Placerville Sunday 13 / 8/17

Today has been delightful. Warm and sunny with some new exploring. We had a leisurely start and decided to walk the rest of Main Street. We had only seen the top end last night and typical of the area it is not a straight street. When we turned the corner we found it blocked off and a craft fair in full swing.  I thought of Ingrid immediately because she loves such events.  It was a big affair and took us quite a while to browse our way around. There was some lovely pottery and wood work. Lots of fabrics and jewellery of course. When we had seen as much as we wanted we headed off on our original plan which was to visit one of the old mining towns nearby. Georgetown was at the heart of the 1850's gold rush and many of it's buildings are substantial enough to have survived a severe fire in the 1850's. The road up there was amazing. Only 25 miles but it was so narrow and winding it took us 3/4 of an hour to get there. The scenery was beautiful with heavily wooded  steep valleys opening up occasionaly for great views. Unfortunately the narrowness of the roads didn't permit parking for photos. Georgetown was all that we expected with lovely old  stone buildings. We had lunch at the saloon and it was yummy. We just had to be strong and not eat all the fries which came with our sandwich. I had to endure my first serve of iced tea because I can't face soda's and didn't want beer. I will attach a photo which shows the interior of the bar. The photo is deceptive because the place had emptied out while I went back for my tablet. It had been hopping with a seniors group some bikers and some young people. After strolling the street, inspecting the fire station ( very important in this country) and the gift shop we drove home. The way back was through  a couple of different communities. The contrast between those which are close to the highway or have a means of promoting the town and those that were less fortunate was very marked. A couple of places were very evidently peopled by those on low income who lacked the resources to do more than eke out an existance. Tonight we are walking down to Main Street again for dinner and hope to keep our waistlines in check with the exercise.