Living like in earlier times

Saturday, April 5: Lancaster, Bird in Hand, Intercourse, Amish

In the morning we started our day in Lancaster on the Farmers Market. It was really nice. You can buy there fruits, vegetables, meat, bread (all things for daily life) and especially products like quilts etc. from the Amish people.
Lancaster which was once the capital of the US in the 19th century is now the historic capital of Lancaster County or the so called Pennsylvania Dutch Country.

In this area all the Amish people live their life like in earlier times. Most of them without electricity and everything and still using their horses on the fields and their black horse buggies instead of cars. They are deeply religious even if the teenagers have the opportunity to test the “normal” life when they are around 16 years old. They can make a free decision then if they want to come back home and live their life like before or choose a life in the normal American society. But then they wouldn’t be allowed to come back in their Amish commune anymore for their whole life.

After visiting the nice town Lancaster and getting directions to Intercourse we continued our way. A stop on the Farmers Market in Birds in Hand where we saw a lot of Amish and then we arrived in Intercourse.

There is located the famous Kitchen Kettle Village where you can buy fresh cooked jams, marmalades, jellies, handmade ice cream and chocolate etc. Here were nearly only Amish people. Intercourse is a really tiny town in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch Country. Farms and fields wherever you look when you go outside the town. And all these cute Amish children and horse buggies. In conclusion we must say the Amish are deeply friendly people and you can see that they mean what they say and that they are absolutely happy and satisfied but they also know how to make money with them being so special!

Would love to send our children to that school...

After spending a long time in Intercourse and trying the wonderful handmade ice cream and chocolate we started our way back. We took the way through the back- country of Lancaster County and reached Reading again after around 1h later. But we didn’t head home directly… We wanted to see the Lebanon!