Spring Fling 2026 - Day 34: Longwood Gardens

 Wednesday, June 04

We went over to Kennett, PA (Mushroom Capital of the World) not to see mushrooms but to visit Longwood Gardens.

It's the largest botanical garden I've ever visited and according to Mike and Terry H. it's second only to the Royal Botanical Garden in England.

Normally, this kind of place isn't my jam.  I was quite surprised at how much I enjoyed it.

The Bonsai Trees exhibit was the highlight of the place, IMO: 

The girls fooling around after watching some Instagram influencer type pose for pics in same spot:

We had a late lunch at the Victory Brewing Co.  Then we were driven back to Mike and Terry's place via the most questionable routing possible by Waze app.  Good to see that Google maps doesn't have a monopoly on occasional bad routing guides 

Spring Fling 2026 - Day 33: A Drive to Lititz, PA

Mike and Terry drove us to the quaint town of Lititz, PA today.  

Although located in the heart of Pennsylvania Amish country, we didn't see any of them. 

Still, the town itself was pretty nice. Our first stop was the Wilbur chocolate factory.  They're offerings were quite delicious but they also a bit pricey so we didn't get a lot of stuff. 

We did some meandering of the shops prior to lunch, and then we retired to the Bull Head Pub located along Main Street.

Pretty nice pub and the food was tasty.  I had the pork chop sandwich, while Martha had the fish and chips.

Some more meandering after lunch had us checking out the first Pretzel Bakery in the USA, established in 1861.

Inside the bakery there were some displays of historical photos and displays related to the bakery.  Near the shop where one can buy pretzels and related items, there was some hard work on display with an Amish theme of sorts:

Today's moto content 

Our purchases in hand, we meandered back to Mike's car for the drive back to Macungie.

Not much else to report, no sightings of Amish horse buggys.

Spring Fling 2026 - Day 31+32: Macungie, PA

Sunday, May 31

Driving day.  Left at 7:42 AM and had arrived at the home of an Army buddy of mine whom I've known since 1981; at the ROTC Advanced Camp in Fort Bragg, NC.

Mike and his lovely wife Terry have been long time friends since then, I attended his wedding to Terry and I am his first daughter's godfather.

I'm lot docking in their driveway in the town of Macungie.  It's near Allentown (yes, of Billy Joel fame).

Monday, Jun 01

Good day today.  We went to the nearby town of Bethlehem and Mike and Terry showed me around the Steel Stacks.  Rusting remnants of the enormous furnaces and support infrastructure from back in the day when steel was produced there.

Steel that would be included in such projects as the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and the Battleship Missouri of WWII fame.

The place is now an eye-catching backdrop for a small show pavilion, a media center, a future hospital and assorted entertainment venues.

Can you see the small bit of greenery?

Nittany Lion, mascot of Penn State

After the Steel Stacks, we drove into Bethlehem's historic center and had a great lunch at McCarthys Irish Pub:

We rested the rest of the day away.  Martha flies in tonight at nearby Allentown and I'll be of course picking her up.