Thursday, May 17, 2012

Getting There, PA


I had been looking for a good redbud picture, but it seemed every time I spotted them in a nice natural setting, there was either no shoulder or a tractor-trailer was breathing down my neck.  But on the way east, I found the Ohio DOT had some nicely potted redbuds at their welcome center on I-80.  They would have been brighter, but as you can see from a couple light shadows, the sun was just barely beginning to peak over the horizon.


This mallard had the closest thing to heaven for a duck.  This is a spring run.  The water is crystal clear and nutrient rich, so the bottom vegetation is healthy, plentiful, and just there for the picking in the shallow water where watercress was raised commercially in years past.


One of the greatest delights of traveling through Pennsylvania is the chance to see a lot of colonial architecture.  Many of them, either in all brick or grey stone, survive in wonderful condition from the revolutionary and colonial period of our history.  They are a marvel to just look at, knowing that there is no way they could be built today, and their preservation is essential.  Some are still working farms, but sadly, as elsewhere, their fields are sprouting not corn, clover, or soybeans, but hundreds of ticky-tacky houses.  These homes are indeed works of art by any definition.


Even their barns are beautiful and irreplaceable.  You'll see several of those as we go along.  You can imagine the surprise when I walked up to strangers' doors to ask permission to photograph their barns.


Except for the redbud picture in Ohio, these were all from Carlisle, PA.
Cheers, jim

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