Amish Country and a Light Mistake

After recovering from the rainy day in New York, we packed up our things at Shawns' and headed on our way. At this point, I was feeling a bit of pressure to make the trip go more smoothly and so I tried to follow their desires. They seemed to prefer to always stay together, even when sleeping, and so I rearranged our hotel accomodations to sleep together in a big room. I also cancelled our Super8 reservations in Niagara Falls and tried to get the best possible hotel with a fallsview, eventually deciding on an upperlevel suite at the Hilton (I didn't tell them- figured I would surprise them later). Finally, I considered what could make four women happy after a rainy day in New York, and settled on shopping- nothing better than an outlet mall in Lancaster, where there's no tax on clothing or shoes!

We had some fun talks about the Amish and how they were connected to the Mennonites (except for JooYeon, they hadn't previously heard of either, but they were excited every time we saw one as they pointed and said, "Amishi! Amishi!") The stores were every bit as good as they had hoped and the aunt and uncle really enjoyed an antique mall we happened across. We continued our streak of daily kim-chi and rice with a makeshift picnic in a parking lot. After shopping, we drove into the Poconos to a town called Stroudsburg where I distracted the concierge as they snuck into our room (I'm sure 7 people in a room is a fire hazard or something so I didn't want to risk asking permission).

The next morning we got everything ready as my mother-in-law stared at me in shock throughout the breakfast buffet (she had only seen me eat Korean food, which I generally eat in moderation). With everyone packed and ready to sneak out, I went to pull the van around. The power locks didn't seem to work, which was a bit odd since they had been fine. Neither did the A/C, which wasn't as cool. But it wasn't until I turned the key, that the sinking feeling came over me that our battery was dead, drained from an overhead light left on through the night. Rephrase that... a light that I left on. After the tour fiasco in New York, I felt horrible as a dead van certainly wouldn't go far in improving my reputation with the in-laws. LUCKILY, the very next couple who passed by happened to be a kind couple with an extended set of jumper cables and so, with the uncle's help, it wasn't long before we were back in action. We had some more kim-chi and rice at a rest area and on the road again, we happened across a sign with an interesting name combo...

Next, we pulled off at an exit near the Appalachian trail and found a nice lake where we did some swinging, walking, and general tomfoolery. Just as did Central Park in New York, this seemed to get everyone in high spirits.