Eastern Ohio - Pretty but .....

My master travel plan this time was to head south after the rally in Indiana. I thought spending a few weeks in the Smoky Mountains would be perfect. It would be perfect except that one day I woke up and decided I should go east instead. Perhaps this time I will get all the way to Maine.  I don’t know if I will make it to Maine,  but that is my current direction.

Normally I try to stay off of interstates, let alone turnpikes. It just seemed silly to pay big bucks for roads that aren’t any better than your average road. And big bucks they are when you are pulling a fifth wheel since they charge you by the number of axles you have. In my case that would be four- twice as many as a car.  I decided to throw caution to the winds though and drive the turnpike this time.

On the Ohio Turnpike there are service plazas where you can get gas, food, picnic areas and, as I discovered, in some of the areas, you can spend the night in your RV in special RV sections. For $20 you can even hook up to electricity. How exciting to be able to do that....or so I thought. Basically you are in a parking lot with the semis roaring past you most of the night. But now I can say I’ve camped in a Ohio Service Plaza. Check that off the old bucket list.

Ohio has a National Park. I visited it back in 2015 but that was before my Junior Ranger days so I felt I needed to go back and “do” the park right.  

Here is the link to the original Cuyahoga post

I meant to stay at a County park but I’m not confident enough yet to try to park this fifth wheel if it means backing into a site with a lot of trees that I have to avoid. So I ended up at a KOA campground. Normally I loathe KOA campgrounds because they put everybody right on top of each other but this one wasn’t too bad. Got to see a new breed of dog – a Pomsky – Pomeranian and Husky. Another manmade designer dog but it sure was cute. It had these piercing blue eyes and at dusk they really stood out.  It was a little bit spooky as in Cujo spooky.

Her name was Princess

I show up at the Cuyahoga Valley National Park and do my Junior Ranger tasks for the badge. I ask Ranger Sage what the best hike to take and she said to definitely do the Ledges Trail. Miko and I head over there and as I pull into the parking lot I realize that I have done this trail before. As in 2015 when I was here before. Geez, I should read my own blog and find out where I've been. It still is a nice little trail and we had a good time walking and talking to other hikers. 

I just thought they were pretty

The Cuyahoga River with the Interstate going over it

This was part of the canal where they would tow the boats through.  I was surprised at how narrow it was.  

Mules would walk on the towpath on the right of the picture

Miko looking all regal as she is on Chipmunk alert

Traveled down to Canton Ohio which was about an hour away. The First Ladies National Historic Site is here. I was a little disappointed. They have very limited space and they can only display seven First Ladies at a time. They change the exhibit every six months. The display, this time, was on the seven Ohio First Ladies. You could also tour the childhood home of Ida McKinley, wife of William McKinley. She was ahead of her time for a Victorian lady. She was well educated and actually had a job as a cashier in her daddy's bank. She didn't need a job as they were very well off but there she was cashiering away. 

Ida McKinley's childhood home

I had a private tour of the McKinley house and got into a conversation about corsets. Ida was very proud of her 18” waist. There is a theory that corsets would rearrange a woman's internal organs. Not too sure if that is true, but Ranger Sue said that women who were corseted their whole life had problems standing upright without their corsets in later life.

I did go to the President McKinley National Library and Museum. Another rather disappointing trek. All poor President McKinley had to show was a rather small room with a few artifacts. Maybe they were keeping everything from his administration in somebody's basement. They did have some mannequins that would spring into life and chat which actually was rather creepy. It actually scared me the first time they went into action. 

Tell me that there isn't something wrong with these two

The McKinley Monument was impressive. William, his wife Ida and their two children are buried in the Monument. It seemed like it was the physical fitness center of Canton. There were kids sliding down the slick sides and there were people running up and down the stairs. One woman had gone up five times while I was there. Impressive. 

Eat Your Heart Out Rocky!!