Georgia - May 2004 

Stone Mountain - Pictures

Stone Mountain, GA - May, 6, 2004

At the campground, we purchased tickets for the park and got a two-day ticket for the price of one.  We set up and took a ride around the area.  We stopped at the Grist Mill and drove across the covered bridge to the picnic area.  We stopped at the Confederate Hall Historical & Environmental Education Center where we watched a film about Georgia’s Civil War and walked through an interactive exhibit gallery about the geology and ecology of the Stone Mountain.  We continued our ride around the mountain and decided to eat dinner at the Mountain View Restaurant in the Stone Mountain Inn because they had a buffet.  Just as the restaurant opened a gang of about 60 teenagers came in, oh well, there goes our quiet dinner.  The buffet didn’t have a lot of choices but it was very good.  

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The next day, we walked around the Crossings, an 1870’s town within the park.  There are shops, a talking fountain and a 4D Theater.  The theater was pretty good, the chairs vibrated, things hit you from behind and underneath the chair, sounds were everywhere and you got sprayed with water three times during the show.  There were a bunch of school kids at the park today and in the movie they kept screaming.  They have a new kid’s play area that hasn’t opened yet and a tree house that is due to open in June.  They also opened ”The Barn” that’s a kid’s delight.  Apparently, you must load these vacuum tubes with as many Styrofoam balls as you can to get points.  The balls shot back out all over the place.  Kids were having a ball. 

 

We rode the Stone Mountain Train around the mountain and were amazed the train was practically empty, that is until we departed.  Hordes of kids boarded just before we left and boy was it noisy until the diesel engines fired up and the train started moving, it overrode the kids.  The train goes around the mountain, a five-mile ride, in 40 minutes through dense trees.  The Mountain is estimated to be over 300 million years old.  I always thought this mountain was formed like others by being forced to the surface when the earth shifts, but not this mountain.  Stone Mountain was a pocket of hot, molten rock seven or eight miles beneath the earth’s surface.  As this pocket of molten rock cooled it became a large lump of densely compacted crystals of gray granite.  It was only after the earth eroded away around this mountain was it revealed as we see it today.  Now it rises 835 feet above the ground and they say this may be only 1/10th of the entire size of the mountain.  The train stopped on the west side of the mountain where you can get out and hike the mountain to the top.  We didn’t get off but stayed on and continued back to the station.  

                                         

We left there and stopped at the truck competition that our neighbors told us about.  We saw lots of trucks and watched two drivers take a tanker truck through an obstacle course; interesting.  It was off to the Antique Car and Treasure Museum.  They not only have old cars but bikes, player pianos and lots of other old antiques. 

                                                                       Carillon Bells

We took a ride to hear the Carillon Bells.  You walk down to a glass enclosed house where a woman sits playing the organ that plays the bells in the tower.  She is so good and the sounds are really great.  She play several patriotic songs and ended about a half hour later.  We headed to Stone Mountain Village to see the car show and festival that was going on today.  For a car show, it wasn’t worth it; there were only six cars and the festival consisted of five tents set up in the parking lot to sell t-shirts, jewelry, crafts, etc., a dunking station and one guy playing a guitar to canned music.  We went back for the buffet dinner, only this time, no school kids, we almost had the entire restaurant to ourselves. 

                                                                       Laser Show

The next night, we went to see the laser show on our blanket.  The lasers were great! They started out what seemed like commercials from the sponsors, Coco Cola, Verizon and the State of Georgia followed by designs and pictures to tell stories.  The best part came last when they played Georgia on my Mind and Proud to be an American with pictures, lasers and fireworks.  I took pictures and even tried to do a video.   Hope they come out.  We finally got back to the motor home at 10:30 PM.  Our neighbors showed up 15 minutes later and built a large bonfire.  

 

Virginia - May 2004 

Dixie Caverns and Pottery Shop - Pictures

Salem, VA - May, 12, 2004

Nice ride, especially up the mountains of northern North Carolina into Virginia, the views of the valleys were great.  We actually missed the sign for the campground office but the owner showed up and told us to register in the office of the Caverns.  The Caverns are in back of the campground.  Our site is nice but there is another pull-thru right next to us, and I mean right next, in fact, if a motor home pulls up too far, we would have a problem pulling out around them.  We walked around the campground, which didn’t take much, there are only four rows of motor home sites with approx. 12 sites per row.  

 

The next day we took a tour of the Caverns.  You get a discount by staying here.  We had to wait for about 20 minutes so we walked around the large pottery store.  This place has all kinds of pottery, jewelry, a large rock and mineral shop, a basket shop and gift shop.  There were a bunch of kids in the shop and I thought maybe they would be going through the cavern on the same tour we were, but the woman at the counter assured me they had already gone through.  We walked out back and up a ramp through locked doors.  You first walk into a small room that was the original entrance to the cavern.  It is now closed off by concrete with the only entrance being through those locked doors.  Our guide said they had to close the original entrance and lock the doors because too many people were entering the caverns and taking pieces, hence destroying the formations.  We continued by going up into the mountain to a very large cathedral room with all kinds of formations.  From there we walked down into the cavern and saw all kinds of formations like the turkey wing, the magic mirror and a formation that is called the wedding bell.  They say dozens of couples have been married here.  It is a sight to see and it really does look like a large bell, even the other side or top is formed like the outside of a bell.  We did see a small native bat hanging from the wall.  There are plenty of deep passages in the caverns and at one point we had to turn around because the passages were too narrow.  I guess if you’re adventurous enough and had special permission, you could continue by crawling through.  We stopped at one spot where you could see the sky above.  This was how they discovered the caverns.  One day a man was walking his dog and the dog fell down the hole into the caverns.  Imagine his surprise when he went to go get him.  They say this man opened the caverns to the public and even allowed people to break off pieces of the formations to take home; little did he realize that the formations would take thousands of years to develop again.  Even today you can see where formations were cut or broken and today if anyone is caught breaking any formation, they would be fined $500.  The tour took about 45 minutes. 

 

Pennsylvania - May 2004

AACA Automobile Museum & Zoo America - All Pictures   (AACA Auto Museum,  Zoo America,  Cicadas)

Hershey, PA - May, 22, 2004

We spent several days visiting friends and family.  One day we went to Hershey with my sister and brother-in-law to the automobile museum.  The museum is new, large and impressive.  You first watched a movie about the museum and the cars then walked through the cars from the 1900’s to 1990’s; really nice cars, some motor cycles and displays of toy cars.  Joe really enjoyed himself and Jack had someone to talk ”car” to that really knew what he was talking about.

Zoo America 

We stopped at this zoo before meeting my sister for lunch one day just to kill time.  My Zoo card from the Sanford Zoo got us in for free so we walked around.  They have bears, deer, turkeys, eagles, hawks, reptiles, buffalo, wolves and of course tigers, lions and leopards.  It’s a nice little zoo.   We were sitting around the campground enjoying the sun and quiet, well not exactly.  Tis' the season for Cicadas.  These strange creatures come out every 17 years, mate, shed their skin and die and boy are they noisy.  

 

National Christmas Museum - Pictures

Paradise, PA - May, 25, 2004

After paying the admission charge they tell you about the first display, Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus, a display of the child’s letter sent to Santa Claus, tells you a little about the museum and leaves you to take the tour yourself.  They have rows and rows of  display cabinets containing all kinds of ornaments, toys, candles and Christmas stuff.  There are antiques, Christmas around the world, Santa’s North Pole Workshop, a 1950’s Woolworth’s 5 & 10, a pathway through Tudor Towne with animated figures of woodland animals as they hear about Christmas and Father Christmas who visits Tudor Towne.  There are Christmas trees, an entire room that’s under a Christmas tree with several train displays and Nativities from around the world.  We spent two hours looking at everything and Dolores and Joe just loved it.

 

New Hampshire - June 2004

Sand Castle Competition - Pictures

Hampton Beach, NH - June 26, 2004

We drove into Hampton Beach, NH and found out there was a Sand Sculpting competition going on.   The details are incredible!  There were castles, monsters, storybook characters and animals.  All the sculptures were on the beach right next to the boardwalk so you could see them from the boardwalk.  They were all roped off anyway. 

 

Maine - July 2004

4th of July Parade        All Pictures   (Parade.  Stephen King's House)

Banger, ME - July 4, 2004

It was a beautiful day and we decided to go downtown to watch the parade.  We found a place to park and walked around the town before most of the people showed up.  We stopped at a place called Bagel Central on Central St. that had all kinds of bagels, breads and was also a deli with sandwiches, soups and salads.  We didn’t get anything but I bet it would have been really good.  The parade  was supposed to start at 11 AM but at 10:45 AM a whole bunch of runners came down the road; this was part of the festivities.  However the parade was delayed until almost 12 noon.  Don’t know why but we did see an ambulance come and go.  When it finally started we thought it was a political parade because it had all kinds of people and cars flying banners for Bush, Kelly and local politicians.  Then came the rest of the parade with bagpipers, marching bands, a few old cars, a motorcycle club and even special groups from the Vietnam, Koran and World War II veterans.  They also had cartoon characters in the parade followed by fire trucks.  

Stephen King's House  

Hermon, ME - July 5, 2004

We drove down West Broadway to Stephen King’s house.  He graduated from the University of Maine at Orono and lived in Hermon before we knew who he was.  The house is a large two story Gothic revival style in red with tan trim.  The only difference between his house and the others on the block is the black iron fence around it with the bats sitting on top and the web design inside.  It seems that Bangor is Stephen King territory.  In fact we even got a map of all the places where parts of his movies were filmed.  There is Betts Bookstore, Mansfield Complex, Hayfords Park from Thinner, the Standpipe, Birdbath, Canal and Bassey Park from IT; the Rite Aid from Bag of Bones, the Waterworks where GraveYard Shift was filmed and of course the Mt. Hope Cemetery from Pet Semetary. 

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Eastport, Maine     Pictures

Eastport, ME - July 7, 2004

Eastport is a really old town with old Victorian style homes and buildings.  It is right on the bay and has a small marina.  We don’t know how the town is surviving because there are not a lot of people around and a lot of the stores are closed.

 

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Headed Back Home to Florida

Home - July 11, 2004

We decided to head home early due to the weather.  We didn't do much along the way and were home on July 25th.  Unfortunately, we were now home when Hurricane Charley hit.  We spent two sleepless nights at Jack's sister's house and came back home to discover lots of damage done to trees and houses in our community.  Fortunately our home was fine.  Then on September 1st, Hurricane Frances started to threaten Florida.  After Charley, we didn't want to take the chance of loosing both the house and motor home, so we ran north into Mississippi.  Hurricane Francis was now about to hit land.   Once we were settled in a campground in Mississippi, we heard Hurricane Ivan brushed Florida bringing lots of rain and headed off land but Hurricane Jeanne was headed our way.  A Tropical storm Karl turned into Hurricane Karl and hopefully miss land.  However, Hurricane Lisa just in back of Karl was expected to go west toward Florida.  Unfortunately, Mother Nature wasn't done with Florida.  Hurricane Jeanne had done a turnaround and was going to hit Florida.  So we spent two weeks in Mississippi and returned home on September 23rd.  On September 25, Hurricane Jeanne hit.  We were committed to stay, so we stored the motor home in a safe place and went over to Jack's sister's house to ride it out.  Back home again on the 28th.  No electric but no damage either.  Okay, enough is enough.

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