We went to Pennsylvania on July 2nd 2021.(Independence Day weekend).
Brief Summary:
Place: Pennsylvania.
Location: Pennsylvania.
Distance: 316 miles.
Members: Me, my wife and my friends.
Transport: Audi Q3.
Duration: 5 hours 34 minutes.
Experience:
Day 1 - Cabin:
On 2nd July we woke up around 6:30am. Around 10:00am I went to airport, parked our car there and brought the rental car. we started at 11:16am. First we went to the Indian store to get some vegetables and few other items. We decided to cook all our favorite delicious items at the site.
We started our journey to cabin around 12:38pm. Before the start of or journey we brought the food for lunch. Around 1:20pm we had our lunch. First we drove on the interstate for about an hour and then our journey was completely on mountain road. On the way we saw so many horses, cows, farms and fields. We saw so many beautiful sceneries as well. Weather was so good as well. It was not too sunny on that day. There were trees on either side of the road and were intertwined and look like beautiful arches. Sometimes we passed the road in between two mountains. After sometime we reached the city of Pennsylvania. Before we reached the cabin we saw so many types of cabins which made us think how our cabin will look like. We thought our cabin might be in middle of the trees and in a lonely place. While we were thinking like that, suddenly we got doubt if were we travelling on wrong direction, because we were still on the narrow road and seems like we were reaching the dead end. The road was not suited for travelling in a car. After sometime we entered into very narrow road still we did not see our cabin but within 2 minutes we saw our cabin in the middle of the trees and it was in completely a lonely place like exactly how we thought about it. We reached our cabin around 5:45pm.We entered into cabin and put all the luggage in the living room and checked rooms, beds, water, electricity and everything to see if they are in good condition or not. Yes they were in really good condition we really liked it very much. Then we reached our car in the parking spot in front of the cabin.
Then we saw a pavement into the cabin. Beside the cabin there was a big ground, in that ground there was a picnic bench and a big fire pit and some chairs. On the left side of the cabin there was an old fashioned bore pump and beside of it there was a small stream. The entrance door of the cabin was like creaky net door and there was hall before the main entrance. there was a another picnic bench and so many out door games also there. In the main hall there was big sofa and a tea table, left side of the hall there was one bedroom. In the hall under the TV there was a wooden box with some indoor board games. After the hall there was a kitchen after that one full bath and another bedroom also there. In the hall there was a staircase to the another bedroom with half bath. In that bedroom there was an antique wooden box with full of teddy bears. Other side of the bed there was a closet with extra comforters and pillows and one wooden bench also there. Around 7:30pm our friends arrived. They also took a look around the cabin and liked it as well. We had our dinner around 10:00pm. Then we saw a movie until 12:30am and around 12:45am we fell asleep.
Day 2 - Laurel Caves and Living treasure animal park :
Next day , it was Saturday we woke up around 5:30am and got ready. we had our breakfast around 8:30am. Then we started to Laurel Caves. It was our first attraction in this trip and it was one hour away from our cabin.
We saw so many white horses in the beautiful farms on our way, it was just like a movie scene. We reached caves around 10:55am. These caves are very huge and very deep. They arranged the caves with very beautiful lights. These lights gave awesome look to the caves. Some places in the caves are very slippery. In the caves some ways were very narrow and low height also. Our knees almost touched the ground. We saw different glowing bacteria also , it was coming from the cave's walls liquid. These bacteria are harmless and just glow in the dark. When we went deep down to the caves it was getting cold. This was one of the sand cave in the world. Because of some chemical reactions the cave walls are transforming into sand. We enjoyed the caves a lot. This was different experience than with other caves. We came out from the caves around 12:32pm.
We started to Falling Water around 12:40pm. But the Falling water entry tickets are sold out so we planned to go to the Seven spring Adventure park. We reached the park around 1:40pm , we enquired about pass, activities timings and everything so it was too late to take the pass, even if we take the pass we cannot complete all the activities so we decided to go to the Living treasures animal park. We had our lunch around 2:30pm on picnic table. Then around 3:15pm we started to go to Zoo. We took the entrance tickets for the zoo. In the zoo we saw a big tortoise first, it was really a big one and was eating carrots. The shell of the tortoise was very hard it was not doing anything even though we tapped on it. Then we saw the deers, ducks, camels, bysons, horses, bears, tigers, wolves and birds, some kind of reptiles as well.
We fed some of these animals. It was very nice experience we had while we were feeding to the animals. We enjoyed a lot with those. And some kind of animals and ducks are gentle only but when we go near to them with food they were very aggressive, sometimes they were eating and poking our fingers. We did not get hurt but it was funny experience. There we saw Ponies also and kids were riding them. Our friend's son also rode those. It was a lovely moment for them too. Then we saw so many types of birds like eagles, owls, parrots, peacocks swans and so many kinds of hen also were there. I never seen before these many kind of hen. We went to zoo in perfect time I think as all the animals were very active. Especially the grizzly bears and wolves are very active and they were roaming very fast in their boundaries and also bears and wolves were big in size. We saw two tigers there one was white and other one was Bengal tiger,
they are also huge but they were just resting. We saw so many kinds of monkeys also and as usual they were very active and aggressive with funny acts. Even though we know how the monkey will behave we did not get bore unknowingly we spent a lot of time near those cages. We saw many zoos before but we enjoyed this one a lot. We never fed animals like this. The animals also were very active and seems like happy to see humans. We came out from zoo around 5:20pm and we reached our cabin around 6:00pm. We decided to put campfire and make some barbecue items. Then we pitched our tent. The ground was very smooth with soft grass so it does not took much time to pitch the tent. Then the campfire, it took a lot of time for us to arrange it because of the cloudy weather the wood took too long time to burn. But at last we arranged the campfire. Meanwhile we were cooking some barbecue stuff to eat. After sometime everything was setup- the camp fire, hot and spicy food, tent. We sat around the fire, eating food and were talking about the caves, zoo and entire our trip of that day. Then we went into the tent and played couple of card games. After sometime it started getting cold, so we went into the cabin and had dinner around 10:00pm. We started to plan our next day of our trip. We had a plan to go to Seven spring Adventure Park , so we booked our tickets online to the park and for adventure activities. Then we watched a movie and slept around 12:00am.
Day-3: Seven Spring Adventure park
The next day morning we woke up around 6:00am and had our breakfast around 10:15am. Then we started to Seven Spring Adventure Park around 10:50am.
We reached the park around 11:15am. Then we entered into the ticket counter, we already booked for all day pass for all the activities so we got the wrist bands(passes) for the entrance to all the activities. Once we came out from the counter we started our adventure activities in the park. In the park we saw big ground first, everybody were roaming, taking photos and kids were playing games over there. There are some rides and water activities and some indoor games also there. First we decided to do water activities. Water activities are little away from the rides, we did one and half mile hike also for that. We saw big lake over there, we wore the life jackets first and did the water car riding, paddle boats, paddle cycling. This paddle cycling was a different one, we never saw it before anywhere, it was very interesting one but we have to ride it slowly. Then we did all other rides also. While we were doing kayaking we sung songs like in the old movies and we had the perfect weather also at that time, cloudy and cool soothing wind.
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We enjoyed a lot with water rides. Then we were ready to go down to do the other activities in the park. There was a ride called alpine slide to go down. In this ride we have to ride our car on the slide. It was really funny and adventurous, we all enjoyed this ride a lot. Once we came down in front of our eyes we saw so many outdoor and indoor activities. We plan to do outdoor activities first then after lunch indoor activities. Then we did the Chair lift there, we saw amazing views, mountains and we saw people who were doing the alpine slide. While we were doing chair lift ride we thought that we can do the alpine slide one more time once we reached there but there was long queue so we did not do that. Then we all did the trampoline thing and kids did the Rockwall climbing. We had packed our lunch from the cabin so we had our lunch on park bench around 3:00pm. Then we went to play indoor games. First we started playing indoor games with Miniature golf, it was very funny and little bit difficult to hit the ball into the hole in one shot.
Sometimes it took too many shots to hit the ball but we all are enjoyed it. Next we went to play Bowling, this was a favorite indoor game for me and my wife. We really enjoyed to play this game with our friends it was like competition between us. Then kids wanted to play in swimming pool but we did not allow as there are already too many people in the pool and felt it might not be safe. Then we went to play Arcade games. We bought four cards and we all played got many coupons to buy toys. After that before we bought the toys we had our dinner around 8:10pm. Then we went to buy with the coupons, there was a big line to change the coupons into points to the card and finally we got our points to the cards then bought small toys with all the points. We played these Arcade games very quickly because it was getting time to get a place to watch the fire works. Then we came down to watch fireworks around 9:10pm and finally we got the perfect place on ground to watch. Around 9:30pm they started the fire works and for 15 minutes continuously they lit up the fireworks . We watched the fireworks before also many times in different places but these were really different and beautiful and also sitting on the ground and watching that was a perfect view. We watched fireworks before in Disney land in Florida but we like these fireworks more. Then we reached the cabin around 10:25pm. We packed all our stuff and talked about our entire 3 days trip. Then the next day we had a plan to see the Laurel state park and the waterfalls. Then we slept around 1:15am.
Day-4 Laurel hill state park
The next day morning we woke up around 7:00am. That was the last day of our trip so we were all busy in packing all our stuff to vacate the cabin.
Around 10:15am we had our breakfast then we packed all the stuff and placed those in our car and last we were ready to leave. We stayed in this cabin for 3 days only but when we were leaving we felt like it was our home. We played games here, enjoyed the small outdoor games activities, did camping, cooked delicious items. We enjoyed a lot in this cabin. Around 11:40am we vacated our cabin and started to Laurel hill state park. While we were going in that route we saw the horses and beautiful scenic views one last time. In 15 minutes around 12:00pm we reached the Laurel hill state park. We saw there was a big lake and so many people were playing over there. We parked our car in parking lot and went there to see what type activities are there.
There we saw all the water activities only and also we already done those in Seven Spring park. Even though if we want to do those again there was a pretty big line to the tickets so we did not go there. Previously at the cabin we came to know there was beautiful waterfall in that park, we searched for nearly 20 minutes and then finally we got the information that we have to do the small hike to see that falls. Then we started hiking to the falls around 12:24pm. It was the first time we did the hiking without shoes but without a problem because it was not very steep. We used the sticks as support for us. We talked about our entire trip while we were walking. While we were talking we heard the water sound after sometime, reached the waterfalls. The falls really are beautiful but these falls are not natural, they are man made. But they built it very beautifully, almost looks like natural falls. The water was very cold, in that hot weather we enjoyed the temperature of water, we felt so fresh. We took lot of photos there and then started to go back. We reached the parking lot and started to go home around 1:40pm. We had our lunch in Taco bell and reached airport. We returned the rental car and drove home in our car. Reached home around 7:00pm.
We really enjoyed this trip very much. We stayed in excellent vintage cabin, saw different places, had thrilling experiences, saw beautiful scenic views, did different activities and played lot of games. We happily spent these holidays with our friends, collected so many beautiful memories and happily reached our home with those. All is Well.
We woke up at 5:30am. We have tried to get up around 4:30am but we could not do it. We got freshened, packed the breakfast and lunch and started around 7:15am. The hike location is around 1 hour 15 minutes journey from our home. The weather was sunny along with the cool breeze. We took country side road instead of interstate highway. We saw beautiful farms, fields, gardens, cows, horses and excellent houses and villas also. Some houses have extraordinary environment with lakes and farms. The entire road had beautiful scenic views on either side. To enjoy these things we always look for country side road only. Around 8:40am we have reached hike location. we saw two parking lots over there, one is at entrance of the location another one is near the river for that parking lot we to cross the first one. Initially we had lot of confusion about the trail. The instructions which we got from the net are not clear. We have to follow the red blazed trail that is Mile run trail. we have searched for the trail for sometime but we could not find it so we asked about it to bikers passing by and they guided us which way we have to go. 
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