Friday last, I was asked "What's a dumb trail?" A dumb trail is usually a touristy thing to do. It usually entails a long ride to get there and then the emotion of "this is it?" It's the feeling you get when you go to see the world's largest ball of string. The term was coined by Teague and her Brother after the first time they felt the "this is it?" emotion.
With the Young One visiting this week, I wanted to do a few things that would get us out of the house. I searched around. I found something fun that I thought would be meaningful to her., but I warned her it was a Dumb Trail. She said she was game as it sounded intriguing.
With Himself chauffeuring, we took a drive, almost an hour because of afternoon traffic, to Lincoln, Massachusetts. We were close to the historical towns of Lexington and Concord. Did we visit Minuteman National Historical Park to see Concord's North Bridge, the "shot heard 'round the world" bridge? No. Did we visit Orchard House, the home of Louisa May Alcott where she wrote her novel Little Women? No. Did we go see the Bauhaus the home designed by architect, Walter Gropius? Nope.
Where did we end up? We drove down the Old Sudbury Road in Lincoln to a field. If you drive too fast down this country road, you will completely blow by:
According to articles I read, no one knows how or who started Ponyhenge. Just in this field, rocking horses of every shape and size started appearing. The ponies are usually arranged in the classic circular formation as Stonehenge in England. Sometimes the ponies are arranged as if they are racing as they were on one Kentucky Derby Day. One year, the ponies were arranged in orderly rows for the first day of school.
I thought the Young One would enjoy seeing the rocking horses. When she was 3 years old, Santa brought her a rocking horse for Christmas. He was dun colored with a blue "saddle blanket" The plastic blanket had a cross-hatch, diamond pattern. She named her horse, Diamond.
As we were crossing the road, I said to her, "Wouldn't it be cool if Diamond was here?"
and then she spotted him right out front!
He was a little faded from being out in the elements, missing the dowel to hold on while rocking, but it was him.
We wandered through the henge admiring all the beloved steeds.
Some wooden
some rusted and some had names like Poppy
This beauty was painted in the style of van Gogh's Starry Night
Thunder, eternally races across the plains
The Blaze Twins. The horse on the left was missing his right, rear leg
Another diamond, saddle blanket. I named this one Black Diamond
Some ponies had yarn manes
some were plush. A lot must have newly joined the herd as they barely looked touched by the weather.
It took us longer to get there and to drive home than the amount of time we spent wandering around. The Young One said it was a wonderful, whimsical outing.
God-steed, Diamond
