. Each of the 12 sides is 29.5 feet in length.
The wall stands today without a crack and with no settling. It is considered to be the finest example of dry masonry in the state of Ohio. At the quarry and the cemetery, Nathaniel III read to the workman from his Bible. According to I Kings 6:7, Solomon’s temple was “built of stone made ready before it was brought thither so that there was neither hammer nor ax nor any tool of iron heard in the house while it was in building.” Stonewall Cemetery was built in the same manner.
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