Covered Bridges Ohio

Just spent the day driving around the county looking for Covered bridges.

Also found a little diner that had a good selection of homemade pies, I got the last slice of Grape pie never heard of it before so I had to try it,tasted a lot like blueberry.

When we exited this bridge there was a huge fully loaded semi coming our way, no way was he getting through this bridge,took him about 20 minutes to turn it around, but he did it.

Garfield -The President

I'm so far behind in posting Blogs I don't think I'll ever catch up. We stopped here in early August.

We stopped by the President Garfield Nation Site.  As soon as you get there sign up for the next tour then go to the museum to look around, they will call you when your tour starts,they get filled up pretty fast.

We had a real good tour guide,he was interning for the summer, the tour was about 45 minutes long and was extremely informative.  Garfield had a very full life even with it being cut short.

He was assassinated for not give someone a government job.

Inaugural Ball dress,cost $45 at that time

Various rooms in the house, 29 rooms total

This plaque was made by the engraving department and as far as they know it's the only one ever made.

This wreath was sent to his funeral by Queen Victoria along with a very nice letter, Mrs Garfield had the wreath taken apart piece by piece and dipped in wax to preserve it then reassembled. 

Everything in the house is original to the house, the chandlers were originally natural gas but then converted to electric. 

Most of the house was added on after his death

This was his library,it contained over 5000 books, he and his wife were fluent in 6 languages. You can see in the reflection in the mirror of elaborate the wood work was, it was all hand carved by a local farmer.

Marshall M Fredericks Sculpture Museum

Friday we drove over to to the Marshall M Frederick's Sculpture Museum which is on the Saginaw Valley State University campus.
There is free parking and the admission to the museum is free.  There is a small but very nice garden in front of the building with about a dozen of Frederick's sculpture mixed in along with some floral painting which fit in perfectly.
The museum itself is just a few rooms but they are packed with his work, enough that they remind you when taking picture please don't walk backwards because there is a very good chance that you will  bump into one of the sculptures.
Almost all of the exhibits inside are the original plaster castings that he had in his Birmingham studio the sculptures out side are copies made from these molds.

If you ever shopped at the old Northland Shopping Center then you will remember this one that was right in front of Hudson's

These are a few in the garden as you walk to the museum

Christ and the Children - At St John's Luther Church in Ft Wayne

Just about everything in the museum is white or a very light color so it was pretty hard trying to get picture with a lot of detail in them, but I tried.

Anybody from Detroit will recognize this guy, he looks better when he's wearing his RED WING jersey, which means they are in the play-offs.

 TWO SISTERS
(Mother and Child)
The plaster was made in 1942 right before he went off to war.  The Bronze was cast in 1965
and now stands at the entrance to Kingswood School at Cranbrook Educational Community, Birmingham, Michigan

There is much to see he here, it is well worth and hour or two of your time to visit if you are ever in the area.
We didn't realize how many of his pieces we had seen in your travels until we came here.
They are mostly through out the mid-west

Here is a condense view of some of the other works.

They have also moved most of his studio here

And this is how it's done

DOW GARDENS

We spent the morning walking around the Dow Gardens in Midland Michigan today.  I took way to many pictures to post individually.  A great way to spend a couple of hours. Entrance fee just $5.00 

I'm not sure what happens if you click on the large pictures?

Krider World's Fair Garden

Took a little drive over to Middlebury, Ind where they have the World's Fair Garden.  It's a small garden and doesn't take to long to walk through but it is also the middle parking spot for the Punpkinvine bicycle trail so we made it a twofer.

And now onto the Bike trail

There are restaurants,  stores and bathrooms  at both ends as well as bathrooms in the middle.

Total paved trail is about 12 miles

It passes through the Amish farms

Horse and buggy parked at the Dairy Queen along side the path