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Elderhostel Notebook #34 Oct 1, 1998
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Elderhostel Notebook provides a place for elderhostlers to share
information about Elderhosteling and other learning experiences
related to travel.
It has a world wide web site at
http://discover-net.net/~jimo/eldnote/eldnote.html
It is an independent project, appreciative of but not associated
with Elderhostel Inc. which has a web site at
http://www.elderhostel.org
To subscribe to the e-mail edition send an e-mail to
jimo@discover-net.net
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Contents
From the Editors Notebook
Elderhostel News and Reviews
Glyn Eyrie Conference Center, Colorado Springs
Atlanta - Mercer College March, 1998
Gettysburg, Pennsylvania September 1998
HIDDEN VALLEY, AN INSTITUTE OF THE PERFORMING ARTS
Hershey PA Elderhostel
Toronto elderhostel at Humber College
Personals
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Editor's Notebook
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We now have two indexes to the back issues of the notebooks.
Frank Jablonski, frank.jablonski@snet.net, has constructed one
using Quatro Pro data base which allows for printouts based on
various headings.
The current version using locations as main headings is located
on the notebook web page.
HGlucks@aol.com has developed one that he keeps on his web page
at AOL (which he invites all to visit). See his note in personals
for details.
Sometimes AOL correspondents e-mail is not available because they
has set their mail controls to exclude all but selected mail to
help stem the flood of junk mail on AOL. It is probably a good
idea to test AOL addresses before sending a lengthy e-mail to see
if you can get through.
AOL correspondents are reminded that setting mail controls can
create misunderstandings if people get a "user is not accepting
mail from you" message.
I'm still a little behind in catching up with reports in my
reserve file.
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Elderhostel News and Reviews
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Glyn Eyrie Conference Center, Colorado Springs, CO, July 26-31,
1998
Larry Doyle doyles@earthlink.net
WoW! What a beautiful setting. This is a 700 acre site located in
Colorado Springs just north of The Garden of the Gods (photo).
The geology of that area extends into the Glyn Eyrie site and is
at the foothills of the mountains (Rampart Range). It is run by
the Navigators, a non-demoninational Christian organization. The
site is within minutes of downtown and only about 25 minutes from
the airport. Wild deer bighorn sheep wander over the hills
grounds. So quiet you never realize how close you are to a
sizeable city.
Our Host, Lorraine Rush, was just outstanding and would quickly
respond to all requests. The lodging was motel-style and very
comfortable. The only direct influence of the Navigator's
organization was No TV and No Alcohol. Food was served in their
main dinning room in 'The Castle' (photo) and was varied and
plentiful - not to mention downright good.
There were 52 Elderhosteliers but we never felt crowded. The
program was one day shorter than usual and ended after noon on
Friday There were three parts of the program:
1) Colorado Springs: It's History It's Founder. The instructor,
Leslie Bergstrom, sure enjoyed her subject and that showed in our
participation. She gave lectures with slides and we had a field
trip downtown to two museums.
2) Varied Splendor: Geology of the Pikes Peak Region (photo).
Priscilla Neus brought this subject alive with slides, practical
demonstrations and a hike. Lots of great information and she is a
very good instructor.
3) Art, Music Ideas: OK, I fess up. This was the part I was
least interested in but our instructor, Oksana Ross, managed to
suck me in and I found myself really enjoying it. She gave
lectures, slides, piano pieces and a field trip to the Fine Arts
Center.
Great location, terrific Host Instructors, very good food, nice
lodging and great company. Will recommend this one for all.
editor's note- There is a page of photos to accompany this report
in the web edition photopage.
_____________
Atlanta - Mercer College March, 1998
Stayed at a Ramada Inn on the outskirts of Atlanta. It was built
as a Hyatt Regency so was much more deluxe than an ordinary
Ramada. Rooms had refrigerators, microwaves and big windows with
beautiful views.
Food was abundant and delicious. Bacon, sausages, cereals,
fruits, and eggs for breakfast. Lunch was an abundant buffet
with pasta, salads, hot roast beef, etc. Of course they always
had a buffet of fancy desserts - cheese cakes, fancy tortes,
etc., of which we could eat as many as we wanted. We were served
dinner in a room lighted by crystal chandeliers.
We had several fascinating lectures about Atlanta and its
history.
During free time we took a 1.5 mile hike up to the top of Stone
Mountain, which is really is a large stone mountain with the
figures of Lee, Jefferson Davis and Stonewall Jackson carved on
it. It was started by the same sculptor who carved Mount
Rushmore, but only finished in the 70's. Toured the Jimmy Carter
presidential library which was surrounded by gardens with
blooming spring flowers. The library displayed many artifacts of
the Carter presidency.
Visited the Atlanta Cyclorama which displays a 360' 100+ year
old painting of civil war scenes. There is a 30' stage in front
of the painting on which are statues, wagons, etc., that give the
painting a 3 dimensional effect. You sit in seats and the
painting revolves around you with lighting, sounds and a recorded
narrative. It was a precursor of the modern movie.
Also visited the World of Coca Cola which shows many posters,
etc., depicting the history of coca cola. It also has a soda
fountain at which you can get versions of coke as it is sold in
other countries in the world. Surprised that there are many
other versions of coke! Thought there was just one coke.
Spend several hours at the Atlanta History Society which had many
interesting exhibits about the civil war and several display
houses on its grounds.
Had several air-conditioned bus tours (with rest room) of Atlanta
which seems to be a city with many beautiful trees and flowers,
all of which seemed to be blooming. In the bus we toured Emory
college which is beautiful and reminded me of the Univ. of Texas
in Austin. Also toured Georgia Tech and Georgia State U which
are also in Atlanta. Also drove by the house where Margaret
Mitchell wrote "Gone With the Wind" and the cemetery in which she
is buried.
The bus tour went thru the wealthy Bulkhead section of Atlanta
which has many beautiful estates including the 18 acre estate of
the governor.
Atlanta is a beautiful city and was very easy to drive around
with in our car. The hotel where we stayed was very convenient
to highways.
Kay Secrist is very organized and everything ran like clockwork.
Highly recommend this Elderhostel.
Bill
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Gettysburg, Pennsylvania September 1998
Jean Sterling sterlij@freenet.tlh.fl.us
Classes: Three Days at Gettysburg Why the North Won Why the
South Lost Related Topics
Gettysburg is what is known as an elderhostel super site, because
they host more than 30 elderhostels each year. The coordinator
told us that they learn from every evaluation form that is handed
in, and they run a really fine elderhostel. Everybody the
motel people, the coordinators, the instructors, and the people
at the restaurant where we had our meals went out of their way
to make the week enjoyable and educational.
Accommodations were at the Days Inn. The motel was quite new and
very nice. There was a fitness center, which featured a
treadmill just like we have at the YMCA and some weights. The
YWCA sponsored the elderhostel and we had use of their facilities
as well. A van was available for trips to the battlefield, the
YMCA, or downtown. We had breakfast at the Days Inn a choice of
cereals, fresh fruit, bagels and such, and some apple strudel
that was absolutely delicious. Lunch and dinner were at Perkins,
which was next to the Days Inn. Perkins provided tasty fare that
provided for the vegetarian and folks who might be watching their
fat intake.
The Battle of Gettysburg lasted for three days, and Three Days at
Gettysburg covered each of the three days. We had some lecture,
which was followed by a field trip to the battlefield. The
instructor was a licensed battlefield tour guide who had written
some books about the battle. He did not rely on secondary
sources, such as other peoples book. A lot of his research had
been done using actual letters and memoirs of people who had
actually been in the battle. He was enthusiastic and
interesting.
In the discussions about the reasons the north won, I learned
some interesting things I hadnt realized before. For instance,
the South had pretty much been victorious until Gettysburg, and
there were people in the North who just wanted to let them go.
This was in spite of the many handicaps that the South had. The
determination of Abraham Lincoln kept the North in the fray. The
instructor for this class was very interesting and really knew
his subject very well.
Related topics covered a variety of subjects such as medical care
in the Civil War, the role of African-American in the war, and a
visit from President Abraham Lincoln. President Lincoln was
amazing the fellow, except for being a bit shorter, looked just
like him. He was presented as the President of the United States
and talked to us about his problems with keeping the Union
together. After about 30 minutes, there was a question and
answer period when we could ask questions. People addressed him
as Mr. President and asked some excellent questions. Another
visitor was a Civil War surgeon dressed in Confederate gray, who
discussed Civil War medicine with us. He had a great array of
pills and potions, and showed us where the surgeon kept his
scissors (stuck in his tunic), where he kept his scalpel (in his
saddlebag or in his mouth while operating), and wherehe sharpened
his scalpel (on his boot). Anesthesia, such as ether, was
available and used during the Civil War, but cleanliness in the
operating room was not practiced at this time.
This was a great elderhostel for learning a lot about the Civil
War in a very interesting way. I recommend it.
_______________
HIDDEN VALLEY, AN INSTITUTE OF THE PERFORMING ARTS - California
Steve/Maxine Slomka diskalog@ziplink.net
I've just returned from Elderhostel at Hidden Valley, CA and
can't believe I stayed the entire time. It was a truly abysmal
experience. This is my 5th Elderhostel which in no way compares
to the other four. Our coordinator coordinated nothing. Except
at mealtimes, he was rarely around. Scheduling was idiotic --
breakfasts at 9, lunch at noon, and dinner at six. Nothing
further was provided until breakfast again at nine the next day.
There was no phone or TV -- which I knew before I came -- however
there was nothing else. Even the daily newspaper was provided by
an Elderhosteler. When a videotape was played of an evening, an
Elderhosteler was in charge of turning it on. When we went to the
aquarium, we had to arrange our own transportation and then an
Elderhosteler collected the money and kept track of the members
attending.
The meals consisted of one main dish. If you weren't a fish or
pork eater, you were out of luck. Evenings began immediately
following six o'clock dinner and stretched out until you could
read no more. There were no playing cards and it was too dark to
walk, and nowhere to walk to if you tried. I have never had so
much free time on any Elderhostel I've gone to.
I knew the housing was not to be luxurious, but i never
anticipated rubberized mattress pads and rubberized pillows. I am
not incontinent, nor was this a hospital. The room was dank and
less inviting than a summer camp facility, but that's where you
spent your evenings reading.
When I told the coordinator that my airport bus left at 2 p.m.,
he said he'd take me at 12 and that I could wait around Monterey.
He took four of us in his car at the same time [$9 each] and told
me that in case I didn't know it, he was doing me a favor. There
was no bus depot -- you waited out in the street for 1 1/2 hours
with your luggage. under the circumstances, you couldn't even use
a toilet facility. When the bus driver came through to drop off
passengers, she kindly let me put my luggage on the bus until she
returned to pick me up for the airport an hour later.
Most of the Elderhostelers were unhappy and disappointed, but
whether they will contact you, I don't know. I do know that they
expressed much of this in our questionnaire. Whatever I did
enjoy this past week, and there were a few things, they were in
no way connected to Hidden Valley.
Cordially,
Anne Slomka
____________
Hershey PA Elderhostel
February, 1998
We stayed at a Comfort Inn and ate most of our meal at the Inn.
Accommodations were comfortable and the food was good.
Enjoyed the week in Hershey learning about the Hershey company
and eating all the candy that was available everywhere. The
founder of Hershey, Milton Hershey built his factory in the
middle of farmlands so he could get an easy supply of milk. He
designed a model city around the factory and it differed from
other model cities in that the workers bought their own homes. He
gave schools and other municipal buildings to the city.
Hershey and wife were childless and left their entire estate to a
private school which still controls the company. Students gave
us tours of the school which now has a five billion dollar
endowment rivaling Harvard and the Univ. of Texas and sits on
10,000 acres in Hershey. The school is for about 1000 healthy,
good children from bad backgrounds and has classes from
kindergarten thru high school. They are taught Spanish, French
and German from the first grade on.
We had a delicious lunch at the school cafeteria which looked
more like the Edwardian restaurant at the Hotel Plaza in NY than
a school cafeteria. Waitresses said our meal was similar to what
the children were eating that day. We were transported around in
a motorized trolley. Toured Hershey's mansion which is now the
home of the Hershey Trust (manager of the $5 billion school
endowment).
The school doesn't know what to do with all its money and donated
some money to the state of Pa to build the Penn State medical
school in Hershey. It includes a 500 bed hospital and has all
private rooms. We spend a day in the hospital and were given
tours and had health lectures by several doctors. Sounds like we
will all getting gene tests in the near future to determine what
we may be in line for. They are now working on ways to correct
our defective genes. We toured the hospital fitness center and
were given exercises and a lecture by a fitness expert.
Greeted at the Hershey technical center by the retired CEO of
Hershey Foods we were shown test kitchens and samples of the
candy manufacturing process. When we left they gave us a bag of
candy including one huge Hershey bar.
So busy touring, listening to lectures, and eating that we really
had no free time. Things going on from 8:30 am to 9 PM. It was
a very enjoyable and delicious week.
Bill
________
Toronto elderhostel at Humber College
Bill842@aol.com
The city of Toronto reminded me of Los Angeles in that they are
both spread out and very modern. Both are so large that they
seem overwhelming in comparison to Atlanta which is small and
cozy. Toronto is very humid, perhaps caused by being right on
Lake Ontario. It has several miles of public beaches and a park
with unusual civic buildings on the lakefront. Toronto has more
hours of summer daylight than we have in CT., must be because it
is further north. Was bright from about 5 A.M. to about 10 P.M.
Conversely, they have must have fewer hours of daylight in the
winter.
Toronto has many immigrants who want to live in their own unique
areas. In contrast to the USA, they seem proud of their heritage
and strive to maintain their identity and culture. It has a very
large Asian population and an interesting Chinatown section.
Mandarin Chinese is being taught in the Toronto high schools and
has replaced Latin which is no longer being offered in the high
school.
Went thru it on Sunday and the sidewalks were full of vendors and
Chinese people doing their shopping. Was hard to drive thru due
to the large number of people in the streets. Attended several
events of their International festival. The German pavilion was
held in a club that occupied the first two floors of a large,
modern 135 unit apartment building. The club has a 800 family
membership and 80% of the apartments are occupied by members of
the club. They provided musical and dancing entertainment. They
had a choir who were dressed in costumes that looked like
something out of the "Sound of Music". The Ukrainian Exhibition
folk dancing was dramatic and very acrobatic. We were all
exhausted just watching the tremendous workout that they went
through.
We stayed at Humber College in the outskirts of Toronto. It is a
two year college with an enrollment of 60,000 students, mostly
commuters. The campus was modern and the high rise, coed dorm in
which we stayed was air conditioned. Bathrooms were also coed as
they are in most colleges. Separate men and women's bathrooms
will probably be obsolete in another few years, to the
disadvantage of men who don't usually have to wait in long lines.
The Elderhostel course itself wasn't up to the standards of other
Elderhostel courses. Co-ordinator was very poor and unorganized.
Speakers were ill prepared, when they showed up at all. Slides
shown upside down, one speaker just read text that he never had
seen before. But I enjoyed the week in Toronto despite the poor
course content, and did a lot of sightseeing on my own.
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Personals
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From: SantaFe812@aol.com
We are thinking about going to Texas in February for 3
elderhostel weeks.
Has anyone been to the Del Mar College/Corpus Christi week of
Shipwrecks and golden treasures, world beneath sea, and do
dolphins always smile; The University of Texas South Padre Island
week; the Kingsville-Kings Ranch week or any of the University of
Texas/Brownsville weeks?
We would be glad to hear from anyone who has experienced any of
these elderhostels.
Thanks,
Georgia Honeyfield
____________
From: BramaJ@aol.com
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 18:04:20 EDT
Subject: Morro Bay
My sister and I are thinking about attending the hostel sponsored
by California Polytechnic State University at Morro Bay,
California.
Can anyone give us any subjective information about same? Thanks
in advance.
Betty Jacobson
________
From: HGlucks@aol.com
Subject: Index to Elderhostel Notebooks
I originally made an index to the Elderhostel Notebooks for my
own use and kept it on my hard drive. I have been intending to
clean it up, put it on the web and make it available to others
after I finished putting all the links and other finishing
touches I wanted into it. However, I am one of the world's great
procrastinators and now realize that if I wait until I get
everything I want in before giving it to you, it will never
happen. Since I find it to be quite satisfactory for my purposes
as is, others may find it useful also.
As each new issue comes out, I update the index. It is located at
http://members.aol.com/EldrNdx
HG (hglucks@aol.com)
______________
From: Gerleon@aol.com
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1998 22:07:36 EDT
Looking for information on Ederhostel in Lake Garda, Italy.
#602930507, studying history. Does anyone have information about
this elderhostel. Would appreciate any information concerning
this place.
Thanks......Gerleon @aol.com
______________
From: Stjong@aol.com
Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 15:11:09 EDT
Subject: Greetings!!
Greetings from the Land of Enchantment......New Mexico that is...
Re: Elderhostel in Lafayette, Louisiana at Southwestern
University I was there in March 1998....accomodations were in a
nice Motel ....a bus was provided for transportation to the
school where the program was held....The lectures were mainly
about Cajun History, Music and Food.....We went on several
interesting field trips and enjoyed a Crawfish dinner served in
the classroom...There was nothing planned in the evening but I
enjoyed trying out the Cajun food and listening to music at
several good restaurants...The bayou country is very unique...a
nice side trip is to driveabout 45 miles south to Avery Island
where Tabasco Sauce is made....also, it is only about 100 miles
to New Orleans...This would be a nice program in the spring or
fall.
I am particularly interested in programs where the accomodations
include a single room with private bath..... Will look forward to
getting the October issue of Notebook...
Thanks...Jo
________
Subject: Personals--Switzerland in 1999
From: Kay and Bill Jones"
We have been accepted for the international trip "Walking in
Switzerland, #66052-0630, 6/30/99 to 7/13/99. We'd love to hear
from anyone who might be going on that trip or who has gone on it
in the past.
Bill and Kay Jones, Natchez Trace B Reservation
Service, 800-377-2770 http://www.bbonline.com/natcheztrace