Kick It Up A Notch ...

“If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun.”

                ~ Katherine Hepburn

                          ~ 1907-2003

The well-known song says “Get your kicks on Route 66,” but this bagpiper kicks it up a notch and clearly shows you can get your kicks wearing a kilt – whoop !

I spotted this Adams Outdoor Advertising billboard on Nineteenth Street in the quaint West End Theatre District of Allentown, Pennsylvania.

It’s advertising the 29^th Annual Celtic Classic Highland Games and Festival September 23-25, 2016 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The Celtic Cultural Alliance hosts the event, which I can personally say was much fun as usual, and a great way to kick off autumn!

Shadowing Serenity ...

"Plant faith, grow hope, harvest love."

The light of sunset serenely shadow dances in October, harvesting a beautiful autumn scene at Hopewell Furnace.

Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site in southeastern Berks County near Elverson, Pennsylvania is an example of an American 19th century rural “iron plantation.” The buildings include a blast furnace, the ironmaster’s house and auxiliary structures including a blacksmith’s shop, a company store and several worker’s houses.

Hopewell Furnace was founded in 1771 by ironmaster Mark Bird for whom Birdsboro was named. The site’s most prosperous time was during the 1820–1840 period with a brief boom in production during the American Civil War. In the mid-19th century changes in iron making, including a shift from charcoal to anthracite rendered smaller furnaces like Hopewell obsolete. The site discontinued operations in 1883.

  

Today, Hopewell Furnace consists of 14 restored structures in the core historic area, 52 features on the List of Classified Structures, and a total of 848 mostly wooded acres. Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site is located in the Hopewell Big Woods and surrounded by French Creek State Park on three sides and the State Game Lands to the south which preserves the lands the furnace utilized for its natural resources.

Peek-A-Blue ...

 “The reason birds can fly and we can’t is simply because they have perfect faith, for to have faith is to have wings.”

               ~ J.M. Barrie

                     ~ 1860-1937

                 from “The Little White Bird”

                           ~ 1902

                 Barrie is the creator of Peter Pan, who first appeared in “The Little White Bird”

A beautiful tree swallow – known for its iridescent blue-green color upper parts – peeks out of its nesting box on a May evening at Lehigh Gap Nature Center.

While there are young or eggs in the nest, adult tree swallows frequently dive bomb intruders, including curious humans, and attempt to drive them from the area – I personally know this to be true, and so does my camera!

In the shadow of the Kittattiny Ridge, also called Blue Mountain, the Lehigh Gap in Slatington, Pennsylvania, is a crossroads where the Lehigh Gap Nature Center’s trails connect two historic trails – the Appalachian Trail and the Delaware and Lehigh Heritage Corridor Trail (D&L Trail). 

The Appalachian Trail, a foot path, follows the ridge on both sides of the Lehigh Gap, running 1,245 miles south to Georgia and 930 miles north to Maine. Running from Wilkes-Barre to Bristol, the D&L Trail passes through the Lehigh and Delaware rivers and their canals in Pennsylvania.