Jethro Borsje

The blog post related to our honeymoon in the USA is split up into three parts. Part one can be found here, part three can be found here.

Today we planned to visit the Capitol for which we booked (free) tickets online months ago. The Capitol has a brand new underground visitors center from which guided tours are given which will lead you throughout the Capitol building. This visit, combined with the visit to Independence Mall at Philadelphia provides some nice insights into where the USA comes from, where it is today and into its motives and behavior. After the Capitol we visited the Library of Congress which is accessible from the Capitol via a tunnel. Visiting these buildings is especially recommended for all you Dan Brown readers out there who read / are reading his newest book "The Lost Symbol", which is a nice book if you like the thriller kind (which I do).

Next we visited the National Air and Space Museum (it's nice to see the command module of the Apollo 11) and the National Gallery of Art (for their collection of impressionistic paintings). Both of these museums , together with all other Smithsonian museums at the Mall in Washington (19 in total), are free of charge. All museums are free because the Smithsonian Institution was founded for the "increase and diffusion of knowledge among men", which was the wish of James Smithson who donated a large amount of money to the United States when he died.

After the museums we had dinner at an Italian Restaurant and went to bed.

Today we drove to Gettysburg which was the location of an important battle in America's Civil War on July 1-3 in 1863. When we arrived at Gettysburg we visited the Military Park (which is the location of the battle) Visitors Center which has a nice museum. In this museum the background of the Gettysburg battle and the American Civil War is explained.

After checking in at the Days Inn Hotel at Gettysburg we went for supper at the parents of Andrea (the girlfriend of Fenneke's brother) who live near Gettysburg. We have a very pleasant evening and it was great to finally get to meet them.

We planned to do a hike through Military Park in order to see the many monuments and the battle grounds. We ended up doing an extended version of the Billy Yank trail which was of about 20 km. It was a very nice and hot day (30 degrees Celsius), so it was a heavy but very nice hike. Bellow you'll find the GPS track log of this hike.

After the hike we had dinner at a nice pub in the center of Gettysburg.

Today we drove from Gettysburg to Lancaster. In the surroundings of Lancaster there are living a lot of Amish. These people came from Europe where they were prosecuted because of their radical belief in adult baptism. They felt a person can only be baptised when he / she can make an informed decision instead of being baptised as an infant. The Amish live in old fashioned houses without electricity. They do not use cars but use a buggy with a horse. These can be seen driving in the streets amongst cars.

We visited an Amish farm and did some geocaching in the surroundings of Lancaster.
The hotel in Lancaster (Lancaster Arts Hotel) was fantastic. The building used to be an old tobacco storehouse with high ceilings and a lot of wooden beams and old bricks, it looked beautiful.

We had dinner at a very nice Italian Restaurant (so no pizza's!).

Today we drove from Lancaster to Niagara Falls. It's a drive of 550 km which takes roughly 7 hours. It is a beautiful drive through the hills and woods of Pennsylvenia. Along the way we picked up a few Geocaches.
We had dinner at a simple local Canadian eatery before entering the commercial town of Niagara Falls. We checked in to our hotel on the Canadian side of the falls and went to see the falls illuminated. On Friday and Sunday nights they have fireworks above the illuminated falls, which is a nice sight to see.

I can't believe it has only been two weeks since the wedding. It feels like a longer time ago due to all the new things we have done and experienced in the USA.
Today we planned to thoroughly visit the Niagara Falls. We bought a Niagara Falls Adventure Pass online which gives you priority access to the four most interesting attractions:

1. Maid of the Mist
2. White Water Walk
3. Journey Behind the Falls
4. Niagara's Fury

We started our day by boarding the Maid of the Mist which brings you very close to both the American and Horseshoe Falls. When you board the ship you get a poncho which is needed, because you come so close the spray of the Falls will make you soaking wet.

After the Maid of the Mist we took a shuttle bus (also included in the pass) downstream. Here you can walk alongside the river which is one of the wildest stretches of whitewater in the world.

Following the "White Water Walk" we took the shuttle bus further downstream to the giant whirlpool which formed in a few hours when a piece of "softer land", i.e. not rocks, collapsed under the force of the river. After the whirlpool we took the shuttle bus back to the falls where we did the "Journey Behind the Falls". During this journey we descended 50 meters into the massive rock behind the Horseshoe Fall. From here we had a nice view of the water falling down right in front of us. We also got to stand right next to the Horseshoe Fall where we became soaking wet yet again.

Finally we went to see the Niagara's Fury 4D movie which explains how the Falls came into existence.
In the evening we went to see the falls illuminated for the last time.

Today we drove from Niagara Falls to Lake George where we planned a couple of days of hiking in Adirondack Park.
before we left Niagara Falls we wanted to do one geocache in Canada. This cache was located at a church near our hotel. From this church the first international phone call was made, to New York City (just one of those things you learn while geocaching). When we arrived at the church we saw two people obviously logging a geocache. This couple from Michigan found the cache right before we arrived, which mad it an easy find for us.
The drive to Lake George is 515 km through the state of New York. The weather was very, very bad with an amazing amount of rain coming down all day long. We managed to quickly pick up one geocache in the rain along the way.
When we arrived at the hotel (Clarion Inn & Suites) they told us the weather predictions looked bad. We were starting to think that we would not get to hike in Adirondack Park after all ...

Comments

Add New Search

3.26 Copyright (C) 2008 Compojoom.com / Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."