Lancaster County...

Late last Saturday, we arrived in Lancaster County. Too late we had realised that our schedule meant that we would be in Amish country on the Sunday but our motel was already booked and paid for. The country we drove through to get to Lancaster was beautiful.  Everything looked so neat and picture-book perfect. Lancaster is a town with many lovely old buildings mixed in with some more modern developments.

Farmland in Lancaster county

Lancaster

Farm buildings

 DH had been looking forward to seeing the Amish community going about their everyday life. I was looking forward to shopping in the town of Intercourse which is in Lancaster County. This town is known for shops selling Amish quilts, patchwork and quilting supplies as well as general craft shops. This wasn't going to happen on a Sunday. So on Sunday, we drove over to Gettysburg and we toured the battlefields and stayed the night there on Sunday.
On the Monday we drove back to have a quick look at Lancaster county and for me to look through the shops in Intercourse. We really only had 2 hours to spare so we couldn't do an organised tour of an Amish farm. So we still don't know much about the Amish and their way of life; whether they make concessions to modern life. We drove past a lot of farms but most of them had trucks etc parked in the yards...but there were some where there were carts/buggies parked.

Some tourists having a ride in an Amish wagon

Some of the houses in the main street of Intercourse

From the carpark of the Kitchen Kettle shopping complex in Intercourse

We first of all had brunch in a restaurant called Klings which is in an historical house. The food was beautiful! DH and I had skipped breakfast at Gettysburg so we could get an early start in our 'backtrack' to Lancaster. You see it was an 80 mile drive from Gettysburg to Lancaster so we were going out of our way when we had been expecting to be driving to Washington DC.

I had a marvellous time in 'The Old Country Store', The Yarn Store and Zooks. Zooks had Amish staff serving. Amongst themselves, the staff spoke a germanic sounding language but spoke English to customers. In 'The Old country Store' I bought gifts for some friends, a collection of homespun in Amish colours, a pattern plus a pure indulgence of 2 Amish dolls. To continue indulging myself, I bought a skein of kettle-dyed wool and a beanie kit in Amish colours which had a soft wool and mohair blend .

My goodies/indulgences

Reluctantly we had to leave Lancaster County and head off for Washington DC...