Blogs from Ohio, United States, North America - page 4

Hi everyone! Welcome to the blog for our 4th "big trip" driving our Toyota Sienna to National Parks. Day 1 - Drove Bay Village to Moorhead, MN. Had lunch at Culver's (world's largest)!... read more

Late start today and I meant to have a bit of a sleep in, but I got up early around 6.00am to start the travel blog writing and get the first blog published. Kerry & I went downstairs to the breakfast provided on the mezzanine level. It was basic food fair and barely OK. It had been raining all morning so we took our time getting ready and headed out about 12.00pm as the rain had now stopped. First stop was the lobby to get 3 drinks vouchers for the evening hotel provided drinks and supper session which we enjoyed last night on our arrival. We had a couple of glasses of wine and heaps of cheese and crackers. We then had a quick look in 5th street arcades across from our hotel looking for souvenirs ... read more

Cuyahoga Valley National Park, Cleveland/Akron, Ohio Joan is still having some pain issues in her back, but they aren’t severe and, with the bones back in the right places, her shoulder is a little sore, but manageable. She spent most of yesterday sleeping - fighting that much pain is exhausting. But she also managed to shower herself, so she’s going to be able to do a few things on her own. We’ve decided, at least temporarily, that we have so much invested in this trip that we don’t want to cancel it right now. We are going to be leaving Ohio, headed for points north, today so it will be a good test of what its going to take to travel with three arms instead of four. I certainly don’t want to abandon the trip, but ... read more

Cuyahoga Valley National Park, Cleveland/Akron, Ohio We continued exploring the park on foot yesterday by tackling the second-biggest ‘official’ hike in the park. Called the Plateau Trail, it is south of Peninsula a couple of miles and is accessible at the Valley Picnic Area off of Riverview Road. (There is a larger parking lot with facilities on the other side of the trail area.) It is considered ‘moderate to difficult’ in Park lingo, although even us old folks managed it so I’m not sure about the ‘difficult’ part - the elevation change is only 200 feet over the 5 mile length of the trail. There is a shorter version available, called the Oak Hill trail and using pieces of both trails you can carve out your own path. The trail gets its name because it is ... read more

Cuyahoga Valley National Park, Cleveland/Akron, Ohio This is truly a spectacular park. And yet, it is very difficult to explain what makes it such a treasure. The mountains aren’t nearly as spectacular as the Great Smoky’s. The hemlock and beech forests are soothing and lush, but not nearly as tall as Congaree or Redwoods. There is no Old Faithful geyser, or anything like it to draw throngs to a single spot. The closest thing I can compare it to is Central Park in the middle of New York City, although Central Park is substantially smaller. Cuyahoga Valley, like Central Park, is known as an ‘urban retreat’, a place city people can go to to restore their energy and re-embrace nature. As we explored this park over the last couple of days we did run into out-of-staters ... read more