Lancaster Day 2

For my second day in Lancaster I walked through the town centre (town centres are generally known as 'downtown' in the US and the high street is known as main street I think) and on to a park.

The town's authorities are clearly keen to sell Lancaster as a tourist attraction and encourage visitors. My guess, and it is only a guess, is that the main reason people come here is, like me, to see the Amish. But Lancaster is one of America's oldest towns and I can't blame the town for trying to cash in on this. There are signs saying 'Historic Downtown Lancaster' all over the place.

There is some really beautiful architecture, much of it not unlike that which you might see in England.

The similarity to English architecture goes further unfortunately. Like in England, there are some home owners who believe that the character of their beautiful old brick houses can be greatly improved by a nice bit of stone cladding and don't consider that this would look ludicrous at all. In the below example, note the fine stone cladding to the left.

I love America and Americans, but some of them really know how to take a tasteless idea and push it to the extremes. Here is an example of the result of a home improvement enthusiast who has boldly clad where no Englishman has (hopefully) clad before. The lovely yellow brick terraced house to the left in the picture below has been clad in blue vinyl. God Bless America.

The park was really lovely. I sat in a quiet area next to a stream and a waterfall, read my book and slept for a bit.

Here is a quick video of the tranquil sounds I listened to.

On the train journey on the way back, the man in the seat across from me did not appear able to take his eyes off me from Philadelphia to New York. So I felt very uncomfortable but I suppose I should be flattered.