Saturday, October 6 The Amish and Annapolis, MD

It is overcast but dry and cool this morning. After a leisurely breakfast, we drive over to Bird-in-Hand in the Amish Country. There is a quilt shop where Carolyn has bought several quilts over the years.

We are looking for a special baby quilt. The shop has maybe six that are suitable so Dick takes pictures of each one with his cell phone and sends them to our daughter. By texting we narrow it down to three and finally a phone call between mother and daughter gives us a winner.

Quilt in hand we drive on to Intercourse. It is Saturday and that is a normal market day for the area. Since it October, it is a special Fall market with stalls lining the road. Traffic is bumper to bumper,

but we finally get into town and parked.

Carolyn is in hog heaven with the temporary stands and the cute shops. There are some beautiful quilts and other hand crafts. Dick finds a place to sit down and Carolyn shops! What Fun! After scratching that itch, we head out into the countryside to explore some of the area. The land is dotted with charming farm homes and green pastures full of cows.

It is now only about 1PM so we decide Maryland crab cakes might make a wonderful diner. We head to Annapolis to check it out and find a good meal. It isn’t really that far mileage wise, but a definite case of you can’t get there from here. We twist and turn along and across rivers and finally arrive about 3:30PM. The idea was to visit the Naval Academy

and then find some dinner. However there is a big in the water boat show and not a parking space anywhere near the Academy entrance. So on to plan "B". We find a Chart House right on the water across from the Boat Show area and the Academy with private parking. The parking problem solved, we watch the sail boats in the bay for awhile until the restaurant opens at 4:30PM.

We have a wonderful chopped spinach salad with crab cakes and a molten chocolate cake....a really great meal.

We do a fast drive around the cute town

and head into the setting sun.

Fortunately, it is only a 60 minute straight shot up the interstate to our hotel. It has been another great day. But the forecast is going south again so we decide that we will start toward home tomorrow since we are getting very tired of the rainy overcast days.