Monthly Archives: July 2014
Trains and Bridges . . .
Today was another ‘tourist’ day, so after our coffee and cinnamon toast made with some of Miss Terry’s delicious homemade bread, we left the park about 10:30, heading for the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center on the Cincinnati waterfront along the Ohio River.
One of the first thing you see entering the museum is this enormous quilt wall, illustrating many traditional African-American themes.
One of the central attractions here is this authentic slave pen from a Kentucky farm. Built in 1830, it probably only survived because a tobacco barn was constructed around it.
It was carefully disassembled in Kentucky and moved here for the opening of the Freedom Center in 2002.
Jan really enjoyed the large quilt exhibit. But in many cases, these were more like 3D cloth artwork rather than just quilts.
This one commemorates Hattie McDaniel, the first African-American to win an Academy Award.
And this one celebrates the the Red Tails, the Tuskegee Airmen, WWII pilots.
There were many other fascinating exhibits, but I imagine Nick Russell will do a much better job covering those on his blog, and in upcoming Gypsy Journal Newspaper articles.
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One of the things that caught my eye, and interest, was the John A. Roebling Suspension Bridge that crosses the Ohio River right in front of the museum.
Built between 1856 and 1866, it still carries traffic between Covington, KY and Cincinnati to this day, and remains the busiest of Cincinnati’s 4 bridges. When it opened in 1866, it was the longest suspension bridge in the world, and has been designated a National Historic Landmark.
30 years later, Roebling’s son, Washington, would design and build the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City.
Near the bridge on the Kentucky side is this beautiful condo building. Called The Ascent at Roebling’s Bridge, it opened in 2008. But the view from Cincinnati is only part of the story.
At 20 stories and 300 feet, here’s what it looks like from the Kentucky side of the river.
But if you want to live here, you better have some big bucks. At present 18 of the 70 condos are available for sale, ranging in price from $545,000 to $5,450,00.
Finally heading back toward home about 4, we ended up having dinner at Ron’s Roost in the Bridgetown area of western Cincinnati.
We weren’t heading there, we just kind of stumbled across it, and found it had 4+ stars on Yelp, so we thought we’d give it a try. And boy, were we glad we did.
I mean, how could you not like a place that has a chicken truck,
and who’s motto is, “It’s Cluckin’ Good!”
But don’t be fooled by the name. This is really a very nice restaurant, as you can tell below.
They’ve been around since 1960, and are so well-known for their food, they’ve been featured on the Food Network.
And our food was great, too. Jan, Terry, and Nick had their award-winning fried chicken, but I finally got my German fix with the Bavarian Sample Platter that had Sauerbraten with ginger-snap gravy over spätzle noodles, red cabbage, potato pancakes, and a smoked German mettwurst, along with their famous Hot Bacon Slaw.
People, this was really, really good. It will certainly be on our ‘Eat There Again’ list.
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Landon’s been working on his primary colors and writing his letters, and this is the result. Nice.
Tomorrow looks to be another stay at rig day, before we’re back in Cincinnati on Friday.
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Thought for the Day:
“I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” – Michelangelo
A Boy and His Cat . . .
When I won’t let Mister in my lap because I’m working on the computer, he’s usually pretty content to just lay at my feet, snoring the morning away. And, boy, does he snore. Sounds like a motorboat. As I’ve said before, he’s more like a dog than a cat.
About 11:30 Jan and I headed out for a couple of errands. After we dropped off a bag of garbage at the dumpsters, we stopped at the park office to pick up my Amazon order of the 3 LED light sets that I ordered, as well as a couple of new park access passes for both Nick and us, since the code changed this past Sunday.
Our final stop was the PO right down the road a couple of miles in Morris, which was closer than driving all the way into Batesville. We did have to wait about 15 minutes for the Postmistress to come back from lunch, but it was really nice sitting in the car with the windows down in this beautiful weather
Nick came over about 4:30 for a while, before we all headed over to Harrison, OH for dinner. Our place of choice for tonight was Buffalo Wild Wings.
I think the last time we ate at BWW together was a couple of years ago in Las Vegas, but it’s always been one of Jan and my favorite wing places. I like the fact that that they have a sweet-hot sauce as well as a really hot sauce. And lucky for us, tonight was 60 cent wing night, so instead of getting 10 wings for $9.99, I got 15 wings for $9.00. Nice!
I got my wings coated with Mango-Habanero, which is their 3rd hottest, but I really like the sweetness. But for more heat, I got a side of the Blazin’, their hottest sauce.
Jan got the boneless wings, coated in Asian Spice, along with a side of Hot, which is their 2nd hottest.
For their part, Nick got a split order of wings, half coated with Honey-Mustard and half with Honey BBQ. He said he liked the Honey BBQ better. And Terry got a Chicken Wrap that she said was very good.
As I’ve noticed before, the Blazin’ sauce is not as hot up here as down in Texas. And I’ve noticed the same thing at other places like Hooter’s.
Leaving BWW, we stopped off at Remko Market for a couple for grocery things before getting back to the park a little before 8.
Our high temp for the day was 69 degrees, with about the same tomorrow, which looks to be another Cincinnati tourist day, with Nick having several things lined up for us.
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Thought for the Day:
Isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet? — L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables
