I spent 6 years in upstate New York attending Cornell University 35 years ago.  Imagine my surprise driving through campus and being completely lost.  I figure old age has take a toll on my memory, but really??  I shared this with Roni and my mother and they both encouraged me to go back and walk through the campus to connect those neuron paths of memory 🙂

I came back the next day and started my walk, remembering the hot and humid summer I had arrived at Ithaca NY the first time.  Looking out from the campus down to Cayuga Lake was spectacular then as it is now.  Gradually buildings came back to my memory,   Olin Hall, Willard Straight Hall, and so on.  I finally climbed the slope to Baker Lab and remembered Clark Hall had resided near it.  Now instead was this modern glass facade over the Physical Sciences Building, all new to me.  Where was the Physics and Applied and Engineering Physics Departments?   Then I saw Rockefeller Hall where I had taught undergraduates as a Teaching Assistant and walked in.  Guess what, a sign to Clark Hall pointed the way.  Well, this is how I remembered Clark Hall, and the back looked exactly like it used to:

But darn !!! they had built the new Physical Sciences Building directly in front of Clark Hall and enclosed part of Clark and Baker Lab in a glass greenhouse, no wonder I couldn’t find it, lol.

Sadly after talking to a nice person in the Administration office, my advisor had passed away recently.  She related the 2011 building of the Physical Sciences Building and my mystery was solved.

I know my mental faculties diminish with age, but I was panicked at first, lol.  Needless to say, it was so nice to walk the campus and enjoy the ambiance of Cornell University.

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Located in an old but charming small town called Seneca Falls in New York is this uplifting museum dedicated to the Woman’s rights movement.  It focuses on the Declaration of Sentiments stating “All men and woman are created equal”.

The convention for this event was held in the above pictured chapel that has been maintained/restored. I sat in one of the pews trying to put myself into the shoes of woman who came before me and had the courage to stand up for themselves and what we take for granted today.  Elizabeth Cady Stanton was one of these woman at the forefront of this movement. She associated herself with people like Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass. This helped to move her cause forward and make great strides for woman.

Abby, our tour guide for Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s home was very open to answering all our questions and made the tour very personal and educational. The home itself has been through many transformations through the years and they have done their best in trying to keep it to its original layout.

There is so much to learn here and I cannot possibly relate it all to you. I urge you to visit the The Woman’s Rights National Historic Park.  I will end with a quote that touched me deeply and brought me to tears.  It came from a black woman who was also a slave.

“I have borne thirteen children and seen them most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother’s grief, none but Jesus heard me.  And I ain’t a woman?”

To put it crudely, she must of felt like she was looked at like a slave maker by those who “owned” her.   She had to fight to withstand the horrors of being black in her time and than if she could get through that she had to deal with being looked at as a woman who was considered less valuable than a man.  She was humiliated, torn down and used but of all the experiences she had to trudge through and try to stand strong with was being a mother.  A mother who could not nurture and love her children the way any woman should be able to.  To see more images please visit

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Our travels have led us to so many small and lovely towns, one of which is Seneca Falls.

At the North end of Cayuga Lake, the downtown has a charm and grace, accented by the Woman’s Rights National Historic Park described by Roni in a separate blog.  The Trinity Episcopal Church looks like an imposing castle on the river edge of town.

The Seneca locks are open to wander over to see how boats are raised and lowered 49 feet from the Erie Canal to Cayuga Lake.

As with all our travels, we meet exciting and interesting people.  This time it was Jim and Linda of Michigan who gave us plenty of advice on campgrounds they love with their 5th wheel trailer.  Thank you for your company on our journey 🙂

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We both thank you for reading our blog 🙂

We drove across the Rainbow Bridge into Canada late in the afternoon.   The reality of our views of the falls became quickly apparent as we approached the edge to look across the Niagara River, what an amazing view !  From Canada you can see each falls in all their beauty.  We waited patiently and were rewarded with the night view of the falls, which Canada lights with powerful beams of colored lights.

The next day we made a full day of the Canadian side to enjoy the falls, ride the Hornblower through the spray of the falls, have an enjoyable lunch watching the falls, and capture the falls in the magic light of sunset, one of the most memorable days of our precious venture across America 🙂

Imagine being on the top deck of the Hornblower, approaching the Horseshoe Falls on a brilliant sunny day, dressed in the provided red poncho, feeling the roar of the falls, then your face and body are hit by a strong wind filled with the mist of the falls.  We scream with primal joy as our faces and hair are instantly drenched, but when we turn to see the the Horseshoe Falls wrapped around our boat, everyone has turned their backs to the intense spray of the falls 🙂

One can sit for a very long time just staring at the intensity and beauty of Mother Nature.  The American Falls and smaller Bridal Veil Falls at the far right are so lovely.

It is hard to pick a favorite Falls, the Horseshoe Falls cause a plume of mist to rise far above them, like a natural tornado of mist.

Head over to the Queen Victoria Place restaurant for a nice meal as you sit on the open air balcony and get distracted by the lovely views of the falls as you eat your meal.

We are in Vermont now and we cannot stop thinking of the falls and their beauty, our precious venture is so wonderful and we are blessed to have this opportunity 🙂

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WOW!  You know that place you’ve always heard about?  You believed it was real because it was written about, talked about and you saw the pictures.  That was Niagara Falls for me.  Never thought much about seeing it.  It seemed something I would just not do in life.   Well here I am!  John captured this beauty very nicely.  Majestic, awesome, inspiring, beautiful are just a few words that do not do it justice.  I found myself leaning on the railing and staring.

We stood this close (the above picture) and it made my tummy have butterflies being so close.  I was standing on the edge watching a gazillion gallons of water rage toward the edge and throw themselves onto the rocks below and flow into the river.  Your tummy might have butterflies too!

In the above picture I called this a sky trolley or a trolley zip line.  Whatever it is called I told John I would go on it , no problem!  I said this knowing we would not so it gave me room to act like I’m brave. I’m not and don’t know if I really could.  I can sometimes be a fraidy cat!

I would love to bring my loved ones back here one day so they too can know Niagara falls is real and not just a beautiful place they hear about from others.

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Western Pennsylvania was delightful in the surprises, the beauty, and the history it offered us.  We were sad to depart for destinations further north, but we celebrated a bit in Johnstown before breaking camp.  First wandering the parks in the downtown area, we found the Polacek Pavilion named for the relatives of a dear friend of ours 🙂

We then wandered over to the Inclined Plane (aka the Incline, a funicular, or a train to the top of a hill 🙂  Being an old man, I rode for free, but they made Roni pay, lol.  With hunger pulling us, we walked over to Asiago’s Tuscan Italian restaurant and Cassie (Cassandra) greeted us excitedly upon hearing of our round America journey.

After being seated with a spectacular view of Johnstown, Nick made sure we were hungry no longer, including the evil house made donuts he brought to us at the end of the meal 🙂

We were so happy with the service at Asiago’s that we asked to take their picture for our memories !

Departing from the restaurant we stared in awe at the lovely town of Johnstown being lit up in the evening sky.

If you ever do decide to travel around America, make sure to include western PA in the itinerary.  We certainly were very pleased with everything we discovered there.

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Roni and I thank you for reading our blog 🙂

Flight 93 Memorial-Shanksville PA

I knew this visit would be (as a friend called it) intense.  The visitor center leads you on a zig zag like path displaying and showing what was going on in the world minutes before our lives would change.  I know you too remember most likely what you were doing minutes before you got the news.  It’s a fairly reverent place.  I was doing fine and going through the motions, listening to the news clips they had of that morning, reading the accounts of all 4 flights that day and patiently waiting to move along as the line moved slowly.  One of the displays was a line of 4 phones.  I picked one up and listened.   This is where the inside of my mind started swirling and I felt the whole room go fuzzy.  I wanted to run to the nearest bathroom stall and let myself cry uncontrollably.   I had just listened to 4 phone messages left by 4 flight 93 passengers to their loved ones before crashing.

I wont go into the statistics and reasons why this flight was more important forensically than the other flights or why a plane that wasn’t full was chosen.

This was one of the most overwhelming, humbling memorials I have ever visited.  It might be because I very much remember it and how it took something so horrible to appreciate the country I was born to and the family I don’t always keep in contact with.

40 lives.  Pilot. Co Pilot. 5 Flight Attendants. 33 passengers which does not include an unborn child.

This site is still in the process of being completed.

Please don’t go one more day without telling THAT person you love them.

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The dam created a lovely Lake Conemaugh in the hills above Johnstown with the exclusive South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club members enjoying their vacation days away from Pittsburgh.  The rich and famous including Andrew W. Mellon and Henry Clay Frick were some of the members.  The Club had purchased the land around the lake including the old leak prone dam and had done little to maintain it.   May 31, 1889 after torrential rains, the dam burst, sweeping devastation down river through all the small towns and finally the thriving city of Johnstown.  Over 2200 perished with over a third never identified.

The National Park Service did a wonderful job pulling together the National Memorial to help explain the tragic story and afterwards we visited the Grandview Cemetery where many of the 2200 are buried.

The people who the flood swept over had to constantly crawl up the debris as it swept down the river to stay above the water.  The enormous wreckage of homes, trains, trees, etc built up in front of the stone 7 arch bridge in Johnstown, and then caught fire.  So many were either drowned or burned to death.  The unmarked graves in the Grandview Cemetery give you a chill as you look upon so many that were not identified.  So many of the marked graves have the date May 31, 1889 noting the fateful day.

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So what do you do when you are in Western Pennsylvania looking for interesting historical sites?  Head to the Allegheny Portage Railroad and have your head explode with the ability of man to overcome nature’s obstacles.

Imagine you are back in the first half of the 1800s and you are wanting to connect Pittsburgh to Philadelphia to help the flow of people, resources, and goods to build America.  You look north and the Erie Canal is making New York State an east/west freeway of trade.  To the South some are talking of a connection of Chesapeake Bay to the west, what will we do in Pennsylvania?  A canal works great till you get near the highest Allegheny ridges.  Solution? Connect the canals by building a railroad designed to pull huge loads up and lower down the other side of the Allegheny mountains.  These loads are the actual boats that are used in the canals.  Thus was born the Allegheny Portage Railroad.

Now fast forward to present and hop in our truck as we head from one interesting historic site to another related to this Allegheny Portage Railroad and stop and talk to a couple from Ohio who have been here many times.  Then a friendly person from Michigan joins the conversation and you find everyone you meet is as interesting as the historic sites you are visiting 🙂  We ran into them first at the Horseshoe Curve National Historic Landmark, then later at the Allegheny Portage Railroad Visitors Center.

As you may have guessed, the portage railroad was short-lived  as railroad tunnels began to be built with more powerful locomotives so that by the 1850s trains could replace the canals and portages.   We visited the Gallitzin PA Museum to see and learn about one of the early tunnels built by the Pennsylvania Railroad to obsolete the portage railroad.  Joan Grimes Kowalski at the museum talked with us for quite a while, describing the museum exhibits as well as talking of her own life in the community of Gallitzin including her poetry.  She was wonderful to talk to 🙂

For Roni and I, it isn’t just learning about the history of America that we travel these roads, but it is to learn about the people of America.  We have been blessed with meeting many wonderful people on our precious venture 🙂

Our http://facebook.com/compositionbyjohn will have the rest of the pictures to this blog posted soon, but the http://compositionbyjohn.com will trail by several days because fast internet is difficult in the Allegheny mountains, lol.

John and Roni

It is odd that with all our travels, this is the first national park we have visited since the Badlands in SD, which seems an eon ago 🙂  Cuyahoga surprised me, neither of us were expecting much to be honest.  I think we have been spoiled by all the parks out west.  That said, I thought the park delivered the goods !

We started at the Boston Store Visitor’s Center which initially was a warehouse along the Erie and Ohio Canal.  Driving south we visited Beaver Marsh to see the canal up close along with a boardwalk out on to the marsh.  I left my telephoto lens behind, of course, leaving me with my less powerful 24-105mm zoom for the wildlife that appeared.  A very cooperative green heron and great blue heron would vogue all afternoon for me and my tiny lens, lol.

While on the boardwalk, we chatted with a nice couple with a tricycle to beat all tricycles 🙂  The recumbent tandem could be separated into two pieces to store in their minivan.  Roni said she would go for it once she found the rear passenger doesn’t have to pedal, lol.

The covered bridge at the end of Everett Road was lovely and recently painted.  We also stopped at Szalay’s Farmers Market near there.  Very commercial and crowded on a lovely Sunday afternoon, but bountiful in their selection of produce!

On to the Ledges Trail, where you don’t realize you are on a plateau with steep rock cliffs on the sides till you hike to the edge.  Very scenic but bring a tripod if you want decent pictures in the dark forested cover.

We ended with a short hike to Brandywine Falls.  They are lovely but with all the people walking on top of the falls and walking past you on the wooden walkway which vibrate the tripod, it was difficult to capture.

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