Heading North Part II: A Stop in Amish Country

Berlin, OH - Events of Tuesday, July 16 to Thursday, July 18, 2019

After leaving Lora and J. Michael's house in Pittsburgh around noon on Tuesday morning (July 16), we headed west to Berlin, Ohio, which is in the heart of Ohio's Amish country. We pulled into Berlin right around 3:00.

Last year, we stayed at an Airbnb loft apartment a mile or two west of downtown Berlin. This year, we stayed at an Airbnb apartment right outside downtown Berlin. This spacious accommodation furnished with several family heirlooms felt like home, and the hosts were generous, gracious, and thoughtful. It was a gem of a find.

Berlin apartment kitchen

View of dining-living areas with the dining table from the hostess' childhood

View of the bedroom with the quilt made by the hostess' grandmother

After we got settled, we headed back out to Der Dutchman in Walnut Creek for their salad bar for lupper. It was yummy!

Der Dutchman Restaurant

We stopped in the bakery after lupper looking for fry pies to have for dessert later. We both wanted peach, but they were out of them, so we ordered some for the next morning. We also asked them to hold two caramel cream sticks for us for breakfast as well. Seems like recently the bakery frequently runs out of our favorite flavor of cream sticks (caramel) relatively early, and we didn't want to take any chances since our stay in Berlin was relatively short.

On Wednesday morning, we headed back to Der Dutchman Bakery to pick up our fry pies. They have a couple of tables with stools, so we ate the cream sticks right then and there. They were delish!

Paul with his cream stick

From the bakery, we went to Walnut Creek Cheese to pick up a few supplies and snacks for our stay. Then we made a stop at Keim Lumber so Paul could browse. Keim has lots different types of wood, tools, and hardware that you can't find at most other home improvement stores. Paul always has fun looking around Keim.

Late in the morning, we drove about 30 minutes northeast to Massillon, Ohio, to stop at Menard's. They are a lot like Lowe's and Home Depot, but they are different enough to make it very interesting. Even Margery likes to look around Menards.

Also located nearby in Massillon is Smoke: The Burger Joint. Smoke has delicious smoked burgers and yummy twice-cooked fries. Margery had a San Antonio BBQ burger with American cheese, mayo, onion straws, and barbecue sauce ($7.29), and Paul had a build-your-own burger ($5.99) with American cheese ($1 extra), tomato, and pickle. Everything was delish!

Margery chowing down on her burger

We headed back to our apartment for an evening of TV. Later in the evening, we enjoyed our fry pies.

Margery's college classmate, Marilyn, and her friend, Larry, live in Ohio a couple of hours to the north of Berlin. They stopped by to spend Thursday with us on their way to Columbus for Marilyn's granddaughter's birthday.

They arrived a little before 11 a.m. After we visited for a while, we decided to head out to Warther's Carvings in nearby Sugarcreek. David Warther, who owns Warther Carvings, is the grandson of the late Ernest "Mooney" Warther, who was another carver from the area. While Mooney carved trains, David carves boats. Both the trains and boats are made from wood and ivory. Ivory trade is strictly regulated in the U.S., so all the ivory used is legally-obtained, antique ivory.

The ships in the museum trace the history of sailing vessels starting with the early ships of the Egyptians and Phoenicians. The photo below shows a 12 to 15-inch replica of King Tut's ship (ca. 1335 BC). As you can see from the magnifying glass, the ships are carved in intricate detail. Note that you can click on any photo for a larger view.

Replica of King Tut's ship (1335 BC)

The next photos show the Mayflower (1620) and the USS Constitution (1797).

Mayflower (1620)

USS Constitution (1797)

Also on display in the museum are David Warther's earliest carvings he did when he was a child. His first one was a Viking ship and was done at age 6. It is in the center of the photo below.

David Warther's early ship carvings

One room in the museum has a window where visitors can watch David at work in his shop.

David Warther working in his shop

David interrupts his work to come out to talk to each tour group to answer questions, to explain a number of the steps, and to give details on the methods he uses to create his ship models. We visited the museum a couple of years ago, and David wasn't in that day, so we were very pleased we got to talk to him this time. Paul, who likes scale models and who likes to make things with his hands, was fascinated.

After visiting Warther Carvings, we headed up the road and made a stop to browse the Walnut Creek Amish Flea Market on the way to have lupper at Park Street Pizza. We all shared a large pizza, an order of bread sticks, and an order of boneless chicken wings (a.k.a. chicken nuggets). Everything was delish!

Park Street Pizza

After lupper, we drove back to Berlin. Marilyn and Larry headed off to check into their B 'n B in nearby Winesburg, and we went back to let Freeway out and to freshen up.

Over the past few years, several live theaters have sprung up in the Berlin/Sugarcreek area to provide visitors with something to do in the evenings since just about everything closes at 5 p.m. The theaters have either family-friendly dramas or comedies with Amish themes or variety shows. There is a new theater just to the east of downtown Berlin called the Amish Country Theater that has a variety show, so we met Marilyn and Larry there in time for the 7:00 show.

There were lots of corny jokes, funny skits, and music. Of course, there was also audience participation. The next photo shows a ventriloquist performing "Old McDonald Had a Farm" with one of half a dozen guys from the audience. Each person held up a cut-out of the lower portion of a face in front of his own face. The ventriloquist went from person to person operating the lower jaw and making the different animal sounds as he went through the song. He used a different voice for each person, and we have no idea how he kept all the voices straight. It was hilarious!

Ventriloquist performing "Old McDonald Had a Farm" with one of the volunteers from the audience

One of the musical numbers

After the show, we all went to Dairy Queen. We then said our good-byes to Marilyn and Larry, who were heading on to Columbus the next morning. We'll tell you about the rest of of our visit to Amish country in our next post.