A Rainy Day in Lebanon, Pennyslvania

One rainy Saturday Dad drove Mom, Chanda and me to Richland to eat at a restaurant right next to a rail road. We saw lots of trucks but only one train went by.

Afterwards he drove us to Lebanon to see the Union Canal Tunnel, a National Historic Site.

When they got to this hill the horses went over it and the canal drifted through the tunnel with the help of men using poles. Canal transportation was 5 times faster than wagons over land and so many canals were built in those days.

Looking through the tunnel to the other side. There are houses built on the hill it goes under and Tunnel Hill Road goes over it. The parking lot for this side of the park is also above the tunnel.

Looking down to the canal from halfway up the hill.

Flowers at Middle Creek Wildlife Management, Kleinfeltersville

These pictures were taken at the Visitor Center.

Clicking on the picture will enlarge it.

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Hershey Chocolate World

Monday Ilene, Grace, Nelda and I went to Hershey's Chocolate World.
We saw a 3-D movie in Chocolate World and then took the tour. It was pretty much the same as it has been for years and years and years. Guess nothing changes in the making of chocolate.

Driving into Hershey we saw the Hershey Kiss street lamps.

Turning right on Cocoa Avenue we went by the Park. We will do this ride next time!

As we were leaving I noticed the "railing" around the edges of the flower beds. Some of them were red Twizzlers and others were black licorice Twizzlers

When we dropped off Nelda, who was staying with Grace, I took this picture of her with one of her paintings which Grace has in her living room.

Pictures of Chanda's House and Yard

Chanda made this concrete Leaf mold at Jessica's last summer.





A rainy day outside the front window.




One of many hummingbirds who comes to the feeder in the front yard.



A female goldfinch ready for a bath.

Phlox

Coleus

Sunday after eating at the Baron's diner Chanda and I drove to Ephrata and stopped to take this picture of the former Clay Hotel which had been owned by our Great Uncle Willie Keller.

Penryn Sunday School Picnic

On the third Saturday of August you will find the best chicken corn soup in the world for sale at the St. Paul Lutheran Church's Sunday School picnic. It is held in the Penryn Picnic Grove. I have missed a few of these but I think my Dad has been to about 82 of them. Last Saturday they had nice weather and lots of soup. They also had hamburgers, hot dogs, watermelon, fruit cup, and lots of pies and cakes.

Here are two former Galebach girls in charge of pies and cakes--Ilene Galebach Landis and Brenda Galebach Sweigert.

In the soup kitchen they cooked the chicken corn soup in big kettles over a fire. I have no idea how many kettles of soup they made or how many chickens they used or how many ears of corn. The corn this year was raised especially for the soup by Jack Uibel.

Here are the two oldest Uibel girls, Sarah and Sylvia.

Sylvia's children: Hannah, Rebecca and Jacob Sugarman visiting Penryn from New York.

Millie Keener, Dolly Bomberger and Mom (Dorothy Galebach) having a lot of fun washing dishes, or maybe just trays.

The Malta Band played all evening. No one is sure how many years they have played at this picnic, but they have been in existence for 100 years and the Sunday School picnic has been held for most of those years. I have videos of the soup-making and the band playing the Stars and Stripes and a couple of clips of the cakewalks but I haven't been able to upload them tonight on here. I will try again another day.

More Pictures of Chincoteague

Wednesday, Mom, Dad, Ethan and Elliott and I went to the beach again. We all got in the water except Dad. It was another nice day at the beach and although there was thunder in the distance the rain didn't show up until we had gone to Ledo's for a late lunch. So we didn't return to the beach and spent the afternoon in the rooms and hanging out at the motel.

That evening we ate at Baldie's and it started to pour down rain. Elliott and I went to the pony show at the Chincoteague Pony Center. We saw Misty III and other Chincoteague ponies perform. After the show we talked to Kendy Allen who used to live north of Manheim. She has also written a book about Misty III which I bought for Elliott. He read it that night and the next day all he talked about was buying Misty III. He thought she would be a good surprise birthday present for his Mom's birthday. He made arrangements with Grandpa (Dad) to keep it in one of the stables in his barn. He also decided that he didn't need a car and driver's licence to get around. He would just ride the pony.

Thursday morning after eating cereal and packing up the cars, Mom, Dad and Ethan left for Pa. and Elliott and I went to the Assateague Lighthouse. To our surprise it was open and for $4 each we were able to go up to the top. It was hot and stuffy inside and there were 198 steps with a landing and a window(closed) every 25 steps. But once we got to the top there was a nice breeze and no mosquitoes.

Here is Elliott about to begin the climb.

And 198 steps later he is at the top posing for a picture. The photographer went up 198 steps also!

The lighthouse is pretty far inland today and so we couldn't really see the ocean at all. Way off in the distance to the east you could make out the cars lined up and parked at the beach, but not the ocean. There were some ponies near the water on the right side of this picture which looks sort of south west towards Chincoteague Island.

There were a few more very narrow ladderlike steps to go up to the lights, but you could only go up a few and stick your head up and look around. There were 2 Fresnel lights.

Back down and outside the mosquitoes were biting like crazy. I had used OFF when I got out of the car but Elliott had just gone straight to the lighthouse and when we came back out he was being eaten for dinner and I couldn't get him to stand still to pose in front of the lighthouse. When we got to the car he sprayed himself and then we sprayed the inside of the car and still killed about 50 mosquitoes that got into the car with us. So I took him back out to the beach to get into the water and cool off his legs.

There were a lot of birds in the marshy land going out to the beach. We saw them sitting in the trees and swooping down to get fish from the water next to the road. I wonder what birds eat mosquitoes. They would have had a feast!

This canoe was across from the beach on the bay side of the parking lot at the area where the rangers have their nature talks. There were some people in that water there. I had never seen anyone get in that water before.

After eating at Ledo's Pizza again to see the cute Russian girls, ( Veronica, the pretty blonde we talked to last year, was there and was our waitress to Elliott's delight!) we drove by the Pony Center again to see one of this year's babies. Elliott was up for going in and talking them into selling Misty III although the night before at the show they made a point of telling everyone she was not for sale. So Elliott had to settle for taking home pictures and no pony.

The Dream For Sale at Chincoteague

We are here in Chincoteague and the Dream is for sale. I wonder how much it would cost. I hope you can click on this and see a close up. Use the back arrow to return to the rest of the Chincoteague pictures.

We saw these ponies this afternoon when we went to the beach. It had rained the night before and was cloudy but warm and actually a nice day for the beach. The water was nice.

Monday, the day we arrived, was very hot and sunny but since it was already after 2 pm, we just went swimming in the pool. Mom, Dad, Ethan and Elliott and I came down here to Chincoteague.

On Tuesday morning Jessica, George, and the rest of us went to Saxis. It is a small town on the Chesapeake side of the Eastern Shore of Virginia. They are involved in crabbing and oyster harvesting.

They have wooden tanks where they keep the crabs they will sell as soft shell crabs. These are crabs which have just lost their hard shell and then are shipped live. People eat them shell and all.

From Wikipedia: Soft-shell crab is a crustacean seafood that can be eaten whole if cooked shortly after molting their hard shell.




More from Wikipedia: Fishermen often put crabs beginning to molt aside, until the molting process is complete in order to send them to market as soft-shells. Crabs should be kept alive until immediately before cooking so they are fresh. Usually crabs must be eaten within four days of molting to be useful as soft-shell crabs.

The crabs in this box are alive and have been sorted and ready to ship.

A 7 year old girl whose mother works in the little local restaurant (without a sign outside to even let you know it exists.) It is mostly frequented by those who are working there on the pier area. She gave us a nice little tour of the area right behind the restaurant where they sorted and packed the crabs by size. And then they stored them in a refrigerated room.

"Male and female blue crabs can be distinguished by their "aprons", or their abdomens. Male crabs have a long, narrow apron while mature female crabs have a wide, rounded one."

In this picture she is showing us that this is a female crab.

"They can deliver an extremely painful pinch and are noted for being particularly aggressive and difficult to handle safely." This one was out of the tanks and stuck between the floor boards at the crab house. Notice his eyes sticking up. I wouldn't want my finger grabbed by that claw!

This is a good place to go to find out more about what we saw yesterday. It explains all about the molting and the crab tanks and the life and importance of blue crabs in the Chesapeake Bay. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_crab

This is the 7 year old girl, named Tabitha with Ethan and Elliott right outside the door of the restaurant. Those are the traps used to catch the crabs behind them.

There was also this guy who was sorting oysters. They were really rough and muddy looking.

And finally a picture of Jess and George at the beach. I have about 30 minutes of video of Jessica trying to fold up that float thing she is holding. She never did get it folded. Elliott was the one who was able to do it.

And my favorite signs on Chincoteague Island. This is on Chicken City Road.