Took a long drive today south of us today through Wayne County and into Holmes County where the world’s largest Amish community resides. It was a lovely drive through some beautiful countryside We drove through Orrville and skirted Wooster before heading into Millersburg and Berlin. Just outside Berlin we stopped at Hershberger’s Farm and Bakery and bought some fry cakes. We also ate grilled cheese sandwiches, which seem to be a popular lunch choice in this part of the country. When we drove into the parking lot an older Amish man came upto us as he had noticed our California license plates; he proceeded to tell us about his several trips to California, on the train of course. He was very chatty and extremely nice and pleasant. Our next stop was at Guggisbery Cheese Factory (how come almost everything we do revolves around food???) and bought some Swiss cheese from the American birth place of the baby Swiss.
We saw a number of Amish people while we were driving around as well as their horses and buggies parked outside stores. The hoses pull those buggies pretty darn quick and the drivers certainly know how to do u-turns. A lot of the buggies that we saw were being driven by the women and it was quite strange to see them with small children just sitting on the seat beside them, no seat belts or anything. We passed or were passed by a bunch of horse and buggies while we were heading home, and by a number of bicycles; it seems that the younger Amish cycle any place that they need to go. It was easy to spot the homes of the Amish people as they were the only ones with laundry hanging outside on washing lines; but even if everyone had washing hanging out they would be easy to spot as all their laundry is blue, white and grey with a splash of red here and there.
On the way home we saw an Amish family playing baseball in their garden, it was really cute to see them all with their gloves on, and we got a wave from a little boy who was out on the road retrieving a ball – it looked like they were having fun.

Mike: Bloody buggy's, always in my way!