It All Leads to Intercourse

The rest of our stay in Washington, D.C. was filled with activities – visiting the various monuments, going to the National Zoo, being taken on a guided tour of the Capitol Building, and having a truly divine dinner at Rasika. Plus narrowly missing being witness to a shooting just outside the fence around the White House. You’ve got to love our nation’s capital! Thankfully spending a couple weeks in Intercourse to relax was next on the agenda after Washington, D.C., but you’ll have to keep reading through the capital details to get to that part of our trip! Aren’t I a tease?

The day after our last blog post, we hung around the RV for most of the day so Lewis could get some work done, then got all fancied up and caught the Metro down to dinner at Rasika. It was absolutely wonderful and I highly recommend it if you’re in Washington for any reason and like Indian food. The food was plentiful and the wine list was much more in-depth than we were expecting. The waiter was also a fount of knowledge, and approved of all our choices for our meal. Of course, it helps that we’ve had a decent amount of experience with Indian food and know what goes well with what. Heck, I’ve even made my own paneer and ghee in the past.

The next day, we headed to the National Zoo. Now, this was unfortunately one of those rare occurrences of bad planning on our part. We arrived at the Zoo at about 10:30 am to find out that the Zoo was closing early due to a private event we were not aware of, with the back side closing first. If you’ve ever been to the National Zoo, you’ll know that the best way to visit it, because of the terrain, is to start at the Connecticut Avenue entrance and work toward the back, resulting in an easy downhill walk for most of the day. Because we had not been aware of the early closing, we had to rush downhill to the back side of the Zoo, then hoof it back uphill fairly quickly to see as much as we could before they started roping areas off. It made for a pretty hectic day and there were several things we didn’t get to see. That’ll teach us to do more in-depth planning and check schedules if we really want to see something.

A lioness with all her attention focused on the men setting up for a private event at the National Zoo.

We thought this tiger was catnapping until I zoomed in on his face.

Maybe this orangutan was trying out for a spot in the next Christmas nativity?

Forget the lions and tigers – the real reason everyone goes to the National Zoo is the (panda) bears!

On Friday we had our private guided tour of the Capitol Building, led by a staff member of our Representative and an intern. That was quite interesting, and we got to skip the tremendously long line the general public had to snake through to get their “I’ve been through security” badges. We enjoyed the tour, then went our way on the Circulator bus, which, if you use a Metro SmarTrip card, you can treat as a “hop on hop off” tour bus for two hours for only $1 per person. It’s probably the best deal in Washington, D.C. and made it very simple for us to visit most of the monuments. The bus also had to maneuver around a white car with its hood up, parked in a no-parking zone adjacent to the Circulator stop closest to the White House. It didn’t seem like a noteworthy occurrence, until we arrived back home, turned on the news, and found out the car was associated with someone who, about 10 minutes after we passed, had carried a gun up to the fence around the White House and been shot by Secret Service after refusing to drop the weapon. Last we heard, the guy was in critical condition after his “suicide by Secret Service” attempt. Oh well.

The view from the Speaker of the House’s office balcony at the Capitol Building.

The outside (facing the Tidal Basin) of the Jefferson Memorial.

Thomas Jefferson in all his bronze glory.

The Lincoln Memorial from the southeast corner.

Up close and personal with Abraham Lincoln’s statue inside the Lincoln Memorial.

Now for the part of this blog post that I’m sure you’ve all been waiting for – the part where I write about spending two weeks enjoying ourselves in Intercourse. Now before any of you readers either get offended or all hot and bothered, let me throw some cold water on your anticipation by explaining this is Intercourse, Pennsylvania we’re talking about, not anything more dirty-minded. It’s the heart of Pennsylvania’s Amish and Mennonite communities and is an excellent place to slow down and get back to what really matters in life. We also became grandparents during our stay to an awesome 7lb, 11oz baby boy whom our daughter delivered after being induced and an emergency C-section. We love you, Lucas!

Our new grandson. Isn’t he adorable?

We parked our fifth wheel at Beacon Hill Camping, a small, quiet adult campground just a short walk up the road from “downtown” Intercourse and literally across the street from a real Amish family farm. On several days during our stay, Amish buggies or wagons came through the campground offering fresh fruits and vegetables, and homemade baked goods for sale. We absolutely loved this perk, and it helped us get to know some of the neighbors much better than if we were simply any other tourists staying at a nearby hotel and only interacting with them in the local stores and shops. We got to help the young sons of the Amish family across the street turn their dairy cattle out to pasture one evening, and we also were able to trade their father an “Amish taxi ride” in our truck to return his seedling trays in exchange for a couple quarts of raw milk. For us, this was a much more enjoyable encounter than any amount of visiting “tourist information centers” or museums about the Amish. Not to say there isn’t a place for the latter, but firsthand experiences are usually a lot more memorable.

Sometimes all you need is 7 horsepower (actually, I guess that should be mulepower)!

When you see this outside the local Costco, you know you’re in Amish country.

We did get over to Strasburg, Pennsylvania to visit the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, and Lewis’ mom came out from where she was staying in Gettysburg to visit us and take us to the National Christmas Center, also in Strasburg. The following day, we in turn jaunted over to Gettysburg to visit her and go to the Gettysburg Diorama, the Shriver House Museum, and drive part of the Battlefield itself. Later in the week, we also went on a private buggy ride through the town of Bird-In-Hand, seeing more Amish farms up close, passing beneath a 200+ year old bridge, and going by a historic grist mill (now an art gallery).

The view from the overlook at the Strasburg Train Museum. Yes, those are real full-sized locomotives and train cars, some of which you can even enter.