Trek to Missouri pt. 2

 One of the things we did while we were there was to go up to an Amish community where twice a week they hold an auction to sell their produce.  It was a very interesting experience watching the Amish come in with their big wagons loaded with produce.  All the vehicles belong to the gentiles who came to bid on the produce. 

Here is a cart sitting in front of the auction building

 This is the long line of wagons waiting their turn.  Each wagon load pulls into the building in front on the auctioneer.  He isn't Amish as for some reason they don't deal directly with the buyers. It was the first time I went to an auction.  The auctioneer talks so fast you have to listen very carefully to everything.  It took quite a while before I started following the bids and even then I don't think I caught all of it. 

 Waiting to go inside.

  I wish we would of had pictures of the actual auction.  There were little boys dressed in their Amish clothing all were barefooted and all were wearing straw hats.  After the bidding they helped unload the wagons into the vehicles. The little girls had simple dresses with pinafores on top.The Amish sold homemade ice cream and pie, so we bought some of that before leaving.  They had hot dogs as well.  It was surprising to see them cooking them in wood stove oven as there was no electricity, which we take for granted. The plumbing was primitive and they had a huge water storage tank to hold water for washing.  As Jessica's boys were eating their ice cream there were some Amish children that kept following them around and staring at them.  I didn't think her boys stood out from anyone else's children.  We didn't stay to bid on the smaller amounts that would have been available towards the end because the boys were restless.  I found it to be a very interesting experience.

 This is a field of haystacks that I found to be intriguing.

 

We went down to the Lake of the Ozarks and went through a cave there.

It has a feature that is in only 14 caves throughout the world and that is a shower formation where the water comes out like a shower and falls into a bathtub (or mineral formation) that has built up over the years.

This is the information station.  I love old buildings like this.

 This is a swinging bridge by the caves

 We stopped at the boys favorite ice cream shop on our way home.