I have lived in three 2 1/2 story houses. Two with parents, one with first husband.  None were real, real old, but far from new. Perhaps that is why I love them so much now. Although I do like the ones built in the 1700 & 1800s.

The one B & B we have stayed in many times is The Cashtown Inn which is 8 miles west of Gettysburg, PA.  This was a Confederate headquarters before the Battle of Gettysburg.  It is said that more Confederate Generals went through that door than any other house. Also if I'm not mistaken the doorknob is the same that was there during the battle.

This was the first one we ever stayed at.  Was our anniversary (we try for that each year), February 13 and through the week.  Off season and we were the only guests there.  Wow! Kind of scary at first as there are a lot of stories that go along with the inn.  Me, being the cheap skate that I am, asked for the cheapest room.  Got there and since we were the only ones there they upgraded us to a better one at same price. This was the A. P. Hill (Confederate general) room. The owners at that time were Dennis and Eileen Hoover. Eileen had been a history teacher and this was a dream come true for her. She had said that when they first bought it she would feel like someone was watching her until she finally just said, "Look, I won't bother you, if you don't bother me." Said everything seemed fine after that. They, along with their adult son, Jason, are great people.  Dennis gave us the grand tour of the whole place and then offered us the suite on third floor for only $17.00 more.  I had seen there was a t.v. in it and said, "No thanks."

So bar downstairs closes about 11 and we are then left all alone in this humongous house.  Dennis had told us that since we were alone there we could ramble all over the place (except bar and dining room) as much as we wanted.  I got camera and Bill and I started exploring. Went back to room and then realized I hadn't taken video camera along. So wanted to do it all over again.  Bill, the party pooper that he is, said he wasn't going to. So I had to ask myself if I had the guts to go it alone. Ha, in a heartbeat, fast, at times. LOL So, I filmed all rooms they rent out on second floor and the parlor on first floor. Ah, shucks, I didn't get third floor. So up I go, all alone, with camera in hand. No nothing jumped out at me but I must admit I did have a creepy feeling up there alone. Almost like someone was watching me. Started back down to second floor and am talking into camera that I'll just bet Mr. Bill is going to jump out of one of the rooms on second floor and try to scare me.  He did jump out of one of the rooms but didn't scare me.  Now if it had been on third floor I'd probably have had to take a shower right away. Anyway, we finally settled down and I lay there for quite some time just listening to the sounds of a house over 200 years old, then the next thing I knew it was morning.

This place had been a stagecoach stop and evidently at some places you could barter for a room, but this one took cash only, so the stagecoach driver would holler out, "Cashtown"  and hence the town got the name "CASHTOWN". They did the cooking in the basement.  There is a walk-in fireplace and a spring (used as frig) in the basement.

This building was used for many things including a house of ill repute. It was left go and in very bad need of repair before someone decided to open it back up as a bed and breakfast.

We had stayed in that room two or three times and in the suite on third floor three times. All my pictures of that place is on other computer which is not on line. Anyone interested can go to their website.

The Hoovers no longer own that one.  They bought another one east of Gettysburg.

Log cabin where I was born. My brother sitting on porch.

Ole Abe might have a few things over on me but not the fact of being born in a log cabin.

Not sure about his but mine was built by my parents.

This was in the sandy soil at Waldorf, Maryland in the early 1940s. They rented a place in D.C. and every chance they got they would drive out there to work on it.  Of course no modern equipment. There were already three small hungry mouths plus their own to feed so therefore no extra money for such luxuries.

My dad would take a ladder with rope hooked to it and put it against a tree, hook other end of rope onto back of car and climb up the ladder and hook the rope onto one tree and then take it around another tree. The reason for taking it around another tree was so tree would not drop onto car. As stated before this was sandy soil. They pulled the trees down with the car and then cut the roots off of them, hence, no stumps left to worry about. 

They had this down to almost  an art. Take the trees down, take then out of the woods on their shoulders. No money for a horse. They did get one after all the trees were taken out. "Nothing like putting the horse behind the work"!  Mom peeled the bark off all but one of the trees. And of course this was done at the wrong time of the year. Think it was in the winter and the sap was up which made the bark stick to the tree more.

Not sure just how they would get the logs where they wanted them but after they got them there Daddy would notch them and put them into place.

Daddy was not a man of a lot of patience. Mother was not all that proficient with the gears in the car.

One day they were out there and got to the point where Daddy would tell Mom to pull the car forward. Well, she had a little trouble with shifting and Daddy started shouting and swearing which of course got Mom all the more excited. She popped that clutch and hit the gas and looked in the rear view mirror and all she could see were two long legs and feet dangling from that tree. Needless to say she was laughing so hard she could hardly move (have no idea where I get my sense of humor) and all the while he is getting more agitated by the second. In his haste he had forgotten to take the hook off the ladder and put it on the tree. Therefore instead of pulling tree down, the ladder went and left him dangling from the tree. Finally Mom did get the ladder back up to where he could get on it and climb down.

I'm assuming he did get over this as I came along about a year later.

They were told by realtor when they were looking at the property (16 acres) that there was talk of a big highway going through and it would be worth lots more money. Yea, do you really believe a salesman? Should have this time. Daddy decided after a couple years that he wanted to raise tobacco. So they sold log cabin and 16 acres and got a farm.

Guess where route 301 went.....yep, right through my birthplace! And to top that off later the slots were legal in that area and just a corner lot sold for $100,000.00. And of course at that time that was a lot of money. Just one more example of hind sight being 20/20!

 My work was slow so they offered voluntary time off (without pay of course). O.K. here's my chance to visit my mother in Florida without having to use up vacation time. Am a train nut so decided to go that way again. Did it last year and loved it.
Left Harrisburg on 3/03/08 got there next morning. Had couple good but cool and rainy days, then mother got a bad cold. She stayed in bed most of next two days.
Although each time I'd ask she'd tell me she was feeling better but still bad. Then on the 10th she winds up in hospital for couple days. We were scheduled to leave on the 11th. Needless to say that was changed. She has bad ticker and that was part of problem but she is much better and gaining strength so since both of us are running out of meds and I was planning on going back to work Monday we left Sat. evening @ 7:20, 3/15/08 by bus from Ocala, FL to train @ Jacksonville which is leaving @ 10:57 that night. Wonderful, everything right on schedule. Y'all know how we say "DOWN SOUTH," not anymore for us, believe me it was all downhill going north. Train heads northwest @ Savanna to take in Columbia, SC and then back northeast. O.K. we were lucky as there had been bad weather thru Atlanta & east before we got there. Reported tornado around Savanna. We missed that, thank God!
What we didn't miss was two trees that were about 12-15 inch thick. They were just around a bend in the tracks so not seen in time to stop. This about 2:30 A.M. Sun. The engine was not one with the cow catcher on so therefore instead of pushing them off track we went up on them. Raised the engine up and had debris scattered back several cars. We were very lucky we didn't have a derailment. Now we have to wait for crews to come and remove trees plus repair engine (yep, it was damaged). No running engine so no lights (except emergency) and no running water for restrooms. Ugh! 2 1/2 hours later we get going again. Next thing I know we stop again. "Sorry, folks, but there is another tree across tracks." This one not hit but still had to wait for crews to come remove it. Bill slept through that one. Now we are about 4 hours late. So guess who has to get off to the side tracks to let other trains through. RIGHT! Us! Now the crew on our train has put in about all the hours allowed so at Columbia, SC we are told we are going to have to wait. I asked conductor just how long of a wait and he said, " A long wait!" O.K. now I've been on the train for hours and hours and the restrooms on them are not the greatest so figure here is my chance to go to a nice one. It was. When I went out (which wasn't long) a lady asked me if I had been on the train. Told her yes, and looked out the window. No train! She said, "Oh! Good, at least there are three of us they left." So I figure, nah! they just pulled ahead to repair some damage that they hadn't before. NOT! Station manager tells us it left and that was the last one headed north until next day. The guy with us is furious with Amtrak, the other gal is concerned as her meds and checkbook were in an open bag with only her sweather over it. Course y'all know me enough to know that by now I'm thinking its funny as heck. I could just see Bill's expression when the train started pulling away. (Didn't realize then that he had paid them to leave me behind! Only kidding.) Had just gotten Bill a cell phone for Christmas but I had left mine on train. Now listen carefully. Bill calls my cell, while waiting for me to answer he hears mine going off in my "activity" bag and he wonders who the heck is trying to call me while he is trying to get hold of me, so he looks at my phone and sees, "Bill calling." Bless his heart he was so darn beside himself he didn't give it a thought that it was him calling my phone. So the lady with us lets me borrow hers to call him and let him know that they are going to get us to Florence and then onto another train for Philly. Yes, we'd be parted until then. And what was I worried about??? My books and CD player was on the other train! Other lady was concerned about her meds on other train. Don't know what or how important. Next thing I know we're told that our train has to wait about ten miles up the track so they are getting us a taxi to take us there. No, it wasn't us they were waiting on it was a new crew. Even after we got there we had to wait about an hour. Tracks belong to CSX and AMTRAK was told to get train off tracks at Columbia. Maybe another train was due through there??????? So this big colored dude that had told me the train would be there for a long time then tells me how upset Bill was. He says that he thought he was going to slap him so he took him to the other guys over him and let him blow off steam. (To bad it wasn't a steam engine) yea, bad! Bet you think my story is over. NOT! So it's go, stop and wait quite often rest of trip. Bill is sleeping again, I notice this guy walking up the isle. At first thought he was looking at seat numbers, no, he's looking on shelves above and in seats, going back and forth many times, then thought he was looking for something to steal and then notice he has this rubber band in his hand and he is working that through his fingers a mile a minute. I figured, oh, crap, this guy is about ready to flip out. He went into cafe car and sat down. I kept watching for him or someone to report him to. He did go back through later but seemed better then. I went to cafe car to charge phone. When I went back to seat (we were stopped again) there was an ambulance and police car outside. They had escorted that guy off train. They just announced there had been a medical emergency and we were waiting for a freight train to pass. So finally get through Richmond, Washington & Baltimore then they opened her up 120 mph. Get to Philly about 3 in the morning. We're only about 10 hours behind schedule so do we want to wait for commuter train at 5:30 or take a cab, at their expense, to Harrisburg station? Oops, station closed so would have to wait outside in the dark. Decided to wait for train. Then they decide they will take us to our door. They didn't need to do that but did let them take us to Bill's daughter's place (109 miles) where we had left our vehicle. Much closer than our place. Now our lives are in the hands of a cabbie from Palestine that was driving like he wanted to do us all in. No, he really seemed nice and knew what he was doing, getting us there very, very quickly. So got to Bill's daughter's place, have cup of tea and leave for home, after she told Bill to watch out for the deer. NO, we did not hit a deer! Bill got stopped at least two inches away from two of them after laying a patch of rubber behind. This was about two miles from our place.
Now I'll bet you all think we'll never take the train again, right? Nah, if I had the time and money I'd be willing to head out again soon. Not so sure about Bill though. And to think he always tells me that I'm going to miss him when he's gone. Poor guy! If he doesn't quit his worrying he's going to lose his hair. I'd really say we were lucky! After all #1 tornado could have hit the train; #2 trees could have fallen on train; #3 train could have derailed; #4 I could have missed the experience @ Columbia; #5 that guy could have had a gun or knife and flipped out and on an on, so not complaining. Besides I wouldn't have had a short book to share with you guys. LOL
 

P.S. After reading over this I thought to myself, "Gee, if someone told me this story I'd probably think, yea, right!  I swear to you that every bit of it is true.  In fact some of it could be varified thru AMTRAK. March 15th, 2008.  Actually, was probably after midnight when things started happening. Check 'er out.

This is an email I had sent to several of our friends shortly after we arrived home.  To save much time I just copy and pasted it onto here.

We went to Lancaster today to visit my mother-in-law and saw the commuter train going by and all I could think and say was, "I want to go again"!  Crazy, huh?