Since arriving in Albany at the Family Motor Coach Ass'n Rally, we've been hearing about Albany's carousel restoration project, that started about 5 years ago. Well, our curiosity got the better of us, and yesterday, we ventured downtown in search of the building where all of this work is taking place. When our GPS in the jeep said "arriving at destination", we looked around, and saw nothing that resembled what we were looking for. Thinking that our faithful GPS (aka Missy) had failed us, we walked across the street to the visitors information center. It was while there, we learned that the address of the visitor bureau was mistakenly printed, instead of the address of the carousel project. Armed with the correct address, we drove to where the restoration was taking place. There were approx. 15-20 volunteers working, as we were given a tour, and some history of the project. The mechanism which was built in 1909, was donated to Albany, but the rest of the carousel (I used to call them merry-go-rounds), is being rebuilt by hand, including 52 animals. This is probably a 10 year project, and it was fascinating to witness the progress at about the half way point. As a younger lad, I remember the carousel at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, and the many attempts I made at grabbing the brass ring. Not too many of these original carousels still in existence. Today, we're back on the road for a couple of hours, as we leave the FMCA Rally, and drive to Pacific City on the Oregon coast. I never know what kind of coverage we will have with our Sprint air card, so if there's no activity on the blog for a few days, it's because we won't have internet connectivity at a future location.
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