The weather can
be your best friend or your sworn enemy. And I know that I have bemoaned this
issue a number of times in previous blog posts, but the fact still remains that
what we can do, where we visit, what attractions we see, are very much based on
the weather. So, let’s just say that we visited a lot of indoor places on our 6-day
stop in Charleroi, PA, which is a lovely suburb of Pittsburgh. Whatever outdoor
walking or sightseeing we did, was carefully arranged and scheduled to be as
dry as possible. We made the best of it, also knowing that we shall return one
day, hopefully with sunnier weather, because Pittsburg is a magnificent city,
and we were only able to scratch the surface.
Charleroi, PA
is a small community about 30-miles south of Pittsburgh and is a part of
Washington County. So not wanting to challenge the rain or the traffic and
drive all the way into the city, we found a couple of enjoyable adventures in
and around Washington County. On a cloudy day early on in our visit, with no
forecasted rain, we set out to find some paved walking trails. It had been a
couple of days since we had really done any walking, so we were looking for a
chance to really stretch our legs. We found Mingo Creek County Park. A large
regional park filled with trails, birds and wildflowers, playgrounds, picnic
shelters, and covered bridges. With all the rain, and the threat of more, we
wanted to stay out of the mud, and the Mingo Park paved path was an easy 6-mile
out and back path that parallels Mingo Creek. We walked far enough to go
through both the Henry & the Ebeneezer covered bridges. Pretty neat. The
best thing is that we didn’t get rained on, mostly because we brought the
umbrellas (had we forgotten them, it would have rained).

On another
rather dreary afternoon, we went to the city of Washington to do some indoor exploring
and stay out of the rain. We started our foray into early American history in
western Pennsylvania at the Bradford House. David Bradford was a prominent
lawyer, and Deputy Attorney General for the county. Mr. Bradford became quite
wealthy and constructed a house on South Main which reflected his high social
standing, not only by its size, but also by its fittings. The house has a magnificent
mahogany staircase, and interior finishes that show remarkable craftsmanship. David
Bradford was also one of the foremost leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion and used
his stature and legal standing to oppose the repressive tax on whiskey. I had
no idea whiskey almost brought down the federal government. Sure, whiskey’s
kind of popular now, but not so much as to become a reason for a violent
uprising. The Whiskey Rebellion (aka the “Whiskey Insurrection”) was a violent
tax protest in the United States beginning in 1791 and ending in 1794 during
the presidency of George Washington. The so-called "whiskey tax" was
the first tax imposed on a domestic product by the newly formed federal
government. I think it’s kind of ironic
that President George Washington literally had to bring troops to Washinton
County, named after the President, himself, to put an end to the Whiskey
Rebellion in 1794.

Weather be damned;
eventually you gotta consider sight-seeing in the rain. So, off we went into
Pittsburg proper. One of the best ways to see a city is to proceed to the
tallest point in the city and have a look around. In many cities this means
taking an elevator ride to the top of a skyscraper. This is not the case in
Pittsburg. In this city, in order for us to get a birds-eye-view of the
surroundings, we decided to ride the Duquesne Incline up to Duquesne Heights.
So basically, we took an outside elevator 400-feet up the side of a cliff,
until we were perched high above the city. From here we got a fantastic view of
the city, the numerous connecting bridges and surrounding neighborhoods. Some
of the more prominent and memorable sights from our vantage point were the PPG
Industries Glass skyscraper, the Fred Rogers Memorial, the location of PNC Park
(baseball), and Three River Stadium (football). I’m no real stadium expert, but
from our vantage point eating on the back deck of a wonderfulrestaurant, I
absolutely understand why the football stadium was named “Three-River
Stadium”. Anyone can plainly see the stadium
is situated on the shoreline of the three converging rivers, Ohio, Allegheny
& Monongahela. Ohh, what’s that, it’s not called Three River Stadium
anymore. What? I am being told of a name change to “Acrisure Stadium”. My mistake, it seemed too obvious to me but
what do I know?

For those days,
and I do mean days, when the rain just would not stop, we turned our adventures
to indoor museums such the Senator John Heinz History Center. This is a great
museum by any standards. Set in a former ice warehouse in the “Strip District”
of downtown, there are five floors, totaling 275,000 sq feet of exhibit
space. There is something in this museum
for everyone. We’ve been to a lot of big museums, and this one is pretty darn
big, so it was great to find out that our entrance fee was good for visiting
the museum on two consecutive days. So that’s what we did. We saw galleries
that included the history of the H.J. Heinz Co, the Western Pennsylvania Sports
Museum (Steelers, Pirates, Arnold Palmer), and an exhibit that traced the Lewis
and Clark expedition. I think one of the exhibits Judy and I enjoyed the most
was Mr. Rogers Studio. Fred Rogers is a Pittsburgh native, and the show was
filmed at a PBS affiliated station. The
museum did a wonderful job of preserving Fred Rogers’s soft-spoken nature, whilst
displaying many artifacts from the original set. Memorable artifacts like his sneakers, sweater
and many of the handmade puppets were on display. I think, all told, between the two days, we
must have spent 8+ hours in the museum, and still missed entire exhibits.

Pittsburg was
the second to last stop on this 6,000-mile, four-month journey, and the
soggiest. True to form, on the morning of the day we were to pack up and
travel, it was raining. Everything got stowed away wet, in the hopes that it
would be drier at our next stop. That stop is 260-miles due east of Pittsburgh,
a place we have stayed before called Manheim, PA in Lancaster County. (See blog post: We conclude our southern expedition with
a stop to explore chocolate & ice cream, dated May 18, 2024.) My
brother & family live nearby, and this location is a reasonable drive to
home in Massachusetts. Funny, as I review my old blog post, seems the weather
was none too cooperative during my previous stay either. Ohh
well, it will be what it will be, as we tell…
the Rest of the Story.
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