Three days and 2140 miles after leaving Flagstaff we arrived safely at Ben's house in Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania. Although day three of the drive was significantly shorter than the first two days, as expected, it was the tougher of the three drives. We passed through Louisville, Kentucky and Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio so the traffic was heavier. Also, the blue skies we had the first two days gave way to gray, and there was even a little rain near the end of the drive. Nonetheless. it was a fun drive with interesting scenery, good conversation and questionable singing along the way. We were thankful to arrive safely and to be here to enjoy the weekend with Ben and his sweet dog Allie.
Saturday morning, we loaded up the Bullet and headed to Pittsburgh, which is just a little under an hour away. It was another cold, gray day so there wasn't going to be any outside fun on the agenda, but we had some good things lined up. First was a visit to the Roberto Clemente Museum. If you're not a baseball fan you might not be familiar with the name. Clemente was one of the greatest baseball players in the history of the game. He played his entire major league career with the Pittsburgh Pirates. For as great of a ball player as he was, he was an even better humanitarian. On December 31, 1972, he was killed in a plane crash while attempting to deliver supplies to Nicaragua after it experienced one of the worst earthquakes in history on December 23. The museum, which is in a really cool old fire station that is over 100 years old, honors not only his baseball career but his life off the field. If you're even remotely a baseball fan or simply want to learn more about a really good person and you're in Pittsburgh, book yourself a tour!
Ben is blessed with some great friends in this area. Last weekend they took him out for a birthday celebration that included a meal at a BBQ restaurant (Off the Rails) in the Pittsburgh area. He knew we'd enjoy it, and we certainly did! The restaurant was located less than a mile from the Oakmont Country Club, which is a frequent host of the US Open Golf Tournament. We rode by hoping to get a glimpse of the course, which would have had a hefty coating of snow. As we expected, we were turned away at the gate. At least the security guard was friendly as she told us, sorry you can't go past the gate!
We finished our fun Saturday at the Oakmont Bakery, which Ben's friends had also taken him to the previous Saturday. The bakeries tagline is "we create delicious memories". That's a good tagline, but we really liked what they had printed on their coffee mugs, "if you are what you eat, make it sweet". Without question this was one of the wildest, busiest bakeries any of us had ever seen. We were joined by hundreds of other sweet seeking fans, shopping for goodies that included everything you would expect in a bakery and more.
It was a great belated birthday with a wonderful son.
