"Ben" To Ohio and LOVED IT!
- thewanderwomanrv
- Jul 27, 2023
- 6 min read
9- 17 July 2023
I FINALLY got to meet my one-year-old nephew Benjamin "Ben" Fain. Look at this precious boy! He's a carbon copy of my baby brother, Jason and is just so stinkin cute! He and his beautiful wife, Jennifer live in Columbus, Ohio and I'm so glad I got to come through here to see them. We'd been trying to coordinate schedules and it finally came together. I only got to spend 3 days there but we had so much fun.
Most of Jenny's family live here and I got to see her mom Joan, and her sister Leslie and her family. I first met them at Jason & Jenny's wedding and they're just the sweetest people.
Jenny and Ben. This boy loooovvveees blueberries! He can pack them away too!
Jason took a day off work and me, him and Ben went to the Franklin Park Conservatory and Botanical Gardens. What a gorgeous place! The plants and flowers were stunning and Chihuly glass was everywhere. I'm a sucker for Chihuly.
Sunset Chandelier, Neodymium Reeds & Green Grass, Torchier, Bluetail Chandelier
This tunnel had two glass panels called Persian Ceiling. Below are a closer look at them.
Aren't they amazing? Pictures don't do them justice.
They had topiaries made out of all natural materials. They were life size and so cool.
Giraffe
Antelope
Tiger
The cutest cub of them all
My favorite, the peacock
They also had a hot shop on site and this guy was blowing glass Christmas ornaments for sale in the gift shop. Here, he's heating the clear glass and rolling it in red frit (tiny pieces of glass).
Blowing the globe and making a loop for the hanger. It was very interesting watching how he made them.
There was a bonsai display and I thought this cascade was so pretty. It was created in 1964. It's almost as old as me.
This tree was collected from the wild in a mangrove in Florida and was determined to have been growing since 1649. It's close to 400 years old! Crazy!
My favorite plant though was this corpse flower. I'd heard of it but never seen one. They were just installing it when we walked through. It only grows in the Sumatran rain forest and is endangered. They can grow up to 20 feet tall (this one was about 3 feet tall) and when they bloom it's said they smell like a corpse. Not the most pleasant scent but you have to admit it's pretty darn cool looking. I told my brother he had to go back when it blooms and tell me about it. He didn't.🤷🏼♀️
I stayed at the Ohio Expo Center Korbel East Campground. It was $50/night and basically a grassy parking lot that's unlevel and many of the utilities don't work but it was only 4 miles from my brother and the only other option was a state park 30 miles north of there. Other than the train tracks across the street, it was relatively quiet.
The trailer next to me pulled in the day after I got there and they were concession workers. Before they came in, I. was. the. only. one. there. They had the entire park to choose from and they parked right next to me! 🤦🏼♀️. Look at all this room!
The grass was very long when I got there and a couple of days later they mowed it...and
chopped up my brand new sewer hose support. I called the office to see if they would reimburse me but of course they never returned my call. That's okay, they only charged me for 2 nights instead of three so it came out even. Yes, I know, integrity and all said I should've called their attention to it but, yeah, I really don't feel bad about it.
After getting all the sugar Ben would allow me, I headed to the little town of Stow. It's between Akron and Cleveland. My plan was to visit the Rock and Rock Hall of Fame in Cleveland and Cuyahoga Valley National Park, which I'd never heard of. I stayed at Silver Springs Campground which is a small city campground. I'll spare you the details but long story short, it took me two hours and moving the trailer 3 times before I could get my levelers to work. The ground was very uneven and I kept getting out of stroke errors. That means the levelers were extending past their limit. I finally got tucked in between the line of trees behind me and the fire pit which ended up right where my trailer tires are. Not ideal but for $18 a night who am I to argue. It's a cute little park, conveniently located, and has the best dog park on the other side.
Site 10. Next time I'll book a different site.
The attendant was very nice and even came around to tell everyone about the space station flying overhead one night. You can't really tell but the spot in the middle is the space station. Pretty cool!
This is Bow Wow Beach, the most awesome dog park ever! Sage had so much fun playing here.
It's a 3 acre lake with plenty of room to run and chase her ball and play with the other pups. She absolutely loved it!
Cuyahoga Valley was designated a National Park in 2000. I'd never heard of it but I'm glad I came. It's gorgeous! We stopped by the Boston Mill Visitor Center to get my National Park Passport stamped and learn about the different hikes.
Our first stop after the visitor center was Brandywine Falls.
Our next stop was Everett Covered Bridge. This is a replica of the original bridge that was built in the 1800s. It was damaged by a flood in 1913 but was repaired. Then, in 1975 a spring storm destroyed it. The locals raised the money for this historically accurate reconstruction which was completed in 1986.
Our next hike was a 2-mile called Ledges. Everything was so lush and green and there were all these nooks and crannies in the rocks to explore.
I love all the moss covered rocks
Ferns grew everywhere
Entrance to the bat cave was closed off due to white nose syndrome. It's spread by a fungus that can cling to clothes, shoes and gear of people exploring the caves. It can be fatal to the bats.
Sage enjoyed climbing around on the rocks too
We made it to the top of Ledges Overlook!
I had no idea Kent State University was so close to Stow. When I discovered this, I had to go do the walking tour of the Kent State Massacre. In case you don't know what happened, on May 4, 1970 students at KSU were protesting the Vietnam war. The Ohio National Guard was called in and they ended up shooting and killing four unarmed students and wounded
nine others, one was paralyzed from the waist down. It was a very dark day in our nation's history and is dubbed "the day the war came home".
Here are the plaques that tell the story.
The plaque on the ground to the left of the pagoda is where the National Guardsmen fired from.
This sculpture is called Solar Totem #1 and was constructed on campus in the summer of 1967. It stands between the pagoda and the parking lot where the students were shot. You can see the bullet hole from that day. Below it is a marker showing where John Cleary was shot and wounded.
The parking lot where four died. The black pedestals mark where they fell.
The legal aftermath of the May 4 shootings ended in January of 1979 with an out-of-court settlement involving a statement signed by 28 defendants as well as a monetary settlement, and the Guardsmen and their supporters view this as a final vindication of their position. The financial settlement provided $675,000 to the wounded students and the parents of the students who had been killed. This money was paid by the State of Ohio rather than by any Guardsmen, and the amount equaled what the State estimated it would cost to go to trial again. Perhaps most importantly, the statement signed by members of the Ohio National Guard was viewed by them to be a declaration of regret, not an apology or an admission of wrongdoing.
I never did get to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It's ironic that that was the main reason for me coming here, but Sage got sick and I ended up having to take her to the emergency vet. TMI alert...she had bloody diarrhea and they think she either had a bout of colitis or a parasite. She was treated for both. Needless to say, I couldn't leave her alone for several hours to go to Cleveland. Poor girl didn't feel good but she was a trooper. I gave her extra love and attention and she's fully recovered.
Next time we head to Indiana and Wisconsin. Hope you will join us!! Bye for now.
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