Some Relaxing, Some Sightseeing

Spring flowers around Hills Family Campground

Trees growing on the sand dunes at Presque Isle State Park

Presque Isle North Pierhead Lighthouse

Although the day dawned bright and sunny, it was only 30F (-1C) when I got up. It had apparently gone down to 28F (-2C) and Gordon had disconnected the water. Brrrr! We’re not used to this. It was quite warm in Columbus while we were there but apparently it turned cold there too the day we left.

We didn’t do much this morning other than watch TV. After lunch we headed out to do some sightseeing and headed to downtown Erie on Rte5. We saw the downtown, the Bicentennial tower and the lakefront. The Bicentennial tower is 187 ft tall and overlooks the bay. It was built in 1995 to celebrate Erie’s 200th birthday. Gordon went to the top of the tower but I elected to stay grounded.

Erie is very industrialized being a port city. It is very clean, however. Of the areas where we went, I didn’t see much debris around and even most of the houses and lawns were in good shape. There were a couple but it didn’t look like most Eastern American cities. I have to qualify Eastern now as Western American cities are very well kept.

We saw the lighthouse that is in the eastern part of Erie aptly named the Erie Lighthouse. I didn’t take any photos as I couldn’t have gotten a good vantage point with my camera. You have to be quite a distance away to take a good photo and with the wires around and a small plot of land, I didn’t bother. I did get one of it far away from Presque Isle State Park. After our tour of Erie we headed back to Presque Isle State Park and drove to the lighthouse there that’s on the point. It’s called the Presque Isle North Pierhead Lighthouse. Photo above.

On the way back, we photographed the sand dunes. We’ve seen dunes with nothing on them, with scrub on them, with small bushes on them and now with trees on them.

We got back to the RV shortly after 4:00 p.m. in time for me to get meatloaf ready and then go for a walk. I took some photos of the spring flowers around the park.

It did get to about 51F (10.5C) but with the wind, it felt much colder.

On a sadder note, we received an email this morning from Gordon’s cousin Judy. Her mother, Gordon’s Aunt Virginia passed away this morning. She was the last surviving relative of his father’s generation. Unfortunately we won’t be able to turn around and go back to Ohio to attend the funeral so will rely on Gordon’s sister, Carol to represent the family.

We head out early tomorrow morning for Clinton, NY for a couple of days with Gordon’s photographer friend, Jim, his wife, Wendy and their son, James.