Celebrating Independence Day 2013

July 4th, 2013 - I went for a walk from our house in Media to Independence Hall. The first question is probably - why? My initial answer is why not? It was kinda cool to do something just because I can on the day we celebrate freedom.

I am a softball widow frequently on the July 4th holiday. There is almost always a tournament of some kind and Dave is almost always umpiring one of them. This year he is in Quakertown at the TNT tournament. We do lots of things together but long distance walking or running is not one of them so being a softball widow from time to time works for both of us.

I got it in my head to do a lengthy hike of some kind and somehow tie it to a 4th of July theme. I thought about mapping a route on www.mapmyrun.com that would look like "July Fourth" or " 1776" but that would only work if I confined myself to Media borough where the streets more or less are in a grid. That did not sound like fun. And it wouldn't take very long either. I've done Valley Forge a lot plus I plan to be at the MLC meetup there on Saturday so I ruled that out.

On a whim I asked Google Maps to map a walking route from our house to Independence Hall.

St Peter's Village

Today I drove out to St. Peter's Village in Chester County to explore the trails there. I can't believe I've lived here as long as I have and didn't know this was here. Yesterday I selected a 30 mile radius using this cool mapping tool. I can't remember where I was introduced to this tool. Probably in someone's blog or on Facebook. It's very useful and it is how I found this village and trails. My camera battery was shot so there are no photos. I need to check into that as it should not have been used up already. Annoying but now I have an excuse to go back so I can show you what I saw.

Not that I need one. Today was a great day. After a week + of daily summer thunderstorms and humidity today started out humid but burned off quickly. I arrived about 10:15 and walked the roughly block and a half that constitutes the town first. There is a bakery, an ice cream parlor and an 'antique' arcade. Antique because it has no electronic games that most kids play today. It's mostly pinball games that I grew up playing. (We had one in the basement of our house for a time too). There is also an Inn and I think we should go back there for dinner sometime. It sits along the creek (as does the whole town). The creek was especially rapid today due to all the rain we've had. It sounded glorious and had I brought dry clothes to change into I would have been sorely tempted to jump boulders and risk getting soaked. I had errands to run on my way home though and didn't want to be in the Acme smelling like a drowned rat. Next time for sure!

Next I wandered over the creek to check out the trails.

Blockbuster Weekend Part II

Sunday - June 23

Today I went to Forbidden Drive for a 2 hour guided hike. I had a good time but probably would have had just as much fun on my own or with friends just wandering around. One thing I learned is that there are way more trails there than I ever imagined. I think it would make a great bucket list item to try to cover all 50 miles of identified trails. But I'd likely get sidetracked on the unofficial trails. At any rate I expect to spend time back there. Now I see why the trail running group likes to go there so often.

Summer is still coming along nicely. It's more humid today and in the last few hours it's gotten a lot more humid. There is a chance of thurnderstorms just about every day this week. After the last few days there is no room to complain about that.

I'm not brave enough to take a photo from the front.
It's a narrow ledge and a long way down.

The only covered bridge inside the city limits of a major US city.

Click here for more photos.

BTW, I'm not sure why I titled these last two posts blockbuster weekend. Probably because I'm thinking of summer starting and that's usually when all the big movies come out.

Blockbuster Summer Weekend Part I

Saturday June 22-

It's a little more humid today but nothing a few extra bottles of water can't handle. Summer is two days old now and doing it right.

Today I went for a walk/hike around trails at Haverford Reserve. If you are local this is what they built on the old Haveford State Hospital site. It's now a mix of community center, ball fields, playgrounds, trails and residences for people with lots of money. The residences that is not the other stuff. The recreational stuff is open to plain folk like me! I've been wanting to check out these trails for some time now and today was the perfect day to do so  - not just for the weather. The Misery Loves Company trail runners (remember the Rode to Joy?) were doing a point to point run from Swarthmore College to Haverford College as a farwell run with Gabby who is moving to South Carolina next week. Leave it to Pete to find a route of that distance that covers more trails than paved roads. Actually where we live is full of secret and not so secret trails if you care to look for them. I knew the last leg of their route would be through this area so that's why I chose today. Here is a photo of Gabby and Me when they arrived. (Courtesy of Pete because I exhausted the battery on my camera taking photos on the trail.)