Gere and Betty are long time friends of Dick’s (and now
Patti’s). Dick and Gere were in a men’s
group together over 40 years ago and then worked together in social services in
Dayton. Those long-term friendships are
so precious.
We enjoyed our breakfast and coffee sitting out on their
back porch in this wonderfully rural setting.
We knew it was going to get much hotter later in the day but in the morning it was so pleasant sitting there eating and talking. The relaxation felt great.
Then we packed up for a nice long hike down the trails of the Grand
Canyon of Pennsylvania. Actually it is a
deep canyon formed by Pine Creek. They suggested we do the two-car method of
dropping one car off at the end of the trail, and then driving the other car to
the beginning.
Althogether we hiked about 8 miles. It was such a peaceful and lovely hike. We started off descending through shaded
woods, much of the trip down was along a beautiful stream, even with the low
water level of late summer. Anytime you can spend the morning in a peaceful woods, you should do it. Wonderful!
At the bottom of the trail we moved onto a wide trail that
had been an old railroad bed that had been turned into a trail. There were a number of other walkers on this
trail, along with many people riding their bicycles. We were sure they would be using more of the
33 miles of trail than we would be using.
There were many beautiful wildflowers along this trail. Some even attracted butterflies. Several times Dick fell behind the others as
he wanted a closer look at some of the flowers and, of course, take a few
photos.
This tail closely paralleled Pine Creek. At times the water rushed through shallows
and at others it slowed in deeper pools.
At one shallow area we could see many birds. Some were fishing by quickly dashing along as
they chased small fish. Others were
preening while still more appeared to be resting. They were quite entertaining. Dick correctly identified them as Mergansers,
close relatives of the Loons, and rarely seen in California. As the clock neared noon, we reached the
point where we had parked the second car.
The ride back to the beginning of the hike was certainly more roundabout
than our walk had been but accomplished much more quickly.
We then went into Wellsboro and got lunch at a local food truck. They served gourmet, excellent food. We all
had worked out an appetite on our hike.
We then strolled along the main street and saw the “Wynkin
Blynken and Nod” statue. This old Dutch poem, beloved by so many children, is
well honored in the middle of the town park at the center of town.
Betty also showed us the Quilt Shop that she works at and
many of the quilts she had created were on display. She is quite an amazing quilt artist. We then walked over to the bookstore where Rowan works and
had the change to talk with her and with the owner about their Harry Potter
party they were planning for ht next weekend. It was really a great independent
bookstore and quite a gathering place in the community for interesting
people. Rowan is a good addition there.
The temperature had climbed into the 90s so we gave
ourselves a treat of some delicious ice cream.
That was a great cap to our day’s outing.
Dinner was excellent home cooking, focusing on delicious
grilled food. It was such a great
conclusion of the day to eat dinner on the back porch overlooking a meadow.
We later sat out and watched the sunset and looked hopefully
for deer, which they often see, but not that night. So nice to have time with friends and just
relax.
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