Friday, June 12th
Our first "pre-rally" event, the Amish Countryside Tour, was scheduled for today. We arose and headed out the door at 7:30, to board the bus by 7:45.
(Thanks to my fellow Heartlander Kelly Barnett for having these great descriptions of the locations, which I borrowed from her blog.)
1st Stop – Rise ‘n Roll bakery, full of fresh baked items and jars of canned fruits and salsas, baking accessories, cookbooks, and similar. They also served fresh breakfast items. As we walked in we got a sample of their cinnamon carmel donut. Oh my, yum! We got a half dozen donuts to eat for breakfast, since we did not eat before the tour.
As we traveled through the country side we passed LOTS of Amish buggies. Our tour guide said it was related to 2 weddings in the area and quite near each other. But we were most likely in 2 different church districts as the entire church district is invited to a wedding so having 2 weddings on the same day would highly unlikely.
2nd Stop – Dutch Country Market. This little family run business is owned by Norm and his wife Katie. They also make home-made noodles which they sell.
3rd Stop – Guggisberg Cheese. We started by going through the line to sample the various cheeses. We picked up a couple we liked.
4th Stop – Amish Buggy Shop. Our Amish host explained that he is about a year and a half behind on his orders and it takes him about 3 weeks to build a buggy from start to finish. The base price for an Amish buggy is $3200 – $4200 depending on size. Average price is $6000. Most expensive he has sold was $9000. The options are what bring up the cost of the buggies. Options include: Brakes, windshield wipers, headlights, turn signals, heaters, hat holders etc.
5th stop – Henry & Caroline Yoder’s Home for lunch. We were served Amish Hay Stacks. They’re similar to a taco salad and can be served with different toppings. Today’s toppings were crushed saltines, lettuce, rice, taco meat, green peppers, onions, tomatoes, sunflower seeds, green olives, Doritos and cheese sauce.
Sounds odd, but it was really good and filling! We were served "family style" so you could select the toppings in amounts you wanted.
After haystacks, we had our choice of three pies for dessert. We sampled a bit of each: blackberry, strawberry and Amish peanut butter pie. We were so stuffed!
But the tour must go on!
6th Stop – Camel farm….yep…an Amish camel farm! The owner, Dallas, wanted a way to make money but still be able to stay home with his family so 4 years ago he ventured into the camel business. He has 16 camels only 1 of which is a male. He currently only milks 1 of the females and she is only 1 of 30 or 40 in the entire US being milked. The milk is supposed to have beneficial properties…especially for those with autism. He sells his milk to a company in California for $8 a pint and it can sell for $40 a gallon! He uses the milk to make soap, which is supposed to be great for the skin. I bought a couple bars.
7th Stop – E&S Bulk Sales. Quite the place to pick up food items in bulk. There were quite a few Amish families shopping here as well.
8th Stop – Yoder Popcorn. Popcorn is a traditional Amish snack and often shared with guests. As we walked in, they gave us a sample bag of popcorn. It was very good!
Once we returned home, we crashed for a while... Both of us napped a good bit. After we were up we had a quickie meal using the salsa flavored cheese we bought to make nachos, then we roamed around the fairgrounds and visited a bit, till it got dark.
Wow, what a neat and action packed day!
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