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Published: September 14th 2009
A tour around the Harley Production line - without any production and around Amish country finishing with a family style meal at an Amish Farm Restaurant - fit to bust! Then onto highway 11 towards Interstate 81 we head out across Amish country through the Endless Mountains of NE Pensylvannia The previous night we stayed on the Lincoln Highway at an independent Motel - the Cross Keys - just north of Hanover PA.
The Motel itself is an adequate standard, although the staff have no sparkle. The modern diner next door however is a treat, good basic American food, and bright bubbly staff.
Our waitress is the most qualified we have had yet out of an almost endless line of college students - she is an Attorney - equivalent to our English Barrister, but is having time out due to stress. Needless to say she is quick witted but brisk and business like - clearly enjoying the experience.
In the usual America fashion the local cop, having overheard us talking to the waitress, enquires after our welfare and our journey. As he leaves he gives us advice for the scenic route north to Canada, but 
Walking The Line - a visit to Harley Davidson, York PA
Display of pressed steel parts, demonstrating tank and fender constructionthe rest of journey on this following day is further to the east, and in the end we don’t have time to return - so end up following highway 11 and Interstate 81 out of Lancaster as you will see below.
So once again preconceptions are challenegd - a nice friendly US cop - well the Sheriffs are effectively the equivalent of a local town bobbie in the UK - shame they all have to carry guns.
Our main purpose is to visit missed locations from our outward journey - so in the morning we set off for the Harley factory to see how they are all put together.
This is a proper tour round a factory in production. Only it isn’t, as the factory is on short time due to the poor state of trade - so we get a tour around a silent plant.
As a technology teacher who had visited other factories before, I can fill in for the missing production workers. Carol finds it harder to imagine what it would be like. An excellent visitors gallery with part assembled bikes - as if on a production line - makes up to some extent for the missing bits. And a showroom of current models allows us to try the bikes out for style and size.
We are certainly impressed by the extent to which Harley make their own component parts and control the quality of their product, even to the extent of making their own frames, engines and running their own plating plant.
Staff are really helpful and enthusiastic, even to the point of loaning me some special tools to get the battery off my Garmin GPS navigator. It seems there are some glitches in the American mapping software I have bought, so that on more than one occasion the damn thing switches off going through junctions, or freezes.
Solution? Wait for the battery to die or take it out. Problem? The tiny screw on the back is made of putty and I manage to chew it up - however the borrowed jewellers driver deals with that, and from then on in the battery is secured with good old duck tape only.
From the York Harley plant we head off east/south east to Lancaster County, Amish country (
sometimes called Pennsylvania Dutch - a corruption of Deusche as they are of German descsent, not Dutch). You will notice there are no photos of Amish folk in this diary entry - because it’s considered polite NOT to take pictures of them.
We did see plenty of them during the afternoon as we headed away down remote back country lanes, where I figured we would - because as they use horse drawn vehicles only for farm work I imagined they would want to avoid major roads.
Their whole philosophy is simplicity and plainness. So the wearing of similar clothes and the covering of the head, even the lack of a crucifix is designed towards a common purpose - all are equal and none should display vanity. There is no need to advertise your dedication to God, you demonstrate it by your deeds, not your outward appearance. I like that philosophy - I suppose its close to both the Jewish ideal of being a mench or mensch, and the style of largely Methodist Christian community I grew up in the North Midlands of England.
We aimed initially for two quaintly named towns - Paradise and Intercourse (don’t ask), and in the latter found the charming dining rooms of the
Walking The Line - a visit to Harley Davidson, York PA
Buell sports. Ms White, if you smile properly you can have one Stoltzfus Farm Restaurant. Here for 16$ you literally get stuffed with Amish food in what was the old family restaurant situated just on the edge of town, with views over the local river and woods. The food is interesting and amazing value for money. The staff are charming and attentive - but curiously not dressed in traditional Amish garb.
From the limited reading I did around the subject of the Amish, it’s seems like many old cultures and religions succeeding generations are slipping away from the traditions.
Even within the Stoltzfus family some of the younger generations are shifting into less ‘disciplined’ forms of Christianity than the Mennonite tradition the Amish belong to. Having said that, all the people we saw that day driving horse drawn threshers, hay turners, carts, and buggies seemed younger that we had anticipated.
If you want to know more follow this link and click on Towns and Heritage - Amish Country at the top.
If you want the fictional view of the Amish, watch Kelly McGillis and Harrison Ford in ‘Witness’ which was actually filmed in Intercourse.
Late that afternoon we head north out of the area through more Mennonite communities onto highway 11 towards Interstate 81 a relatively scenic motorway passing through the western flank of the Poconos and later the Endless Mountains more of which you can read and see in the Blog entry:
Through the Endless Mountains of PA to NY State dated 17th August.
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