Pennsylvania.......Lancaster County

After reluctantly leaving our accommodation in Virginia we did the quick drive into Pennsylvania...I always thought that's where the vampires live...turns out that's Transylvania!!  Thanks Josh! Also, it has taken me 48 years to spell Pennsylvania correctly...so I'm quite proud I've finally worked it out..that's one up on Stu!

As soon as we got off the busy freeway I fell in love with Pennsylvania.  It is so green and clean, crops everywhere, small picturesque towns, winding roads...

rolling hills....

and some beautiful properties....

The crops were mainly wheat and corn and I never thought they could look so beautiful, especially grown together....

We were heading to a town called Ronks, in Lancaster County, which is the heart of the Amish country.  Amish are  members of a strict Mennonite sect that established major settlements in Pennsylvania and Ohio from 1720 onward. We were all ill informed about the Amish and were keen to show Joshuah more, particularly as his knowledge came from South Park....(actually South Park has taught Joshuah a lot...it seems every town we go through has an "educational" connection to an episode of South Park!) So it was with great excitement that we saw our first Amish buggy...even though it held us up for a while.....

and it was amazing to see the Amish alongside mainstream America, but it appeared that they were totally oblivious to what was going on around them.

Our hotel was called Scottish Inn, in Ronks and Stu had read about it.  The advice from many reviews was to ask for a room upstairs, out the back, overlooking the fields belonging to the Amish, so you could watch them ploughing the fields and if you were lucky you might see some hot air balloons.  We checked in, went to our room and there we had it....from the verandah outside our room.

It was a beautiful evening, nearly a full moon and I think the longest day of the year, so our next mission was to go in search of "Covered Bridges".  Again, (and I don't know why) I have always wanted to see covered bridges.  The only one I really know is from Beetlejuice...which isn't one of my more favoured movies.....but there are over 25 covered bridges in Lancaster County and we wanted to find one of them before nightfall.  Directions were really sketchy..even on the internet...and when you go looking for them you can see why. Narrow, windy, out of the way roads everywhere!  But we did find one.....not as I expected, but there nonetheless....

right next to this gorgeous old building.....

So I was a happy camper as we headed back to the hotel, but life got even better when we saw all these small farms..Amish and non Amish with the huge moon as a backdrop...a few photos, but I was in love....

You could pick the Amish farms...no vehicles - only buggy's and old fashioned machinery.  All the houses and farms were immaculate and there seemed to be a real sense of pride amongst all the home owners in the area.  We came across 2 young Amish girls aged about 8yrs old, playing on the road with an old fashioned wooden cart and lots of Amish with scooters...that you push with one leg.  They prefer these instead of bikes.
Our hotel was close to a large shopping centre and we were amazed to see this parked outside a  local takeaway.....

When the sun went down and it was dark we were sitting outside overlooking the fields when all these lights started flashing.  They were fireflies (I think that's what they were called) and it was a most amazing sight.  I videoed it, so if you look carefully you can work it out....

The next day we were in search of more covered bridges...Joshuah was thrilled with this idea as you can imagine...but being the good sport he is, he came along for the ride...(he's told us he hates how people must think he's an only child and we should have had more kids after him, so he'd have brothers and sisters around him, and we're a bit selfish by not having any more!)  We found this one within minutes....disused, but on the Heritage list.

We were about to go and look for more when we came across a sign for an Amish Village tour.  So we paid $8 each and went into a replica community, where we were given a brief tour by a non Amish guy and then were able to wander around, check out the gift shop and the one teacher school...it was really interesting and we learnt heaps...which shall remain in my head!

Stu and Josh in the buggy..it is tiny and whole families travel in them.

A mixer that runs by a diesel generated air compressor.

Farm machinery which is used

I took some photos of their quilting for Joan....hers is far better, but it was still lovely....

They don't have electricity, use horses for work and travel, attend church once a fortnight at a different persons house each week..this service goes for 4 hours, men eat first, followed by boys, then women and finally girls, females never cut their hair, men have beards if they are married - clean shaven if they're not, 9 out of 10 Amish in the Lancaster community who go on Rumspringa, return to their communities...these are just some of the facts given to us.  We were really glad we did the tour....gave us more of an insight...not one that we necessarily agree with...but interesting.
Off we went to find more bridges,,,,,

but not, before I was abused by some redneck for parking next to a bridge....he yelled at me that I was on his property (there were no signs to say Private Property) and that if I was going to be in his backyard, he'd come to mine and piss on it! Nice.  I really wanted to tell him he was more than welcome to....WA is a fair hike from Pennsylvania, especially if you're busting for a wee....but I thought he might shoot me.  He certainly changed my perspective of this quiet, peace loving area we were in.
Our last afternoon in the area, we took a drive to Intercourse (a most unfortunate name), which is the epicentre for the Amish community., and where a lot of the movie Witness was filmed,  There happened to be a huge gathering of Amish at what we think was a town event.  We didn't really know what was going on. There were food stalls and volleyball games happening...mainly between young men who looked around 18/19 yrs old.  It was some sort of competition....with polite applause and minimal cheering from the large Amish crowd, but all watching intently.

I was standing by myself, watching, when a group of about 5 young girls (around 13 yrs old) stood right next to me.  So I decided to ask them what the volleyball game was about...was it a competition?  One of the girls was so incredibly rude to me...looked at me in disbelief that I would dare to speak to her...said "it's about volleyball" and that was it.  I was so furious...I thought....13 year old girls the world over can be rude little cows!! So I said "I know it's about volleyball, we play it where I live too...but I wanted to know if it was a competition"...she just looked at me and didn't speak again.  That's when I realised that we are insignificant beings to them and barely exist!
Still, it was fascinating to hear the language, see the haircuts, the clothing.....

the buggies....

 

it was a real insight into a totally different world.  Then to top it all off, a local church band played for the crowd, and before every song they praised the Lord, America, each other, people they knew...the list went on.  It was a surreal experience to say the least.

 

 So again, I left another place reluctantly. I'm hoping we can go back to another Amish community in Ohio and I know there is plenty more of the US to see, but it really was a fascinating closeup look at a completely different society.