I’m barreling down I-81 south through the Shenandoah Valley as I write my final travel log. Marion is taking the first shift behind the wheel this morning. I am navigating poorly because we missed the exit to Buc-cee’s.

“You’re not doing your job,” she says.

This necessitated a seven-mile round trip back to Buc-cee’s. The bathrooms are that clean.

The sky is cobalt blue. The fields are green. The Alleghanies to the west are standing tall. The Blue Ridge Mountains to the east are outlined by long shadows dividing the ridges from the hollows, the early morning sunlight piercing through the blue haze. I wish I could paint it for you so you could see it.

One of my retirement goals was to travel this country with Max. Just me and my faithful dog. We took a little road trip up into Kentucky, then few day trips to visit old friends. But my travels with Max were not meant to be.

When I met Marion, one of the things that drew us together was our desire to go see places we’d never seen before. Pick a destination. Set a date. Chart a course. Get on the road and go.

“It won’t happen if we don’t put in on the calendar,” she would say.

Which is the way it goes in most of life. If there’s no goal, there’s no dream. If there’s no appointed time to leave, there’s no plan. Until you pack a bag and head out, the dream never becomes a reality. Which is why we put this trip on our calendar over a year ago.

For the record, Marion is a much better traveling companion than Max. For one thing, Max couldn’t drive or use his phone to find some place to eat. Marion is always concerned about feeding me.

I saw a sign in a store yesterday that I should adopt as my motto for trips like this. “A full life cannot be enjoyed on an empty stomach.” Marion makes sure that I don’t starve.

Today is an interstate kind of day. Dodging construction zones and semi-trucks. The sway of the truck and rough pavement are making it kind of hrd too t;yp3.

Our favorite part of the trip, though, has been the back roads. The farmlands. Small towns. The winding hill country. This is where we found the most interesting places and met some of the most colorful characters.

Like Fannie.

Yesterday, we stepped inside a wood framed building in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania that was built in 1861. Fannie stepped out from behind the counter to greet us. She is maybe five-foot-two. A white bonnet sits atop silver-grey hair, the white ribbons of the bonnet dangling down over her black dress. Her white apron is tied at the waist.

Her face is round, and her eyes are bright behind her gold-rimmed wire glasses. The wrinkles in her skin are hardly noticeable behind her gentle smile, and her voice is cheerful.

“I will tell you what I tell all the men who come in here,” she says to me.

Although this is a gift shop, I am captivated more by the building itself than the wares on the shelves. Old timber beams held together by wooden pegs. Overhead there are mechanical shafts with pulleys connected by thick belts. I can tell that they are not for decoration. They are somehow connected to the history of this place.

“Most of the men who come in here can’t stop looking at the ceiling.”

Fannie is standing beside me with her hands clasped in front of her apron. Her grin tells me she has more to say.

Hanging from almost every beam are the artifacts of a woodshop from another era. Buck saws. Wooden templates for table legs. Hand augers. Levers. Turnbuckles. Wooden clamps.

“Whatever you see on the ceiling is not for sale,” she says.

“Miss Fannie, everything is for sale if the money is right.”

I’ve watched way too many episodes of American Pickers.

“Not here,” she says.

When the owner bought this place to turn it into a trendy Amish gift store, she fell in love with what this building stood for in this community. She made it her mission to retain as much of the authenticity of the place as she could. Whatever was here when she found it, it stayed put.

Fannie held a hand up with her index finger in the air. “Let me show you something you may not have seen.”

Hidden beneath all the clutter, otherwise known as handmade crafts, were the benches and tables of the old woodshop. A 12 ft lathe sat atop a long wooden table. The bandsaw, the massive jig saw, the table saw, the planer, the mortise and tenon cutter, the drill press; they were all there.

Once I saw it, I couldn’t see anything else. Stout wooden frames. Cast iron wheels and worm screws. Brass marking plates. The old traditions of woodcraft moving into the industrial age.

“There used to be a hit-and-miss engine in the basement that ran all of these machines.” Fannie knows that I am soaking up every word. “And over on that end, there’s an elevator that operated by rope and counterweights. They used it to move their timber supplies from the loft down to the shop.”

The central line shaft runs the length of the building overhead. Secondary shafts are connected by four-inch leather belts. At each workstation, the belts drop down to the machines. I’ve seen old gristmills set up similarly, but never a woodshop like this.

“What did they do here,” I asked.

“They built wagons,” she tells me. “Not the fancy buggies, but the farm and freight wagons. When the steam locomotive came along, it hurt the wagon business. By the late 1800’s they were making furniture here.”

It occurs to me that I am standing where the earliest Conestoga wagons were made. These are the wagons that moved America west to the Mississippi. Dutch and German immigrants from 160 years ago stood on this very floor. They brought with them the dreams and hard work to make a life for themselves, the spirit of which lives on in this small Amish community today.

Sometimes we think of the Amish as quaint, with their oil lamps, simple dress, and their horse drawn buggies. They have, for the most part, become a tourist attraction for the majority of us more comfortable Americans.

But Fannie reminds me of something more. She is tied to a time in this country when small farms, village shops, and neighborliness made us a simpler and more kind-hearted community. A better people. Her lessons about the woodshop were one of the highlights of this trip for me.

Well, the Tennessee line is coming up. By suppertime we should be home.

Thanks for going on the road with us. Maybe we’ll venture out again one of these days and you can be bombarded with more of my sappy travel adventures. Maybe you’ll take one of your own. I hope you do.

Gotta go. Marion is beginning to weave all ob@r thw r0#d. The big trucks are getting to her.

It’s my turn to drive.