The Boomers have Arrived

The first Elderhostel Bicycling group of nearly forty departs today after arriving five days ago and riding between twenty and forty miles a day through the countryside surrounding Amish Acres and Nappanee in Elkhart and Marshall Counties. Highlights included lunch in an Amish home, visits to an Amish country store, Mennonite Church, Goshen College, and a stern wheeler paddle boat ride on the St. Joseph River.

They were treated to Threshers Dinner, Forever Plaid Theme Buffet hosted by the cast and company of The Round Barn Theatre, a haystack supper, yodelers, Plain and Fancy, Forever Plaid, and Amish Acres and Nappanee history by yours truly. Marlies West has mastered the details of these events.

The group included novices and seasoned riders in a senior celebration of vitality and an enormous appetite to learn new things about different people and culture. They came from Webster Groves, Missouri; Monroe, Wisconsin; Rockford, Illinois; Evansville, Indiana; Columbus, Ohio; LaSalle, Illinois; St. Paul Minnesota; Lansing and Ann Arbor, Michigan; Warrenton, Oregon and Freemont, Sebastopol, Santa Barbara, San Diego, and San Francisco, California.