Travel Log Day Four

Fairmont is the county seat of Marion County
and has an elaborate courthouse.

Our trip to WV and MD.

I planned our trip so that we didn't have much "have to" driving except on the first day. We had a few goals, but nothing hard and fast except to get the wood.  So our days were focused with a couple of things we wanted want to do, but with plenty of time to do what we felt like. Ward studied maps and often decided that a particular road or area looked intriguing, and I reserved the right to stop at any roadside marker that looked interesting. Each day we managed to find a good balance among all of them.

We started our day in Fairmont driving and walking around the downtown area. This was on the way to locate a friend's perennial flower farm.  It's a long story, but I knew the person who ran it through another friend. I felt awkward about phoning out of the blue after not hearing from her for a couple of years, so it was decided that if we saw someone outside, we would stop. If not, we would drive on. The drive there took us over many back roads and through the little town of Fairview. We found the farm, but didn't see anyone outside, so we drove on. 

In the meantime, another sister texted me and said we should eat lunch at the Poky Dot Diner in Fairmont. Timing was right, so we headed back into Fairmont to find it. What a fun place to have lunch. It was bright and colorful, both inside and out. The only problem was that we didn't know that we should go for the ice cream. The food was good, but the ice cream looked incredible. Next time, we will eat dessert first.

Then it was onto the other agenda item for the day--a visit to Prickett's Fort State Park. We had passed the turn off for it dozens of times over the years without time to stop. Today I was going to make it happen. 

Prickett's Fort was built in 1973 and is a reconstruction of a fort in the area from the mid-1700's. Forts were common during this time for defense against Native American attacks. We had planned to do some hiking in the park after we explored the fort, but the heat got the better of us and we retreated to the car. 

After the fort, Ward mapped a back way to get to our next destination for the night. Once again we enjoyed country back roads through the hills of West Virginia with a detour to find a covered bridge we read about on a road sign. 

Here are a few more details from the day.

We drove though Fairview, WV, a little town of about 400 people. It must have been bigger at some point to have it's own high school (which is now a middle school.)

I didn't know the name of my friend's farm, but we thought we were in the right place
 when we saw this flag. I checked online later and found out we were.
Next time, I will call.

Our fun lunch spot, The Poky Dot Diner.

Fort Prickett. Inside were shops, a meeting house and cabins. Later I found out from my genealogist sister that our 4th (or 5th) great grandmother, Phoebe Cunningham, was married here. Phoebe is in the history books because she was captured by Native Americans in 1785 and held captive for three years. These finds are incredible to me. I didn't know I had any history related to this area, but in just two days, I found two places my ancestors had lived.

Inside the fort were different crafts people demonstrating jobs from the time period.  We got a personal talk from this spinner and weaver because Ward and I were the only visitors at that time.

We were also the only ones at the blacksmith's shop and could ask questions to our heart's content.

Just south of the fort was Jacob Prickett's house built about 100 years after the original fort.

We took a tour of the house and learned what life was like in the mid 1800's. This time we weren't by ourselves on the tour, but still were able to see everything easily.

Dent's Run Covered Bridge. This bridge was built in 1889 for a cost of $448. The bridge was 1.5 miles from the roadside marker and we had to ask for directions before we found it.