We left Chicago on
Tuesday morning and headed for Columbus to visit Caroline's
paternal grandparents, Joan Huber and Bill Form. After
driving through a torrential downpour and flooding roads, we
arrived in one (well, two, I guess) piece(s). Joan had
many stories to share regarding Caroline's family heritage,
including stories about Caroline's great-great-grandparents, who
came (separately) to New York from Czechoslovakia around 1911
and met subsequent to their arrival in the US.
We highly recommend
the Columbus Museum of Art, where we saw a Georgia O'Keefe
exhibit, among other interesting works of art, if you are ever
in the Columbus area. The weather was beautiful that day,
low 60's and dry. Caroline was SO excited to finally get
some decent weather after days of driving in horrible rainy
and/or cold conditions.
After a nice visit
with the grandparents, we left Columbus and headed off for
Caroline's Aunt Nancy's place in Bethesda, MD. After
getting our oil changed, we decided to take a detour before
leaving Ohio to the Amish town of Kidron, OH, which was founded
by Caroline's great-great-great grandfather (I think I got that
right) on her father's mother's side (Grandma Joan's, that is).
Kidron is a small town, approximate population of 300, so there
is not much there, but it was interesting to see the Amish in
their dark, old-fashioned clothing and horses and buggies living
alongside the modern folks in town. Unfortunately, it
started to rain as we drove into town so we didn't have much of
an opportunity to get out of the car, but we did stop at
Lehman's hardware, where we enjoyed looking at their amazing
selection of gas, wood and coal-burning (yes, coal!) stoves and
brand new retro-style kitchen appliances. We also enjoyed
gawking at the Amish shoppers in their dark dresses and black
bonnets the store (just kidding!).
After leaving Kidron,
we continued on the scenic route through Ohio, Pennsylvania and
into West Virginia. The rolling hills would have been even
more picturesque if we could see them better through the rain.
We stopped for the night at the Best Western Mountaineer Inn in
Morgantown, WV so Caroline could catch the latest episode of
The O.C. and so Scott could enjoy the hillbilly
southern accents of the other hotel guests. We
particularly enjoyed listening to the hillbilly author that we
had breakfast near this morning, who, incidentally, is no longer
writing angry-woman stuff, and has evolved to writing survival
guides.
Now we're off to
complete our journey to Bethesda, about 3 hours away. |
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