Jaunted

On our half hour tour through wind, rain and snow, a guy called Tom and his horse Chino took us on a two-mile circuit around the countryside. The ride itself was marginally interesting—you can drive around the roads, and though we went through an Amish farm, it’s just as easy to drive up to one that’s selling produce. But what was fascinating was hearing about the Amish lifestyle (Tom turned out to be Mennonite, but for obvious reasons, gave us more details about the Amish).

Those tiny outhouses you see? Those are the phone huts. The covered bridges? They exist because the green lumber, from which they were made, needed to be protected. The language? A mix between German and Dutch. Totally fascinating.

But the absolute best bit was riding in the buggy. The inside was surprisingly cramped and unsurprisingly cold, but moving around at a different pace really does make you look at life differently; the Amish don’t have anything against cars, we learned, but think buggies are a more sociable way to travel, and a way of taking life slowly and calmly. And you know what? After half an hour in one, we think they may have a point.

Buggy rides cost $10 for the half hour tour. There are plenty of discount tickets around, but we felt too embarrassed to use ours.

*Slight cheat – Blue Ball is in Delaware, but we made it there all the same.

Photos: Juliab for Jaunted