Summer 2018, Day 47: Ft Stanwix NM

Posted on August 23, 2018 by Ben

We woke up to the worst Walmart parking we’ve ever seen:

We drove a few blocks to Fort Stanwix National Monument:

The fort is a recreation of the fort built by the British for the French and Indian War. It was “sold” by NPS to the town as an attempt to revitalize downtown. Sixteen acres of downtown were demolished to make way for the fort:

In the original fort, there was a Ravelin between the gate and the Ace Hardware:

The fort was used by American forces in the Revolutionary War. Camp followers had to live outside the fort because the fort was too small to accommodate them:

After finishing our visit, we drove southeast to get home. See the alternating yellow line on the trip map for today’s drive.

This is probably our last summer trip as a family, as M will be graduating high school this spring. I’m glad we’ve had the opportunity to experience all these trips together!

Summer 2018, Day 46: Niagra Falls, Women’s Rights NHP

Posted on August 22, 2018 by Ben

It wasn’t the quietest night at this truck stop outside of Boulder. It wasn’t quite clear what the signs were referring to, as there were dozens of trucks parked here:

We drove over to Niagara Falls. We’ve never been here before, so we wanted to see what all fuss was about:

The falls were pretty impressive:

We continued east across upstate New York:

We visited Women’s Rights National Historical Park, site of the first women’s rights convention in 1848:

The church in which the convention was held:

We continued east to overnight at the Walmart of Rome, New York. See the alternating yellow line on the trip map for today’s drive.

Summer 2018, Day 45: Garfield NHS, Roosevelt Inaugural NHS

Posted on August 21, 2018 by Ben

Our first stop today was James A. Garfield National Historic Site in Mentor, Ohio, home of the 20th president:

1980s social media?

We toured the house:

The wreath from Garfield’s funeral after his assassination in 1881:

An original painting of Yosemite, probably from the Hudson River School, most likely Bierstadt, who was a contemporary of Garfield:

We continued east into Pennsylvania along the shore of Lake Erie:

Onward to New York. The Rainbow is a consolation prize, I guess:

Our next stop was Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site in Buffalo, the house where then-VP Theodore Roosevelt was inaugurated in 1901 after the assassination of President McKinley:

Upon leaving the site, we discovered that one of our new leaf springs had become misaligned, so the top leaf spring fell past the lower leaves. We limped to a home depot parking lot where I unloaded the spring and hammered the leaves back into position:

We overnighted at a nearby truck stop. See the alternating yellow line on the trip map for today’s drive.

Summer 2018, Day 38: Short Pine OHV, Roosevelt NP

Posted on August 14, 2018 by Ben

Another great day at Glendive:

The horses wouldn’t come down today:

We got in a little over our heads today:

We packed up and headed east into North Dakota:

We stopped at the South Unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Last year we visited the North Unit.

We visited Theodore Roosevelt’s Maltese Cross Cabin. Roosevelt moved here from New York after the death of his wife and mother:

The Maltese Cross carved into the cabin:

In the visitor center, this display listed the lands conserved by Roosevelt:

We went to an overlook for the Park’s badlands:

We continued east. Approaching Bismarck, I felt an odd shuddering in the steering wheel. We pulled off the interstate into a gravel parking lot and discovered most of the lug nuts on the front passenger wheel had broken off: