Happy Birthday Stephen!

Today is my husband's birthday and the first day of Spring Break. We took to the road to do some wine tasting, exploring, and birding.



We started off by going to French Lick, Indiana. A billionaire couple in Indiana have refurbished a hotel which was created I believe in the early 1900's and since then has been a Jesuit seminary, a college, and then abandoned. They spared no expense and have kind of revitalized a ghost town. The lobby is magnificent!



We then drove to Madison, Indiana. It is a charming, historical town on the Ohio River. We ate lunch on the river...a great sandwich that a colleague made for me on the WV trip. Tomato, cucumber, chutney, and pepper jack cheese. We also ate a piece of Stephen's birthday cake. We made it last night...a lemon cheesecake. Stephen is a big fan of lemon.



We then went to two local wineries. Indiana is alive with wineries, with some grapes grown here, and some imported. We went to two and tried some wine.



Finally, we went birding at a bird refuge. We have been here before but never with the scope that Stephen is borrowing from his ornithology professor. Here we are in a bird hut on the water. We heard an owl, watched many a duck including some elusive wood ducks and a new one for Stephen, one that has a shovel-like bill. We also watched a beaver.

Tonight Stephen will talk to family, we will enjoy more cheesecake and Mediterranean pizza, and chill. Happy Birthday sweetie!