The past weekend was the Memorial Day long weekend here so we decided to venture to Pennsylvania to spend some time in Lancaster County. I spent three days simply sighing at the beauty of the countryside. It was magnificent and so pristine. The farms looked like scenes from a historical postcard. It was just perfect.
Obviously, I also got to see first hand how the Amish and Mennonites live and it was fascinating. We drove and drove and drove – the only way to real appreciate the beauty of the area is to get on the back roads and just… discover.
We chose our driving tours based on information Bill got from the tourist bureau. These provided great directions and we discovered places we would not have found otherwise. Here are some photos from our drive discovering covered bridges… with many flashbacks to Bridges of Madison County!
We also did another suggested tour that gets off the main roads and goes through the back roads to discover some of the Amish farms. Here are some scenes from around Lancaster County –
After a while we were able to determine the difference between Amish and Mennonite properties.
On the Amish farms, their equipment looked like this –
Horses working in the fields –
One thing that they both have in common is how they hang their washing out to dry –
We stopped by two Mennonite homes to buy strawberries and tomatoes.
To get the tomatoes, this family had a little stall set up with a bucket that we had to put our money in and take the tomatoes that we wanted. I love buying by an honesty system!
A big novelty is sharing the road with horse and buggys… I actually felt guilty as we drove around in 95F weather with the air-conditioning on while they were sweating it out in those little boxes. For much of the time they stick to their own ‘buggy lane’ on the main roads…. on the side roads however we got to travel behind one –
Then we had to wait for this one to cross the bridge –
This reminded me of a scene out of Little House on the Prairie –
And looky here… I have even made a video so you could experience what it looked like away from still shots! You will see some buggy action and lots of pretty scenery!
In all my travels around America this was one of my favourites… we did so much more that I’ll be saving for another post – I just wanted to share these photos ASAP! It was the perfect time to visit and the perfect weekend getaway. I cannot wait to get back there!