Celebrating America's 250th

When we arrived back home in mid June, we were pretty tired from our long trip and just wanted to relax for some time at home. Well, that certainly did not last long, because we had a family trip planned for the 4th of July. For many years when our kids were growing up, we spent the first week of July with Tim’s family at the camp both he and his father were members of: Baker Run Hunting and Fishing Club. It is located in Potter County, PA, i.e. “God’s Country”. This is a beautiful area in north central Pennsylvania filled with woods, streams, rolling hills and mountains and many small towns. Definitely a place to get away from it all and relax.

We hadn’t made it to camp over July 4th in recent years until last year to attend the Bark Peeler’s Festival at the Pennsylvania Lumber Museum. We had so much fun at the festival and camp that everyone wanted to come back to camp this year and go to the festival again. This festival is held the first weekend of July every year and this year, it fell on July 4th, America’s 250th. Definitely a great way to celebrate America by celebrating one of the industries that helped to build this country, especially Pennsylvania - Lumber!

Katie and Nova Rose (Rosie), Kim, Greg, Jenny and Dan were able to join us at camp for the holiday. Unfortunately, we had a stormy and rainy week at camp with power outages and some mechanical issues at the camp with the well and an electrical issue. The worst day was Thursday, July 2nd when we arrived. Our arrival was quickly followed by a storm that caused a long power outage.

When the power was back, we discovered we had an issue with the pump on the well so didn’t have water. We were able to get the well fixed on Friday, but it took another day to get the lines cleared enough to use the water. Definitely challenging to manage without clean water or even running water. Luckily, we had some strong young people with us who could haul buckets of water up from the creek so we had water to flush the toilets. Kim and Greg booked a hotel room in Coudersport that at least 5 of us used to get showers.

rosie enjoyed the fireworks (courtesy of Kathryn hyslop photography)

Katie took these wonderful pictures at the fireworks. nice to have a photographer in the family. (courtesy of kathryn hyslop photography)

Luckily the rains held off on July 3rd so we got to attend a terrific fireworks show in Austin, PA and then spent a couple of hours at the Bark Peerlers Festival on July 4th before a storm chased us away. Even though some of the events were rained out at the festival, Rosie enjoyed the treasure hunt in the huge saw dust pile and some of the other children’s activities. When the rain slowed down, we headed out and went to the deer park so Rosie could feed the deer and chickens. While there, we could see another storm rolling in but we had just enough time for her to use up the deer food and hop in the car just as the rain hit.

rosie learned to milk a cow at the festival

We arrived back at camp as the stormed passed and we celebrated the 4th in style with steaks on the grill and a great bottle of bourbon to toast America’s 250th. Tim and I purchased this bottle when we were in Deadwood, SD and saved it for this occasion. I mainly purchased it because the bottle was so special with it’s label celebrating America’s 250th and we lucked out that it tasted great, too! We capped off the holiday with a competitive game of 31.

kim and greg prepping the steaks for the grill

celebration time! don’t you love this bottle??? katie got a great picture of it all frosty when we took it out of the freezer. (courtesy of kathryn hyslop photography)

After the holiday weekend, Greg, Kim, Jenny and Dan left because they had to go back to work. Katie and Rosie spent the rest of the week with us. It rained off and on for the rest of the week so we spent most of our time at camp. Rosie loved playing in the puddles; cooking mountain pies and roasting marshmallows over the fire; and searching for bugs, butterflies and little toads to catch. We did get out one afternoon to a local mini golf place that also had a lake with swan boats where you could feed the ducks. Definitely a wonderful way to entertain a 4 year old.

we need to have a butterfly net for the next trip to camp!

All in all, it was a great week even with the weather not cooperating and having the mechanical issues. Tim may say it wasn’t too relaxing for him, since he spent quite a bit of time dealing with the issues that came up. In addition to the issues at camp, we had an issue with the van and he had to order and then replace the alternator. Definitely a lot of work for him at camp this year. We had to go back home for Tim to finally get some relaxation!

a well deserved beer after flushing the water lines for a second, third or fourth time!

After we got back home, I spent time reflecting on our 6 week Great American Road Trip through the American Heartland. As I reflected on the trip, I realized that in 2026, we definitely celebrated America and 250 years of freedom with our travels. We started in Florida, traveled through and spent at least one night in 16 states before arriving back in Pennsylvania. States visited on this trip included: Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. So that is 18 states total so far this year with more to come. Thanks to the trip, we have now visited 43 states since I retired in 2019.

During the trip, we visited numerous national parks, monuments, historical sites, forests, nature preserves and grasslands. I can’t think of a better way to celebrate than visiting sites managed by our National Park Service. I hope you enjoyed the blog posts about this trip and look for upcoming posts on our summer in Pennsylvania.

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