Merlyn Fuller's Blog: www.merlynmischief.blogspot.com
February 6, 2017
Florida Trip Blog: Skipping thru time & space~ Part 3 (Antietam Battlefield)
Our last adventure on our trip back north this year, was to the Battlefield of Antietam on our way home.
You can find the Antietam Battlefield Visitor Center at
5831 Dunker Church Road, Sharpsburg, MD 21782
This museum and location, documents the day, September 17, 1862, one of the bloodiest battles in the history of this nation.
Here is a Betsy Ross flag with the 13 stars
Oh my. So much history...and it's of the tragic kind.
Americans fighting Americans.
23,000 soldiers killed in 12 hours. Making it the bloodiest one day battle in American history.
And the meeting point of both the North & the South, was here at Dunker Church.
Ironically, this church was pacifistic and the battle was fought on its front yard.
Wow.
Let that sink in.
Here is a photograph from that tragic day...
The church was nearly destroyed due to artillery, souvenir hunters and storms...
but was later rebuilt
Here it is as it stands today..
Visit Dunker Church webpage
The museum was very interesting, with so many exhibits to absorb.
Here is a battle drum...
and a minstrel coat of the era....
Some of the many, many monuments that dot the countryside in this historic area:
You can even take a virtual tour on the website! Amazing story.
The Antietam Battlefield Museum
The battlefield itself is now pretty much devoid of any trees...
and there is a haunting feeling of sadness and despair that lingers there to this day....
We remember and pray for those who died there...
and we hope and pray that our present day Americans can learn to listen to each other and work for the good of all now and in the future.
<3
You can find the Antietam Battlefield Visitor Center at
5831 Dunker Church Road, Sharpsburg, MD 21782
This museum and location, documents the day, September 17, 1862, one of the bloodiest battles in the history of this nation.
Here is a Betsy Ross flag with the 13 stars
Oh my. So much history...and it's of the tragic kind.
Americans fighting Americans.
23,000 soldiers killed in 12 hours. Making it the bloodiest one day battle in American history.
And the meeting point of both the North & the South, was here at Dunker Church.
Ironically, this church was pacifistic and the battle was fought on its front yard.
Wow.
Let that sink in.
Here is a photograph from that tragic day...
The church was nearly destroyed due to artillery, souvenir hunters and storms...but was later rebuilt
Here it is as it stands today..
Visit Dunker Church webpageThe museum was very interesting, with so many exhibits to absorb.
Here is a battle drum...
and a minstrel coat of the era....
Some of the many, many monuments that dot the countryside in this historic area:
You can even take a virtual tour on the website! Amazing story.
The Antietam Battlefield Museum
The battlefield itself is now pretty much devoid of any trees...
and there is a haunting feeling of sadness and despair that lingers there to this day....
We remember and pray for those who died there...
and we hope and pray that our present day Americans can learn to listen to each other and work for the good of all now and in the future.
<3
February 2, 2017
Florida Trip blog: Skipping thru time & space Part 2 (Hindu Temple of FL & Henry B. Plant Museum)
Hey Ho~
Continuing the traveling stories from our tour south....
Our second adventure was to the "Hindu Temple of Florida" and it was wonderful to go and see the artwork and feel the vibes here at this most beauteous temple! Construction started in 1994 and was finished in the year 2000. The folks there were very kind, hospitable and welcoming. We each came away with a banana that was given to us by the Priest. :) We marveled at the shrines, the artwork, the stories, the lavish colors. It was very, very kewl.
We couldn't take pics of the inside of the temple, (which is fine and we used our decorum) but there are a couple of pics posted on the web, that I did include.
See for yourself and surf here:
Hindu Temple of Florida
Check out the Osprey's nest on tip-top of the shrine!(Ospreys are symbolic for The Osprey is a majestic Bird of Prey. ... The Osprey is a symbol of true power, with mastery over the sea, air and land. It is a true hunter, with speed, agility, power and precision. It is a symbol of keen vision, seeing its prey clearly and not being blinded by the sun as it dives towards its target.)
Ganesh, with his big elephant tusk to carry things is the "Remover of Obstacles"
I personally said a prayer to Ganesh for you, and for our country. <3
Hey, we need all the help we can get! :)
It was beautiful!
Our third adventure was to the Henry B. Plant Museum in Tampa. Talk about your gilded age in the day of robber barons! WOWSA. This building was previously a 500 room hotel in its heyday! So posh! Yet so HUGE! It never really filled....and started going into decline...but it was saved by turning it into another site for the University of Tampa.
The Henry Plant Museum was formerly known as the Tampa Bay Hotel, which was a 511 room resort hotel opened on February 5, 1891 by Henry B. Plant near the terminus of his rail line. The museum's exhibits focus on Gilded Agetourism, the elite lifestyle of the hotel's guests, and the building's use during the Spanish–American War. It was designed by architect J.A. Woodwho also created the old Hillsborough County Courthouseand the Oglethorpe Hotel.
U.S. National Historic LandmarkThe Tampa Bay Hotel was built by railroadmagnateHenry B. Plant between 1888 and 1891. The construction cost over 3 million dollars.[5]It was considered the premier hotel of the eight that Mr. Plant built to anchor his rail line. The hotel itself covers 6 acres (24,000 m2) and is a quarter-mile long. It was equipped with the first elevatorever installed in Florida. The elevator is still working today, making it one of the oldest continually operational elevators in the nation. The 511 rooms and suites were the first in Florida to have electric lights and telephones. Most rooms also included private bathrooms, complete with a full-size tub. The price for a room ranged from $5.00 to $15.00 a night at a time when the average hotel in Tampa charged $1.25 to $2.00.
The grounds of the hotel spanned 150 acres (0.61 km2) and included a golf course, bowling alley, racetrack, casinoand an indoor heated swimming pool. In all, 21 buildings could be found on the hotel's campus. The Moorish Revival architectural theme was selected by Mr. Plant because of its exotic appeal to the widely traveled Victorians who would be his primary customers. The hotel has six minarets, four cupolas, and three domes. In the early 90's, all were restored to their original stainless steel state.
Click this link!
Henry B. Plant Museum on Youtube!
Gorgeous!!
Just LOOK at the SCALE of this place!
See me?
See the size of the window??
Look at Donna and I...can you see us?
See how long the hallways are???
After all that walking and learning and adventuring....
Lunch was long overdue!
So a trip to Frenchy's Rockaway Grill, in Clearwater, right on the beach!!
Complete with a sighting of a PIRATE SHIP!
Arrrg!
We enjoyed the day to be sure!
And Rockaway Mules to drink washed down Steamed Oysters and Shrimp.
Mmmmmmmmm!
What a great treat.
A very happy time of it!Thanks to Donna Davenport for being our tour guide and driver!
<3
Florida Trip blog: Skipping thru time & space Part 2
Hey Ho~
Continuing the traveling stories from our tour south....
Our second adventure was to the "Hindu Temple of Florida" and it was wonderful to go and see the artwork and feel the vibes here at this most beauteous temple! Construction started in 1994 and was finished in the year 2000. The folks there were very kind, hospitable and welcoming. We each came away with a banana that was given to us by the Priest. :) We marveled at the shrines, the artwork, the stories, the lavish colors. It was very, very kewl.
We couldn't take pics of the inside of the temple, (which is fine and we used our decorum) but there are a couple of pics posted on the web, that I did include.
See for yourself and surf here:
Hindu Temple of Florida
Check out the Osprey's nest on tip-top of the shrine!(Ospreys are symbolic for The Osprey is a majestic Bird of Prey. ... The Osprey is a symbol of true power, with mastery over the sea, air and land. It is a true hunter, with speed, agility, power and precision. It is a symbol of keen vision, seeing its prey clearly and not being blinded by the sun as it dives towards its target.)
Ganesh, with his big elephant tusk to carry things is the "Remover of Obstacles"
I personally said a prayer to Ganesh for you, and for our country. <3
Hey, we need all the help we can get! :)
It was beautiful!
Our third adventure was to the Henry B. Plant Museum in Tampa. Talk about your gilded age in the day of robber barons! WOWSA. This building was previously a 500 room hotel in its heyday! So posh! Yet so HUGE! It never really filled....and started going into decline...but it was saved by turning it into another site for the University of Tampa.
The Henry Plant Museum was formerly known as the Tampa Bay Hotel, which was a 511 room resort hotel opened on February 5, 1891 by Henry B. Plant near the terminus of his rail line. The museum's exhibits focus on Gilded Agetourism, the elite lifestyle of the hotel's guests, and the building's use during the Spanish–American War. It was designed by architect J.A. Woodwho also created the old Hillsborough County Courthouseand the Oglethorpe Hotel.
U.S. National Historic LandmarkThe Tampa Bay Hotel was built by railroadmagnateHenry B. Plant between 1888 and 1891. The construction cost over 3 million dollars.[5]It was considered the premier hotel of the eight that Mr. Plant built to anchor his rail line. The hotel itself covers 6 acres (24,000 m2) and is a quarter-mile long. It was equipped with the first elevatorever installed in Florida. The elevator is still working today, making it one of the oldest continually operational elevators in the nation. The 511 rooms and suites were the first in Florida to have electric lights and telephones. Most rooms also included private bathrooms, complete with a full-size tub. The price for a room ranged from $5.00 to $15.00 a night at a time when the average hotel in Tampa charged $1.25 to $2.00.
The grounds of the hotel spanned 150 acres (0.61 km2) and included a golf course, bowling alley, racetrack, casinoand an indoor heated swimming pool. In all, 21 buildings could be found on the hotel's campus. The Moorish Revival architectural theme was selected by Mr. Plant because of its exotic appeal to the widely traveled Victorians who would be his primary customers. The hotel has six minarets, four cupolas, and three domes. In the early 90's, all were restored to their original stainless steel state.
Click this link!
Henry B. Plant Museum on Youtube!
Gorgeous!!
Just LOOK at the SCALE of this place!
See me?
See the size of the window??
Look at Donna and I...can you see us?
See how long the hallways are???
After all that walking and learning and adventuring....
Lunch was long overdue!
So a trip to Frenchy's Rockaway Grill, in Clearwater, right on the beach!!
Complete with a sighting of a PIRATE SHIP!
Arrrg!
We enjoyed the day to be sure!
And Rockaway Mules to drink washed down Steamed Oysters and Shrimp.
Mmmmmmmmm!
What a great treat.
A very happy time of it!Thanks to Donna Davenport for being our tour guide and driver!
<3
January 31, 2017
Florida Trip Blog: Skipping through time and space tour~ Part 1 (Salvador Dali Museum)
Hey Ho~
If last year's trip was hell on wheels, then this year's trip was heaven on wings.
While calamity and depression seem to sell the big clicks these days on news and product...
there is something to be said about delight, friendships, safety and adventure combined as well!
The traveling was (thankfully) without incident and except for the occasional wild tractor trailer driver, the road conditions were just super. We got ahead of a storm on the way down...and we sidestepped a storm on the way back! WHEW! Lucky!
Of course, our first order of business once we landed...
was turning Santa back into HARRY!
So I bought him a pampering day with a "Hot towel shave!"
Harry said it "was fantastic!" He felt like a million bucks afterwards! <3
We visited and stayed with friends in our love of communal gatherings, we worked at the Fort Myers Medieval Festival and enjoyed playing with the other minstrels and with the patrons!
We performed for an early morning news program, live on the air at 6am on a Sunday morning IN GARB, ON SITE. This is no small feat if you've ever had to get into garb at 5am for performance!
Oh, it was also 38 degrees. Did I mention that? We were fine. Harry's guitar got a new crack in the finish from the cold. We got free sandwiches, coffee and Meade for breakfast. It helped. :)
Our first faire weekend was chilly but fun! Here is a clip of friends of ours (Jay & Abby of The Harper & The Minstrel) and hammer dulcimer babe, Barby Holder) playing with us after the pub closed. It's pretty fun and special.
Click on it.
Minstrels off on a tangent :)
Our midweek found us doing a slug day (our traditional minstrel holiday) on the Mondays after faire. Slug days include padding around without a brain for 1/2 day. ...errands to the liquor store and otherwise laying around, eating, drinking, smoking and binge watching something awesome on Netflix or Amazon prime. Our choices this year was "Reign" which was really quite grand! We also absorbed "Mozart in the Jungle" 3rd season. We all binge watched the first two seasons last year! Excellent. Highly recommend you watch it if you love stories of sex and drugs and rock n' roll (only it's sex & drugs & classical music!) It's a soap opera based on classical music aficionados.
Our midweek gig playing at The Celtic Ray in Punta Gorda was great. This was our third year playing here. Great food, nice people. And we loved a secret sign for all the performers there which said:
"Please...no buffet, no wagon wheel, no country, no skynyrd, eagles, etc."
(this sign...a message for performers...and those who come down the stairs...only visible from the stage). Ha!
Needless to say, we played Celtic music all evening. And other than leaving the pub and accidentally going the wrong way on a one way street (we blame the GPS), a very nice Florida cop only gave us a warning and wag of the head. We DID say we had just come from the pub too. But with all the gear and instruments in the back, he believed we worked it. Also checking our website with it on our gig calendar showed we weren't there drinking all night too :)
ADVENTURES!
Our first adventure was to the Salvador Dali Art Museum in St. Petersburg.
Click here to surf it
Salvador Dali Museum
Now THAT'S a moustache Harry!
And as luck would have it, we were also able to enjoy the exhibit of Frida Kahlo's work as well!
Surf here for more info:
Frida Kahlo Art
The Labryinth!
It was all so inspiring and consuming! How'ere, something weird DID happen there. Whilst I was wandering the Kahlo exhibit, I was becoming more and more aware of becoming achy in my body...and then I was in flat out PAIN. I'd measure it at about a 6 or 7 on scale of 1-10. Why? What was happening? All of a sudden, my lower back, hips, legs and feet were just excruciating! I didn't know how to get to the car fast enough, which was a good stretch of the legs distant to walk it.
I did finally get to the car, sat gingerly in the back seat and took off my sandals and sat cross legged. Some pain subsided. I tried troubleshooting WHY and WHERE it was coming from previously. Was it msg from the Chinese food the day before? And then after a day or two of wondering, it finally DAWNED on me.
I was at Frida Kahlo's exhibit and that's when I became SO aware of her, the bearer of pain!
Well, silly Merlyn...you ARE an empath! Her paintings were very much about her pain. Her pain in her lower back, hips, legs, feet. OF COURSE I must've picked it up. It dispelled more and more the longer I was not around it. I would however, HIGHLY recommend you see and view her art work! Just put up your shields and learn and don't dive in like I do! She was FABULOUS as was Dali's artwork! Mindblowing!
I leave you with this WALL of flowers for her!
Stay tuned for more pics and stories tomorrow!
If last year's trip was hell on wheels, then this year's trip was heaven on wings.
While calamity and depression seem to sell the big clicks these days on news and product...
there is something to be said about delight, friendships, safety and adventure combined as well!
The traveling was (thankfully) without incident and except for the occasional wild tractor trailer driver, the road conditions were just super. We got ahead of a storm on the way down...and we sidestepped a storm on the way back! WHEW! Lucky!
Of course, our first order of business once we landed...was turning Santa back into HARRY!
So I bought him a pampering day with a "Hot towel shave!"
Harry said it "was fantastic!" He felt like a million bucks afterwards! <3
We visited and stayed with friends in our love of communal gatherings, we worked at the Fort Myers Medieval Festival and enjoyed playing with the other minstrels and with the patrons!
We performed for an early morning news program, live on the air at 6am on a Sunday morning IN GARB, ON SITE. This is no small feat if you've ever had to get into garb at 5am for performance!
Oh, it was also 38 degrees. Did I mention that? We were fine. Harry's guitar got a new crack in the finish from the cold. We got free sandwiches, coffee and Meade for breakfast. It helped. :)
Our first faire weekend was chilly but fun! Here is a clip of friends of ours (Jay & Abby of The Harper & The Minstrel) and hammer dulcimer babe, Barby Holder) playing with us after the pub closed. It's pretty fun and special.
Click on it.
Minstrels off on a tangent :)
Our midweek found us doing a slug day (our traditional minstrel holiday) on the Mondays after faire. Slug days include padding around without a brain for 1/2 day. ...errands to the liquor store and otherwise laying around, eating, drinking, smoking and binge watching something awesome on Netflix or Amazon prime. Our choices this year was "Reign" which was really quite grand! We also absorbed "Mozart in the Jungle" 3rd season. We all binge watched the first two seasons last year! Excellent. Highly recommend you watch it if you love stories of sex and drugs and rock n' roll (only it's sex & drugs & classical music!) It's a soap opera based on classical music aficionados.
Our midweek gig playing at The Celtic Ray in Punta Gorda was great. This was our third year playing here. Great food, nice people. And we loved a secret sign for all the performers there which said:
"Please...no buffet, no wagon wheel, no country, no skynyrd, eagles, etc."
(this sign...a message for performers...and those who come down the stairs...only visible from the stage). Ha!
Needless to say, we played Celtic music all evening. And other than leaving the pub and accidentally going the wrong way on a one way street (we blame the GPS), a very nice Florida cop only gave us a warning and wag of the head. We DID say we had just come from the pub too. But with all the gear and instruments in the back, he believed we worked it. Also checking our website with it on our gig calendar showed we weren't there drinking all night too :)
ADVENTURES!
Our first adventure was to the Salvador Dali Art Museum in St. Petersburg.
Click here to surf it
Salvador Dali Museum
Now THAT'S a moustache Harry! 
And as luck would have it, we were also able to enjoy the exhibit of Frida Kahlo's work as well!
Surf here for more info:
Frida Kahlo Art
The Labryinth!
It was all so inspiring and consuming! How'ere, something weird DID happen there. Whilst I was wandering the Kahlo exhibit, I was becoming more and more aware of becoming achy in my body...and then I was in flat out PAIN. I'd measure it at about a 6 or 7 on scale of 1-10. Why? What was happening? All of a sudden, my lower back, hips, legs and feet were just excruciating! I didn't know how to get to the car fast enough, which was a good stretch of the legs distant to walk it.
I did finally get to the car, sat gingerly in the back seat and took off my sandals and sat cross legged. Some pain subsided. I tried troubleshooting WHY and WHERE it was coming from previously. Was it msg from the Chinese food the day before? And then after a day or two of wondering, it finally DAWNED on me. I was at Frida Kahlo's exhibit and that's when I became SO aware of her, the bearer of pain!
Well, silly Merlyn...you ARE an empath! Her paintings were very much about her pain. Her pain in her lower back, hips, legs, feet. OF COURSE I must've picked it up. It dispelled more and more the longer I was not around it. I would however, HIGHLY recommend you see and view her art work! Just put up your shields and learn and don't dive in like I do! She was FABULOUS as was Dali's artwork! Mindblowing!
I leave you with this WALL of flowers for her!
Stay tuned for more pics and stories tomorrow!
Florida Trip Blog: Skipping through time and space tour~ Part 1
Hey Ho~
If last year's trip was hell on wheels, then this year's trip was heaven on wings.
While calamity and depression seem to sell the big clicks these days on news and product...
there is something to be said about delight, friendships, safety and adventure combined as well!
The traveling was (thankfully) without incident and except for the occasional wild tractor trailer driver, the road conditions were just super. We got ahead of a storm on the way down...and we sidestepped a storm on the way back! WHEW! Lucky!
Of course, our first order of business once we landed...
was turning Santa back into HARRY!
So I bought him a pampering day with a "Hot towel shave!"
Harry said it "was fantastic!" He felt like a million bucks afterwards! <3
We visited and stayed with friends in our love of communal gatherings, we worked at the Fort Myers Medieval Festival and enjoyed playing with the other minstrels and with the patrons!
We performed for an early morning news program, live on the air at 6am on a Sunday morning IN GARB, ON SITE. This is no small feat if you've ever had to get into garb at 5am for performance!
Oh, it was also 38 degrees. Did I mention that? We were fine. Harry's guitar got a new crack in the finish from the cold. We got free sandwiches, coffee and Meade for breakfast. It helped. :)
Our first faire weekend was chilly but fun! Here is a clip of friends of ours (Jay & Abby of The Harper & The Minstrel) and hammer dulcimer babe, Barby Holder) playing with us after the pub closed. It's pretty fun and special.
Click on it.
Minstrels off on a tangent :)
Our midweek found us doing a slug day (our traditional minstrel holiday) on the Mondays after faire. Slug days include padding around without a brain for 1/2 day. ...errands to the liquor store and otherwise laying around, eating, drinking, smoking and binge watching something awesome on Netflix or Amazon prime. Our choices this year was "Reign" which was really quite grand! We also absorbed "Mozart in the Jungle" 3rd season. We all binge watched the first two seasons last year! Excellent. Highly recommend you watch it if you love music, sex and drugs. It's a soap opera based on classical music aficionados.
Our midweek gig playing at The Celtic Ray in Punta Gorda was great. This was our third year playing here. Great food, nice people. And we loved a secret sign for all the performers there which said:
"Absolutely no wagon wheel, no Buffet, no Country, no Eagles, etc." (only visible from the stage). Ha!
Needless to say, we played Celtic music all evening. And other than leaving the pub and accidentally going the wrong way on a one way street (we blame the GPS), a very nice Florida cop only gave us a warning and wag of the head. We DID say we had just come from the pub too. But with all the gear and instruments in the back, he believed we worked it. Also checking our website with it on our gig calendar showed we weren't there drinking all night too :)
ADVENTURES!
Our first adventure was to the Salvador Dali Art Museum in St. Petersburg.
Click here to surf it
Salvador Dali Museum
Now THAT'S a moustache Harry!
And as luck would have it, we were also able to enjoy the exhibit of Frida Kahlo's work as well!
Surf here for more info:
Frida Kahlo Art
The Labryinth!
It was all so inspiring and consuming! How'ere, something weird DID happen there. Whilst I was wandering the Kahlo exhibit, I was becoming more and more aware of becoming achy in my body...and then I was in flat out PAIN. I'd measure it at about a 6 or 7 on scale of 1-10. Why? What was happening? All of a sudden, my lower back, hips, legs and feet were just excruciating! I didn't know how to get to the car fast enough, which was a good stretch of the legs distant to walk it.
I did finally get to the car, sat gingerly in the back seat and took off my sandals and sat cross legged. Some pain subsided. I tried troubleshooting WHY and WHERE it was coming from previously. Was it msg from the Chinese food the day before? And then after a day or two of wondering, it finally DAWNED on me.
I was at Frida Kahlo's exhibit and that's when I became SO aware of her, the bearer of pain!
Well, silly Merlyn...you ARE an empath! Her paintings were very much about her pain. Her pain in her lower back, hips, legs, feet. OF COURSE I must've picked it up. It dispelled more and more the longer I was not around it. I would however, HIGHLY recommend you see and view her art work! Just put up your shields and learn and don't dive in like I do! She was FABULOUS as was Dali's artwork! Mindblowing!
I leave you with this WALL of flowers for her!
Stay tuned for more pics and stories tomorrow!
If last year's trip was hell on wheels, then this year's trip was heaven on wings.
While calamity and depression seem to sell the big clicks these days on news and product...
there is something to be said about delight, friendships, safety and adventure combined as well!
The traveling was (thankfully) without incident and except for the occasional wild tractor trailer driver, the road conditions were just super. We got ahead of a storm on the way down...and we sidestepped a storm on the way back! WHEW! Lucky!
Of course, our first order of business once we landed...was turning Santa back into HARRY!
So I bought him a pampering day with a "Hot towel shave!"
Harry said it "was fantastic!" He felt like a million bucks afterwards! <3
We visited and stayed with friends in our love of communal gatherings, we worked at the Fort Myers Medieval Festival and enjoyed playing with the other minstrels and with the patrons!
We performed for an early morning news program, live on the air at 6am on a Sunday morning IN GARB, ON SITE. This is no small feat if you've ever had to get into garb at 5am for performance!
Oh, it was also 38 degrees. Did I mention that? We were fine. Harry's guitar got a new crack in the finish from the cold. We got free sandwiches, coffee and Meade for breakfast. It helped. :)
Our first faire weekend was chilly but fun! Here is a clip of friends of ours (Jay & Abby of The Harper & The Minstrel) and hammer dulcimer babe, Barby Holder) playing with us after the pub closed. It's pretty fun and special.
Click on it.
Minstrels off on a tangent :)
Our midweek found us doing a slug day (our traditional minstrel holiday) on the Mondays after faire. Slug days include padding around without a brain for 1/2 day. ...errands to the liquor store and otherwise laying around, eating, drinking, smoking and binge watching something awesome on Netflix or Amazon prime. Our choices this year was "Reign" which was really quite grand! We also absorbed "Mozart in the Jungle" 3rd season. We all binge watched the first two seasons last year! Excellent. Highly recommend you watch it if you love music, sex and drugs. It's a soap opera based on classical music aficionados.
Our midweek gig playing at The Celtic Ray in Punta Gorda was great. This was our third year playing here. Great food, nice people. And we loved a secret sign for all the performers there which said:
"Absolutely no wagon wheel, no Buffet, no Country, no Eagles, etc." (only visible from the stage). Ha!
Needless to say, we played Celtic music all evening. And other than leaving the pub and accidentally going the wrong way on a one way street (we blame the GPS), a very nice Florida cop only gave us a warning and wag of the head. We DID say we had just come from the pub too. But with all the gear and instruments in the back, he believed we worked it. Also checking our website with it on our gig calendar showed we weren't there drinking all night too :)
ADVENTURES!
Our first adventure was to the Salvador Dali Art Museum in St. Petersburg.
Click here to surf it
Salvador Dali Museum
Now THAT'S a moustache Harry!
And as luck would have it, we were also able to enjoy the exhibit of Frida Kahlo's work as well!
Surf here for more info:
Frida Kahlo Art
The Labryinth!
It was all so inspiring and consuming! How'ere, something weird DID happen there. Whilst I was wandering the Kahlo exhibit, I was becoming more and more aware of becoming achy in my body...and then I was in flat out PAIN. I'd measure it at about a 6 or 7 on scale of 1-10. Why? What was happening? All of a sudden, my lower back, hips, legs and feet were just excruciating! I didn't know how to get to the car fast enough, which was a good stretch of the legs distant to walk it.
I did finally get to the car, sat gingerly in the back seat and took off my sandals and sat cross legged. Some pain subsided. I tried troubleshooting WHY and WHERE it was coming from previously. Was it msg from the Chinese food the day before? And then after a day or two of wondering, it finally DAWNED on me. I was at Frida Kahlo's exhibit and that's when I became SO aware of her, the bearer of pain!
Well, silly Merlyn...you ARE an empath! Her paintings were very much about her pain. Her pain in her lower back, hips, legs, feet. OF COURSE I must've picked it up. It dispelled more and more the longer I was not around it. I would however, HIGHLY recommend you see and view her art work! Just put up your shields and learn and don't dive in like I do! She was FABULOUS as was Dali's artwork! Mindblowing!
I leave you with this WALL of flowers for her!
Stay tuned for more pics and stories tomorrow!
December 31, 2016
Docking 2016
Ahoy mateys!
Well, 2016 was a good year, a hard year, a blessed year, a tumultuous year.
There was loss...there was gain
There was joy ...there was pain.
Starting to sound almost like the song "Season in the Sun" doesn't it?
While the news and media look like shite...
Let us not look back with darkness nor ahead with storms brewing.
Remember, that "shite sells" in the commercial world.
If we want a different way...
And if we are the creators of our own destiny, then we must manifest the goodness and expect the best!
In other words, we must Believe it... to See it.
You are worth it.
I have experienced much inner growth this year.
Did you know that the earth is 98.5% water?
Did you also know that we are, as human beings, also the same 98.5% water?
Think of it like this:
I feel like deep water some days.
Other days I just enjoy the ripples.
Once in awhile I make a big splash!
I know the freeze cold and sharp....
And the droplet of the misty brow,
The glisten of a steamy body.
The gloom of a cloudy day
The parched tongue of drought
The hopeful dew of a sunny morning in May.
These things are all of worth.
They make you feel ALIVE.
And that my dear is the greatest gift of all.
You are HERE.
NOW.
YAY!
Make 2017 the year of BEING PRESENT.
Go with the flow of YOU and be one with the Universe. Great things happen!
Well, 2016 was a good year, a hard year, a blessed year, a tumultuous year.
There was loss...there was gain
There was joy ...there was pain.
Starting to sound almost like the song "Season in the Sun" doesn't it?
While the news and media look like shite...
Let us not look back with darkness nor ahead with storms brewing.
Remember, that "shite sells" in the commercial world.
If we want a different way...
And if we are the creators of our own destiny, then we must manifest the goodness and expect the best!
In other words, we must Believe it... to See it.
You are worth it.
I have experienced much inner growth this year.
Did you know that the earth is 98.5% water?
Did you also know that we are, as human beings, also the same 98.5% water?
Think of it like this:
I feel like deep water some days.
Other days I just enjoy the ripples.
Once in awhile I make a big splash!
I know the freeze cold and sharp....
And the droplet of the misty brow,
The glisten of a steamy body.
The gloom of a cloudy day
The parched tongue of drought
The hopeful dew of a sunny morning in May.
These things are all of worth.
They make you feel ALIVE.
And that my dear is the greatest gift of all.
You are HERE.
NOW.
YAY!
Make 2017 the year of BEING PRESENT.
Go with the flow of YOU and be one with the Universe. Great things happen!
February 3, 2016
The Wing & a Prayer Tour- The Good, the bad, the Miraculous!
You know, sometimes life gives you lemons, and you wonder if you should go forward or not. Like an Omen of badness to come or something.
The start of our trip was like that.
But there is always Good if you choose to look at it and find it within the bad.
Like the sudden engine problems at the start of a 3500 mile trip.
As in...
ours blew a cylinder only 1/2 hour away from home.
How'ere, the GOOD NEWS was that we were only a 1/2 hour away from home!
And we went to mechanics we know and trust and not getting stuck in W.Va bumfeckboonies somewhere and then have to go to BillyBobJoe's Garage.
THANK GOD.
We had to borrow a car we didn't know, and drive thru a blizzard in the night to even get to our work. BUT the car that our good friend loaned us got 35 mpg!! That's amazing! (even if we were in close quarters, the car was a CHAMP!)
We saw a lot of rough blizzard conditions on the way down as you can see.
This is a pic of the car with the dried on salt and sand from only 9 hours thru a blizzard on the road that day....
Then there was the catching up of the time schedule of leaving late to be able to arrive on time...
but we squeezed in a great visit with friends (Kristin, Jeff and kids) and then we pushed hard and got into Florida on Thursday night... instead of the usual Friday morning before faire.
And that was a good thing.
BUT the bad news was that we were just in time for a tornado.
Yah, well, that was a rough rainfall on the surrounding environments, including the faire and all the vendors trying to set up....
The good news was that we were safe inside and not driving when torrential rain came down!
Looking out the window of our hosts Dre & Max's backyard, on the Friday before faire opening, we saw 4" of rain come down in an hour, it was exactly like looking out into a snowstorm blizzard! Nothing but white expanse
The faire pending to open the following day suffered hard for it. But the faire and all the rennies and patrons were troopers (they are a hardy breed!) Everyone mucked in. Literally. I even saw someone loose a shoe in it.
But we had lovely reunions with friends and patrons, and we were staying safe with friends, who are more like family. The faire had to close one of the only 4 days that they were running, but thankfully, the faire made good on everyone's contracts even so. It was a beautiful kindness in the face of ruin. They will be blessed next year, methinks on this faire that runs as a fundraiser for the children in the community. It is a Kiwanis faire. Some of the nicest people I've ever met and we love them.
Here are some pics we took the day that the show was closed:
This was our stage for where 3 of our 4 shows was to take place.
Yah....I'm thinking Sailing Songs....
or maybe....
Drowning songs....
Then there was the sad fact I couldn't see my actual family down that way on the other side of the state, midweek as we had previously planned, (what with the borrowed car, we felt we shouldn't do any extraneous travel, only what was required of us to get us to gigs.) That really sucked bad and I felt crappy about bailing out while so (technically) close. I had very much wanted to see my brother and his family, and my nephew in his family, but that didn't get to happen.
The good news tho, was that the weather was mild, and we were safe, and we hung out in a communal atmosphere at our friend's house. I cooked several times for everyone, and we made the "family" atmosphere happen anyways. Family is loving who you are with.
We did get to see the new Star Wars movie with Jay and Abby tho, that was AWESOME. Cuz we'd never been out to a movie theater together!
Then there was the early TV promo where us 4 minstrels had to get up at 4am to get to faire on that last Friday before the last weekend of faire.
That whole promo went well, and aired fine.
Then the dozen performers and administrative folks from the faire, all decided to turn up for breakfast at Perkins in garb at 9:30am. We gave the patrons a thrill, I'm sure...as does any Rennie who's ever had to get gas or shop for something while in Ren garb in Wegman's. :)
The bad news was when we got to Perkins, a sudden thunderstorm blew up and (get this) LIGHTNING hit the parking lot of the restaurant right by us!
BAM!!!
SO LOUD!
All the air got sucked out of the room where we were sitting stunned, then the fire alarm went off screeching at us and we all sat there dazed stupified for a moment. Then I looked at my forearms and all and the hair on my forearms was standing straight up for about 20 minutes afterward!
The good news was that none of us were hurt and after breakfast we all went home for naps. :)
We had a relaxing week off...with a couple gigs in between. Great time at The Celtic Ray Public House (Voted Florida's Best Celtic Pub!)
We are already booked again there for next year!
See you there on Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2017!
And we enjoyed singing at the Fort Myers Unitarian Universalist Church for our sister UU Friends!
Then the faire got hit with a wind storm, on the 3rd of the 4 days it runs, with 30 mile an hour winds. That was rough for the vendors, the performers, the faire attendance. It was a severe day. It looked pretty but it was tough to withstand. When I sang, the words and music just got swept away and even Harry couldn't hear me unless I was looking at him!
It was WINDY!
The good news was that we did it, and we all had about a 2 minute pub sing with all the minstrels of the faire playing one quick windburned song at the end and we all went home to recover.
The good news was that when we went home to our home away from home at Dre & Max's,
they had invited family and friends, Donna (Rayvn) and Jenna (Dharma) over for dinner! And (BONUS) I got to see the cover art Dharma's been working on for my upcoming new book! We are still working on it and it's coming along for sure!
The last day of the faire (Day 4) was AWESOME. A perfect day. With good weather, good moods, and good fun! The faire will open next year, but they sure deserve a medal for all their hard work that they went through!
Abby & I are minstrel sisters :)
Here we minstrels are taking a break for lunch, getting away from the wind, and wondering how the heck we put all the stuff we did into this car.... :)
We enjoyed being with our friends down there very much and always hate to say goodbye for another year when we leave. But leave we must. We packed it all into the car once more, and set off for Charleston! I've wanted to go to Charleston for the longest time. It is said that it is "America's most beautiful city!"
We got a room at the Comfort Suites about at 9pm after a 10 hour ride. We ask for a ground floor room so that we don't have to cart the instruments far. The concierge told us regretably that there were no ground floor rooms due to conference area, however, if we didn't mind taking a "Handicapped" room...that it was right by the elevator on the 4th floor...would that be ok?
Sure we said.
OMG. What an awesome room! It was HUMONGOUS! :) Biggest bathroom, a couch, chair suite and gads of room. So much for thinking that was a bad idea, eh? This room rocked.
But we hadn't done any real adventure on this trip but survival mode, and we had about 6 hours to kill, so we allowed ourselves a look around at this beautiful city and had some lunch. Would love to go back to Ft. Sumter sometime and see it on the island!
While in Charleston, we stopped at this place called "Southern Brewery & Smokehouse" and the Assistant Manager told us he was from Liverpool, NY! He gave us a beer and we had a great chat and look around! The Coconut Porter they make is AMAZING. He even let us take pics from the 3rd floor!
Historic Charleston!
Would really like to go back and go thru the Aquarium and do the ferry ride to the Fort, but not this time. No time. No money for it, and that's ok. But hey, it's lunch time and we only have a couple of hours to kill....we could at least afford a seafood treat and a couple of pints, right? I mean, we ARE at a PORT. :)
We ate lunch at the Noisy Oyster. MMMM
Onward!
Then we were off once again, saw friends Kristin and kids that night and stayed for an awesome quick "power-visit" with her before we were off to the wilds of N.C.
Check this out:
We were going to play a house concert at Harry's HS chum's house by the ocean. Harry hadn't seen her for 40 YEARS. Nora and her husband were great, her friends wonderful and her house and property were amazing! Really surreal how beautiful it was there!
I would like to paint some of these vistas!
They used to play music together.
They even got a chance to do that again when we were together! <3
Just lovely the way the pics turned out...
How'ere,
It did take us a Loooong time to get home tho. 14 HOURS on that last leg, which we drove full sore. That was the bad part.
How'ere, the good part is that we missed "Snowmaggedon!" And when driving through Washington, D.C. we saw the President's motocade pass us by! SO many cop cars, 2 limos (one decoy) and an ambulance following it. That was freaking kewl!
The other good part to this whole story is that we really didn't know HOW we were going to get here, or even how we were gonna pay for the vehicle when we got back from our jobs, as we put everything we had into it to get it in the first place. Ya gotta have a car when you live by the Muse.
And we do live by the Muse, lovies, it's always feast or famine.
Starving musicians is not a joke. But then there are awesome times too.
Why do we do it?
Because we love our work, and we try to make life happier for others with our music, banter and costuming.
We arrived home to Nick, Alissa watching the house and a very happy Monty Joe schnoodle of love waiting for us with all well at home!
Well, the good news in all this, was that Fate smiled on us with the gifts of safe travel, good friends, and a spontaneous gift of a GoFundMe page set up for our behalf for the car repair!
People we knew and loved, (and even some folks we don't really even know but who have seen us play) all helped us pay for the majority of our vehicle repairs.
We don't have to go to debtor's prison! YAY!
We would not be able to do what we do, without help from our friends sometimes.
This blog is me telling you that even if SHITE happens, take that LEAP OF FAITH!
A leap of faith (in my opinion) is JUMPING...
and THEN yelling to the Universe "Catch Me!" and believing it WILL BE OK.
Cuz more times than not....It WILL BE OK and there are reasons for it.
Thank you Universe!
Thank you all for your friendships, and for opportunities to perform and thank you for eyes for seeing the Good in life.
So when life hands you lemons...
Just TRUST the Universe to give you the makings for Marguaritas!
:)
The start of our trip was like that.
But there is always Good if you choose to look at it and find it within the bad.
Like the sudden engine problems at the start of a 3500 mile trip.
As in...
ours blew a cylinder only 1/2 hour away from home.
How'ere, the GOOD NEWS was that we were only a 1/2 hour away from home!
And we went to mechanics we know and trust and not getting stuck in W.Va bumfeckboonies somewhere and then have to go to BillyBobJoe's Garage.
THANK GOD.
We had to borrow a car we didn't know, and drive thru a blizzard in the night to even get to our work. BUT the car that our good friend loaned us got 35 mpg!! That's amazing! (even if we were in close quarters, the car was a CHAMP!)
We saw a lot of rough blizzard conditions on the way down as you can see.
This is a pic of the car with the dried on salt and sand from only 9 hours thru a blizzard on the road that day....
Then there was the catching up of the time schedule of leaving late to be able to arrive on time...
but we squeezed in a great visit with friends (Kristin, Jeff and kids) and then we pushed hard and got into Florida on Thursday night... instead of the usual Friday morning before faire.
And that was a good thing.
BUT the bad news was that we were just in time for a tornado.
Yah, well, that was a rough rainfall on the surrounding environments, including the faire and all the vendors trying to set up....
The good news was that we were safe inside and not driving when torrential rain came down!
Looking out the window of our hosts Dre & Max's backyard, on the Friday before faire opening, we saw 4" of rain come down in an hour, it was exactly like looking out into a snowstorm blizzard! Nothing but white expanse
The faire pending to open the following day suffered hard for it. But the faire and all the rennies and patrons were troopers (they are a hardy breed!) Everyone mucked in. Literally. I even saw someone loose a shoe in it.
But we had lovely reunions with friends and patrons, and we were staying safe with friends, who are more like family. The faire had to close one of the only 4 days that they were running, but thankfully, the faire made good on everyone's contracts even so. It was a beautiful kindness in the face of ruin. They will be blessed next year, methinks on this faire that runs as a fundraiser for the children in the community. It is a Kiwanis faire. Some of the nicest people I've ever met and we love them.
Here are some pics we took the day that the show was closed:
This was our stage for where 3 of our 4 shows was to take place.
Yah....I'm thinking Sailing Songs....
or maybe....
Drowning songs....
Then there was the sad fact I couldn't see my actual family down that way on the other side of the state, midweek as we had previously planned, (what with the borrowed car, we felt we shouldn't do any extraneous travel, only what was required of us to get us to gigs.) That really sucked bad and I felt crappy about bailing out while so (technically) close. I had very much wanted to see my brother and his family, and my nephew in his family, but that didn't get to happen.
The good news tho, was that the weather was mild, and we were safe, and we hung out in a communal atmosphere at our friend's house. I cooked several times for everyone, and we made the "family" atmosphere happen anyways. Family is loving who you are with.
We did get to see the new Star Wars movie with Jay and Abby tho, that was AWESOME. Cuz we'd never been out to a movie theater together!
Then there was the early TV promo where us 4 minstrels had to get up at 4am to get to faire on that last Friday before the last weekend of faire.That whole promo went well, and aired fine.
Then the dozen performers and administrative folks from the faire, all decided to turn up for breakfast at Perkins in garb at 9:30am. We gave the patrons a thrill, I'm sure...as does any Rennie who's ever had to get gas or shop for something while in Ren garb in Wegman's. :)
The bad news was when we got to Perkins, a sudden thunderstorm blew up and (get this) LIGHTNING hit the parking lot of the restaurant right by us!
BAM!!!
SO LOUD!
All the air got sucked out of the room where we were sitting stunned, then the fire alarm went off screeching at us and we all sat there dazed stupified for a moment. Then I looked at my forearms and all and the hair on my forearms was standing straight up for about 20 minutes afterward!
The good news was that none of us were hurt and after breakfast we all went home for naps. :)
We had a relaxing week off...with a couple gigs in between. Great time at The Celtic Ray Public House (Voted Florida's Best Celtic Pub!)
We are already booked again there for next year!
See you there on Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2017!
And we enjoyed singing at the Fort Myers Unitarian Universalist Church for our sister UU Friends!
Then the faire got hit with a wind storm, on the 3rd of the 4 days it runs, with 30 mile an hour winds. That was rough for the vendors, the performers, the faire attendance. It was a severe day. It looked pretty but it was tough to withstand. When I sang, the words and music just got swept away and even Harry couldn't hear me unless I was looking at him!
It was WINDY!
The good news was that we did it, and we all had about a 2 minute pub sing with all the minstrels of the faire playing one quick windburned song at the end and we all went home to recover.
The good news was that when we went home to our home away from home at Dre & Max's,
they had invited family and friends, Donna (Rayvn) and Jenna (Dharma) over for dinner! And (BONUS) I got to see the cover art Dharma's been working on for my upcoming new book! We are still working on it and it's coming along for sure!The last day of the faire (Day 4) was AWESOME. A perfect day. With good weather, good moods, and good fun! The faire will open next year, but they sure deserve a medal for all their hard work that they went through!
Abby & I are minstrel sisters :)
Here we minstrels are taking a break for lunch, getting away from the wind, and wondering how the heck we put all the stuff we did into this car.... :)
We enjoyed being with our friends down there very much and always hate to say goodbye for another year when we leave. But leave we must. We packed it all into the car once more, and set off for Charleston! I've wanted to go to Charleston for the longest time. It is said that it is "America's most beautiful city!"
We got a room at the Comfort Suites about at 9pm after a 10 hour ride. We ask for a ground floor room so that we don't have to cart the instruments far. The concierge told us regretably that there were no ground floor rooms due to conference area, however, if we didn't mind taking a "Handicapped" room...that it was right by the elevator on the 4th floor...would that be ok?
Sure we said.
OMG. What an awesome room! It was HUMONGOUS! :) Biggest bathroom, a couch, chair suite and gads of room. So much for thinking that was a bad idea, eh? This room rocked.
But we hadn't done any real adventure on this trip but survival mode, and we had about 6 hours to kill, so we allowed ourselves a look around at this beautiful city and had some lunch. Would love to go back to Ft. Sumter sometime and see it on the island!
While in Charleston, we stopped at this place called "Southern Brewery & Smokehouse" and the Assistant Manager told us he was from Liverpool, NY! He gave us a beer and we had a great chat and look around! The Coconut Porter they make is AMAZING. He even let us take pics from the 3rd floor!
Historic Charleston!
Would really like to go back and go thru the Aquarium and do the ferry ride to the Fort, but not this time. No time. No money for it, and that's ok. But hey, it's lunch time and we only have a couple of hours to kill....we could at least afford a seafood treat and a couple of pints, right? I mean, we ARE at a PORT. :)
We ate lunch at the Noisy Oyster. MMMM
Onward!Then we were off once again, saw friends Kristin and kids that night and stayed for an awesome quick "power-visit" with her before we were off to the wilds of N.C.
Check this out:
We were going to play a house concert at Harry's HS chum's house by the ocean. Harry hadn't seen her for 40 YEARS. Nora and her husband were great, her friends wonderful and her house and property were amazing! Really surreal how beautiful it was there!
I would like to paint some of these vistas!
They used to play music together.
They even got a chance to do that again when we were together! <3
Just lovely the way the pics turned out...
How'ere,
It did take us a Loooong time to get home tho. 14 HOURS on that last leg, which we drove full sore. That was the bad part.
How'ere, the good part is that we missed "Snowmaggedon!" And when driving through Washington, D.C. we saw the President's motocade pass us by! SO many cop cars, 2 limos (one decoy) and an ambulance following it. That was freaking kewl!
The other good part to this whole story is that we really didn't know HOW we were going to get here, or even how we were gonna pay for the vehicle when we got back from our jobs, as we put everything we had into it to get it in the first place. Ya gotta have a car when you live by the Muse.
And we do live by the Muse, lovies, it's always feast or famine.
Starving musicians is not a joke. But then there are awesome times too.
Why do we do it?
Because we love our work, and we try to make life happier for others with our music, banter and costuming.
We arrived home to Nick, Alissa watching the house and a very happy Monty Joe schnoodle of love waiting for us with all well at home!
Well, the good news in all this, was that Fate smiled on us with the gifts of safe travel, good friends, and a spontaneous gift of a GoFundMe page set up for our behalf for the car repair!
People we knew and loved, (and even some folks we don't really even know but who have seen us play) all helped us pay for the majority of our vehicle repairs.
We don't have to go to debtor's prison! YAY!
We would not be able to do what we do, without help from our friends sometimes.
This blog is me telling you that even if SHITE happens, take that LEAP OF FAITH!
A leap of faith (in my opinion) is JUMPING...
and THEN yelling to the Universe "Catch Me!" and believing it WILL BE OK.
Cuz more times than not....It WILL BE OK and there are reasons for it.
Thank you Universe!
Thank you all for your friendships, and for opportunities to perform and thank you for eyes for seeing the Good in life.
So when life hands you lemons...
Just TRUST the Universe to give you the makings for Marguaritas!
:)
January 17, 2016
The "Wing & a Prayer Tour"
Hey ho Mischievites, friends and family!
Well, it's been quite a wild ride.
We've named this trip "The Wing & a Prayer Tour" and it's aptly named!!
From our first blog of telling you about our beginning trip complications of having our car having engine problems....as in....there IS now NO ENGINE in our car....
To a miracle happening and thankfully borrowing Elaine's car and getting safely out of Central New York just as a winter storm came in suddenly....
We got to S.C. to see our dear friends Kristin, Jeff and the kiddos!
YAY! Relief in the form of friendly faces, hugs and food and wine! Thank you so much!
What a lovely family and one that we care for deeply!
We sure relished a glass or two of wine about the time we got there! There were a lot of crazy drivers and some crappy weather to drive thru! Thanks to the Izzo family for such a lovely, yet quick stayover and we were back on the road at 7am next morning!
Pictures are worth a 1000 words. There was some "weather" on the way down, as you can see....
Elaine, your car is fine (and now is washed!) but people down south were giving us dirty looks, (even tho' we'd only been on the road 1 day) so Harry & Jeff washed it! Great car and the mileage is 35 mpg!
This is the dried on salt and sand from the storm. All gone now, but man, Harry did great traveling thru it all in a car that he really didn't know well!
We got in to Cape Coral Florida to stay with Dre & Max Rousseau and Jay and Abby (The Harper & The Minstrel) in our annual "Musician Infestation" at Dre's house....
but just in time and out of the car in time for Tornado watches, and torrential downpours!
The faire DID open yesterday, but it was very saturated with water, and there was so much mud. But Rennies being Rennies, we truly all did "muck in" and we STILL managed to get crowds and have a good day.
It was a little rough.
Here's pics from opening day:
Hey!
Can you see our stage????
So, when life gives you lemons...you make lemonade.
And when faire gives you water...you sing a lot of Sailing Songs!
We still had a lot of fun tho and made a lot of people happy.
And then last night this happened....click this link
We got dressed for a faire work day and we went, but after last night's 2nd terrible storm, the faire was cancelled. There was such damage from the storm on top of another storm....
This is what faire looks like today when we went in for morning meeting:
Gods Bless the Vendors!
Where the water is here is usually just grass....
Abby and I are sort kinda in ren garb...as much as necessary for the morning meeting on a day that the faire cancels anyways...
We are making the best of it.
Hey, at least we are together! <3
An Orb on me!
Me with my stage behind me.
This is usually called "The Tavern Stage"
Now it is "The Moat Stage" or "The Swamp Stage"
(no, no bodice for me...going home soon back to Cape Coral for a boon day off....)
Come on...You gotta just have a sense of humor about shit like this.
Here's my stage!
LOL
Come on...
At least the sun is coming out!
Thank you to everyone who donated to Heather Jenson's GoFundMe page for us to help with our engine repair back home Hopefully all will be well one of these days. :)
At least we are alive, happy and with friends in a borrowed car. Signing off from sunny wet Florida for now!
Hugs from Merlyn & Harry
Your Wandering Minstrels
Well, it's been quite a wild ride.
We've named this trip "The Wing & a Prayer Tour" and it's aptly named!!
From our first blog of telling you about our beginning trip complications of having our car having engine problems....as in....there IS now NO ENGINE in our car....
To a miracle happening and thankfully borrowing Elaine's car and getting safely out of Central New York just as a winter storm came in suddenly....
We got to S.C. to see our dear friends Kristin, Jeff and the kiddos!
YAY! Relief in the form of friendly faces, hugs and food and wine! Thank you so much!
What a lovely family and one that we care for deeply!
We sure relished a glass or two of wine about the time we got there! There were a lot of crazy drivers and some crappy weather to drive thru! Thanks to the Izzo family for such a lovely, yet quick stayover and we were back on the road at 7am next morning!
Pictures are worth a 1000 words. There was some "weather" on the way down, as you can see....
Elaine, your car is fine (and now is washed!) but people down south were giving us dirty looks, (even tho' we'd only been on the road 1 day) so Harry & Jeff washed it! Great car and the mileage is 35 mpg!
This is the dried on salt and sand from the storm. All gone now, but man, Harry did great traveling thru it all in a car that he really didn't know well!
We got in to Cape Coral Florida to stay with Dre & Max Rousseau and Jay and Abby (The Harper & The Minstrel) in our annual "Musician Infestation" at Dre's house....
but just in time and out of the car in time for Tornado watches, and torrential downpours!
The faire DID open yesterday, but it was very saturated with water, and there was so much mud. But Rennies being Rennies, we truly all did "muck in" and we STILL managed to get crowds and have a good day.
It was a little rough.
Here's pics from opening day:
Hey!Can you see our stage????
So, when life gives you lemons...you make lemonade.And when faire gives you water...you sing a lot of Sailing Songs!
We still had a lot of fun tho and made a lot of people happy.
And then last night this happened....click this link
We got dressed for a faire work day and we went, but after last night's 2nd terrible storm, the faire was cancelled. There was such damage from the storm on top of another storm....
This is what faire looks like today when we went in for morning meeting:
Gods Bless the Vendors!
Where the water is here is usually just grass....
Abby and I are sort kinda in ren garb...as much as necessary for the morning meeting on a day that the faire cancels anyways...
We are making the best of it.
Hey, at least we are together! <3
An Orb on me! 
Me with my stage behind me. This is usually called "The Tavern Stage"
Now it is "The Moat Stage" or "The Swamp Stage"
(no, no bodice for me...going home soon back to Cape Coral for a boon day off....)
Come on...You gotta just have a sense of humor about shit like this.Here's my stage!
LOL
Come on...
At least the sun is coming out!
Thank you to everyone who donated to Heather Jenson's GoFundMe page for us to help with our engine repair back home Hopefully all will be well one of these days. :)
At least we are alive, happy and with friends in a borrowed car. Signing off from sunny wet Florida for now!
Hugs from Merlyn & Harry
Your Wandering Minstrels
January 13, 2016
False Starts
I should probably preface this blog posting with telling you that I had a nightmare night before last. Stress about the recent death in the family (Wayne's mom passed away on the weekend) or the fact that our Florida trip was looming. Chalked it up to that, I did. In my dream, I was camping by the side of the road at night. I looked up to the Universe and gazed at the stars and saw so many strange symbols and signs in the heavens, crisscrosses and marks that I woke up in terror.
Onward.
Today, after much packing of clothing for a wide range of temperatures from freezing brrrr fecking brrrrr...to warm toasty sunshine...and packing in the many kinds of garb we'll need (Medieval faire with a couple of costume changes to pirates, medieval) and also a couple of everyday gigs (Celtic pub and a church)...adding in 4 guitars, a mandolin, drum, food and drink....we loaded our new car to the gills and set off in our "new to us" 2006 Suburu that we just got just before Christmas. We have sort of named the car "The Sleigh" because it's red, we got it at Christmastime and because we were doing a lot of Santa and Mrs Claus gigs then.
It fit.
We love the car! It's beautiful and there have really been no problems with it. It's clean and the mileage was a lot lower than our old Suburu (compare 84,000 miles to 253,000). It's the nicest car we've ever had!
We had been very concerned that our old car wouldn't make another trip south this year. We needed to feel safe and have a dependable ride. Our awesome friends and mechanics at Auburn Engine and Transmission went through the car with a fine tooth comb and all was well to set off. YAY! It was running great too!' So happy!
Loaded up for bear and we set off- a little later than we wanted to- at 8:45am in the morning. At about 9:10am I said to Harry:
"This trip seems weird. I don't know if its the day or what, but it seems odd. We should think of a name for the trip as we always name our tours."
Then I thought to myself, "How about The Sleigh's Maiden Voyage?"
Then I next thought, "Yah, but I don't want it to just be all about the car. This trip is broader than that...."
A couple minutes later we were climbing a small hill in Borodino and we heard a small "pop" and immediately lost power. Now the car started running rough and the "check engine" light started blinking.
FUCK.
Eegad. We know this story ALL to well.
FUCK FUCK FUCK.
Ok, look on the bright side!
We were pretty close to home yet, so we immediately turn around and take it to the mechanics we know and trust. I mean, it's better than breaking down in the boonies somewhere, right? It's a blessing in disguise! Think positively! Thankfully, we call them and they know we are leaving away today for three weeks and miraculously they let us pull into a bay. We limp the car back to Auburn, running rough and engine light doing the fandango. OY.
Hey...Maybe its a spark plug or wire, you know...something simple? Scrumpy (yah, our cool mechanic is named that :) gets out his tools and plugs in the diagnostic tools.
But its a mystery. A real conundrum.
There was no symptoms, there wasn't much information coming in.
After a bit of brainstorming and troubleshooting and time spent, it is discovered that cylinder #4 had no compression.
So...they dig a bit deeper to try to find out the cause....
Bit by bit, more parts come off. We wait in the waiting area. I now have my laptop out and am seriously considering getting the flasks out of the car. Hey, its noon somewhere.
Think positively Merlyn! I say "Hey, we can wait. We have computer, food and liquor. We're fine to wait.We're on an adventure, right?"
Thankfully we always built in an extra day or two travel into our itinerary for just such emergencies.
Now the bad news.
The engine is broken down over the next few hours to discover that something truly bizarre happened. The "Valve Guide" popped out of its sleeve in the engine. A simple thing, but a major thing. So, all of our life, trip and opportunity for work in the south was in the Suburu, which was now up on jacks.
It's a great and clean engine! A thing of beauty....See?
Now you see it:
Now you don't:
Ok, so it's gonna take a couple days (at least) to fix this, because the valve guide needs to be sent to the machine shop to be re-tooled, planed special. So, with my handy dandy computer on my lap (complete with the fan that keeps the old thing running and not burning the hell out of my thighs...) I start letting my fingers do the walking and we start calling around to try to find a rental car. Logical, right?
This gave us more bad news.
A rental for 3 weeks would be (are you sitting down?) Around $1500 fecking dollars!!!. And U-Haul was even more. (We are on this trip to WORK. You know. to make money?)
We certainly didn't want to break contracts or disappoint fans down south....yet now we also will be having to finance a pricey engine job. I mean, it can't be cheap to work through all that mess. Add to this, that we threw all we had, and all we could borrow into the car already....
Now it's thank God for even more plastic- time.
And we thank the Gods for FRIENDS and FAMILY.
Like Sam, Wayne's brother, who drove Wayne around and let us use his big truck for a bit.
I started praying to every God and Saint that I loved. There was Jesus, yes, but also Hermes and St. Christopher (travel helpers), Athena for wisdom, Mary for acceptance...and most especially Ganesh- "Remover of Obstacles." I had even chosen to wear a Ganesh pendant before I left the house and it was getting a lot of prayer time.
See, the new car was getting work done. YAY. BUT......the metaphor for it was that the car had to have major heart surgery. Would you run a marathon (Florida trip over the next 3 days) immediately after getting heart surgery? Probably not a good idea.
FUCK.
What to do? Please God....give me a sign....(and a good one, not the shite signs in my dream please...)
I posted on Facebook to keep our fans in the loop (after I so hastily had posted a "We're OFF!" post before we left...silly me....)
Could we rent from someone?
Borrow a car? (not likely, but hey, any twine would lead me at this point...)
And den?
Another miracle happened!
Our dear friend, Elaine, saw my FB post and OFFERED HER CAR to us for the duration!!
WOWSA!
So then the next set of issues:
*We borrowed Wayne's brother's truck to get all of our belongings packed so tightly out of the car (sitting in the shop- which will be continued to be worked on while we are away) and we load up all our stuff in the open back end of that truck. The mechanics could not believe we packed that car as full as we did. I should've taken a picture, but I was busy reloading our stuff out. Again.
*Big storm coming in. We need to move if we are gonna move. Several weeks of good weather and shite storm is coming NOW. sigh.
*Drove to Marcellus and picked up Elaine's car (which we've never seen nor driven before) THANK YOU ELAINE. You are a Godsend!! She gave us her only key and said "don't lose it, it's the only key.. If anything breaks, fix it, and travel safe and I love you." We love you too so much!
*Left her house and drove in a blizzard back home (now 7 hours later and we are still at our house AGAIN) and our instruments had to ride in the snow and freezing elements for a 1/2 hour back home (eeeek!) open air in back of pickup. Worried about them.
* Got to our house....and took all that stuff out of the truck....again....and squeezed "most of it" into Elaine's car. Unfortunately, we've had to jettison stuff to get it all into Elaine's Toyota Tercel which is a bit smaller capacity than the sardine packed Suburu Forester.
We had to leave behind our sound system for the bar gig- keeping only mics and stands (hopefully plugging into their system at the pub) Other ballast also included: 2 guitars and a mandolin (we were taking 4 guitars/ 2 are "outside" guitars...and 2 are "inside guitars") and several other things deemed nice but not necessary. The inside guitars (for the electric gig) will now be getting a faire experience Pray for dry weather there. (rain in forecast unfortunately this weekend).
* Then we set off AGAIN at 6pm in the evening to start our trip...
*Not in our new car...
*Not with all our needed gear
*BONUS, now in a blizzard and shite weather.
*Elaine's car (which we have now named "The Good Samaritan") is running good, we have found most of the switches and lights in the dark and is going down the road.
*We stopped for a slice of pizza for dinner (we really hadn't eaten since breakfast and most of our food is burid somewhere in the car) We bought a whole pizza for $5 in Homer at the Minimart and that was our dinner. Big box manuevered back and forth and we ate slices carefully while trying to make up the time lost, and trying to find our way in a blizzard.
We landed, worse for wear, but happy to be alive, and at least making on our way south - at midnight last night in Harrisburg PA where we stopped for the evening.
We thank Mike and Scrumpy at Auburn Engine for their time and service. Good luck on fixing "The Sleigh!" And what are you gonna do with all the extra parts? :)
HUGE THANKS to Elaine Moran for lendind us her very own car to us...we'll keep your car, now named "The Good Samaritan" well watered and she'll need a shower once we get to better weather. It's snow, ice and salt encrusted right now. But we'll be very good and kind to her. It was a pretty blue when I saw if first. Now it is a whitish greyish snow blizzard car.
Thanks to friends calling and checking in on us. It means a lot in weird times.
We hope that the trip is (as Garp says in "World According to Garp) that it is "Pre-Catastrophed" and that the worst is now over?
Say a prayer for us please.
We saddle up and will make some more miles, (Gods willing and the creek don't rise) Knocking on Wood and hoping for the best.
Fair Winds,
Merlyn & Harry
Onward.
Today, after much packing of clothing for a wide range of temperatures from freezing brrrr fecking brrrrr...to warm toasty sunshine...and packing in the many kinds of garb we'll need (Medieval faire with a couple of costume changes to pirates, medieval) and also a couple of everyday gigs (Celtic pub and a church)...adding in 4 guitars, a mandolin, drum, food and drink....we loaded our new car to the gills and set off in our "new to us" 2006 Suburu that we just got just before Christmas. We have sort of named the car "The Sleigh" because it's red, we got it at Christmastime and because we were doing a lot of Santa and Mrs Claus gigs then.
It fit.
We love the car! It's beautiful and there have really been no problems with it. It's clean and the mileage was a lot lower than our old Suburu (compare 84,000 miles to 253,000). It's the nicest car we've ever had!
We had been very concerned that our old car wouldn't make another trip south this year. We needed to feel safe and have a dependable ride. Our awesome friends and mechanics at Auburn Engine and Transmission went through the car with a fine tooth comb and all was well to set off. YAY! It was running great too!' So happy!
Loaded up for bear and we set off- a little later than we wanted to- at 8:45am in the morning. At about 9:10am I said to Harry:
"This trip seems weird. I don't know if its the day or what, but it seems odd. We should think of a name for the trip as we always name our tours."
Then I thought to myself, "How about The Sleigh's Maiden Voyage?"
Then I next thought, "Yah, but I don't want it to just be all about the car. This trip is broader than that...."
A couple minutes later we were climbing a small hill in Borodino and we heard a small "pop" and immediately lost power. Now the car started running rough and the "check engine" light started blinking.
FUCK.
Eegad. We know this story ALL to well.
FUCK FUCK FUCK.
Ok, look on the bright side!
We were pretty close to home yet, so we immediately turn around and take it to the mechanics we know and trust. I mean, it's better than breaking down in the boonies somewhere, right? It's a blessing in disguise! Think positively! Thankfully, we call them and they know we are leaving away today for three weeks and miraculously they let us pull into a bay. We limp the car back to Auburn, running rough and engine light doing the fandango. OY.
Hey...Maybe its a spark plug or wire, you know...something simple? Scrumpy (yah, our cool mechanic is named that :) gets out his tools and plugs in the diagnostic tools.
But its a mystery. A real conundrum.
There was no symptoms, there wasn't much information coming in.
After a bit of brainstorming and troubleshooting and time spent, it is discovered that cylinder #4 had no compression.
So...they dig a bit deeper to try to find out the cause....
Bit by bit, more parts come off. We wait in the waiting area. I now have my laptop out and am seriously considering getting the flasks out of the car. Hey, its noon somewhere.
Think positively Merlyn! I say "Hey, we can wait. We have computer, food and liquor. We're fine to wait.We're on an adventure, right?"
Thankfully we always built in an extra day or two travel into our itinerary for just such emergencies.
Now the bad news.
The engine is broken down over the next few hours to discover that something truly bizarre happened. The "Valve Guide" popped out of its sleeve in the engine. A simple thing, but a major thing. So, all of our life, trip and opportunity for work in the south was in the Suburu, which was now up on jacks.
It's a great and clean engine! A thing of beauty....See?
Now you see it:
Now you don't:
Ok, so it's gonna take a couple days (at least) to fix this, because the valve guide needs to be sent to the machine shop to be re-tooled, planed special. So, with my handy dandy computer on my lap (complete with the fan that keeps the old thing running and not burning the hell out of my thighs...) I start letting my fingers do the walking and we start calling around to try to find a rental car. Logical, right?
This gave us more bad news.
A rental for 3 weeks would be (are you sitting down?) Around $1500 fecking dollars!!!. And U-Haul was even more. (We are on this trip to WORK. You know. to make money?)
We certainly didn't want to break contracts or disappoint fans down south....yet now we also will be having to finance a pricey engine job. I mean, it can't be cheap to work through all that mess. Add to this, that we threw all we had, and all we could borrow into the car already....
Now it's thank God for even more plastic- time.
And we thank the Gods for FRIENDS and FAMILY.
Like Sam, Wayne's brother, who drove Wayne around and let us use his big truck for a bit.
I started praying to every God and Saint that I loved. There was Jesus, yes, but also Hermes and St. Christopher (travel helpers), Athena for wisdom, Mary for acceptance...and most especially Ganesh- "Remover of Obstacles." I had even chosen to wear a Ganesh pendant before I left the house and it was getting a lot of prayer time.
See, the new car was getting work done. YAY. BUT......the metaphor for it was that the car had to have major heart surgery. Would you run a marathon (Florida trip over the next 3 days) immediately after getting heart surgery? Probably not a good idea.
FUCK.
What to do? Please God....give me a sign....(and a good one, not the shite signs in my dream please...)
I posted on Facebook to keep our fans in the loop (after I so hastily had posted a "We're OFF!" post before we left...silly me....)
Could we rent from someone?
Borrow a car? (not likely, but hey, any twine would lead me at this point...)
And den?
Another miracle happened!
Our dear friend, Elaine, saw my FB post and OFFERED HER CAR to us for the duration!!
WOWSA!
So then the next set of issues:
*We borrowed Wayne's brother's truck to get all of our belongings packed so tightly out of the car (sitting in the shop- which will be continued to be worked on while we are away) and we load up all our stuff in the open back end of that truck. The mechanics could not believe we packed that car as full as we did. I should've taken a picture, but I was busy reloading our stuff out. Again.
*Big storm coming in. We need to move if we are gonna move. Several weeks of good weather and shite storm is coming NOW. sigh.
*Drove to Marcellus and picked up Elaine's car (which we've never seen nor driven before) THANK YOU ELAINE. You are a Godsend!! She gave us her only key and said "don't lose it, it's the only key.. If anything breaks, fix it, and travel safe and I love you." We love you too so much!
*Left her house and drove in a blizzard back home (now 7 hours later and we are still at our house AGAIN) and our instruments had to ride in the snow and freezing elements for a 1/2 hour back home (eeeek!) open air in back of pickup. Worried about them.
* Got to our house....and took all that stuff out of the truck....again....and squeezed "most of it" into Elaine's car. Unfortunately, we've had to jettison stuff to get it all into Elaine's Toyota Tercel which is a bit smaller capacity than the sardine packed Suburu Forester.
We had to leave behind our sound system for the bar gig- keeping only mics and stands (hopefully plugging into their system at the pub) Other ballast also included: 2 guitars and a mandolin (we were taking 4 guitars/ 2 are "outside" guitars...and 2 are "inside guitars") and several other things deemed nice but not necessary. The inside guitars (for the electric gig) will now be getting a faire experience Pray for dry weather there. (rain in forecast unfortunately this weekend).
* Then we set off AGAIN at 6pm in the evening to start our trip...
*Not in our new car...
*Not with all our needed gear
*BONUS, now in a blizzard and shite weather.
*Elaine's car (which we have now named "The Good Samaritan") is running good, we have found most of the switches and lights in the dark and is going down the road.
*We stopped for a slice of pizza for dinner (we really hadn't eaten since breakfast and most of our food is burid somewhere in the car) We bought a whole pizza for $5 in Homer at the Minimart and that was our dinner. Big box manuevered back and forth and we ate slices carefully while trying to make up the time lost, and trying to find our way in a blizzard.
We landed, worse for wear, but happy to be alive, and at least making on our way south - at midnight last night in Harrisburg PA where we stopped for the evening.
We thank Mike and Scrumpy at Auburn Engine for their time and service. Good luck on fixing "The Sleigh!" And what are you gonna do with all the extra parts? :)
HUGE THANKS to Elaine Moran for lendind us her very own car to us...we'll keep your car, now named "The Good Samaritan" well watered and she'll need a shower once we get to better weather. It's snow, ice and salt encrusted right now. But we'll be very good and kind to her. It was a pretty blue when I saw if first. Now it is a whitish greyish snow blizzard car.
Thanks to friends calling and checking in on us. It means a lot in weird times.
We hope that the trip is (as Garp says in "World According to Garp) that it is "Pre-Catastrophed" and that the worst is now over?
Say a prayer for us please.
We saddle up and will make some more miles, (Gods willing and the creek don't rise) Knocking on Wood and hoping for the best.
Fair Winds,
Merlyn & Harry
April 14, 2015
The Botanical Gardens~ Buffalo, NY
Time to Stop and Smell the Flowers...
It is FINALLY Spring here in Central New York! So over this spring break, I went on vacation with friend Talon, journeying west to Buffalo to see our new friends Sean, Charlie and Liz and to go sight seeing with them! So off we went for three days of adventure!
So.....Sightseeing in Buffalo, NY? Really? Buffalo??
Well, YES. It's got a lot of history and amazing sights to see!
This blog will be about The Buffalo Botanical Gardens there. A most beautiful set of Victorian Garden buildings, started in the late 1860's was developed. Can't you just envision ladies in long white lace gowns with Gibson Girl hairdo's wandering the grounds here?
You just don't see buildings like this anymore...
It may have been a grey day....but it was sure bright and cheery inside!
Flowers, flowers flowers!!
Easter flowers, lilies, orchids blooming everywhere!
Amazing to see such colors!
Two Geminis, a Sagitarius and an Aries get along fantastic!
Such colors are a DELIGHT after a winter of white....
And lots and lots of strange cactuses!
DISCLAIMER TO ENTER THIS GREENHOUSE
This one looks more like coral under the sea than a cactus!
The Crown of Thorns cactus
Ethereal Beauty!
Majestic Desert Flowers!
This one too, looks more like a Sea Urchin than a cactus!
Live Bamboo is the weirdest thing.
It feels...so....unnatural....like plastic almost.
Shiny and strange...not "plant like" at all... for a plant.
EEEKKK!
The Godzilla Topiary almost ate Sean!
:)
But we kept it at bay with our growls....
:)
Check out this tree's bark...Prehistoric looking, isn't it?
I so enjoyed this day's adventures with my friends, Sean, Talon and Liz
And ORCHIDS...
which are about the hardest thing, I have found...to grow..
Orchids...
So beautiful!
Just gorgeous and SO many varieties!!
Ooooh....a CHOCOLATE TREE :)
The garden sculptures within the gardens so lovely....
Spring has SPRUNG!!!
"Best"-ies" Sean & Liz....
Beautiful Koi Pond....so Zen...
Tell me why the Ivy twines.... :)
It felt SO good to be in a warm and beautiful environment...
This winter was so cold, dreary and harsh...
Yah, that's a big snake plant....
The textures and varigated ivys...so pretty..
Silly fun at Easter time :)
Hee Hee...
Here comes Peter Cottontail....hopping down the bunny trail...
All in all...
A wondrous day's adventure with friends in a magical Victorian place!
If you get a chance to visit these Botanical Gardens in Buffalo, please do so!
It is FINALLY Spring here in Central New York! So over this spring break, I went on vacation with friend Talon, journeying west to Buffalo to see our new friends Sean, Charlie and Liz and to go sight seeing with them! So off we went for three days of adventure!
So.....Sightseeing in Buffalo, NY? Really? Buffalo??
Well, YES. It's got a lot of history and amazing sights to see!
This blog will be about The Buffalo Botanical Gardens there. A most beautiful set of Victorian Garden buildings, started in the late 1860's was developed. Can't you just envision ladies in long white lace gowns with Gibson Girl hairdo's wandering the grounds here?
You just don't see buildings like this anymore...
It may have been a grey day....but it was sure bright and cheery inside!
Flowers, flowers flowers!!
Easter flowers, lilies, orchids blooming everywhere!
Amazing to see such colors!
Two Geminis, a Sagitarius and an Aries get along fantastic!
Such colors are a DELIGHT after a winter of white....
And lots and lots of strange cactuses!DISCLAIMER TO ENTER THIS GREENHOUSE
This one looks more like coral under the sea than a cactus!
The Crown of Thorns cactus 
Ethereal Beauty!
Majestic Desert Flowers!
This one too, looks more like a Sea Urchin than a cactus!
Live Bamboo is the weirdest thing.It feels...so....unnatural....like plastic almost.
Shiny and strange...not "plant like" at all... for a plant.
EEEKKK!The Godzilla Topiary almost ate Sean!
:)
But we kept it at bay with our growls....:)
Check out this tree's bark...Prehistoric looking, isn't it?
I so enjoyed this day's adventures with my friends, Sean, Talon and Liz
And ORCHIDS...which are about the hardest thing, I have found...to grow..
Orchids...
So beautiful!
Just gorgeous and SO many varieties!!
Ooooh....a CHOCOLATE TREE :) 
The garden sculptures within the gardens so lovely....
Spring has SPRUNG!!!
"Best"-ies" Sean & Liz....
Beautiful Koi Pond....so Zen...
Tell me why the Ivy twines.... :)
It felt SO good to be in a warm and beautiful environment...
This winter was so cold, dreary and harsh...
Yah, that's a big snake plant....
The textures and varigated ivys...so pretty..
Silly fun at Easter time :)Hee Hee...
Here comes Peter Cottontail....hopping down the bunny trail...
All in all...A wondrous day's adventure with friends in a magical Victorian place!
If you get a chance to visit these Botanical Gardens in Buffalo, please do so!
