In telling the story of this last long weekend in Cincinnati, it seems prudent to start with the very best and favorite thing that we did. I hope you like it too because you most likely will hear about it more because there are so many pictures and stories to tell from just this place.
Our very favorite place was …… drumroll, please……. a cemetery.
Crickets.
I know. Hear me out.
It isn't just a cemetery. It's an arboretum too and the Grande Dame of all the amazing cemeteries at least in this part of the country.
Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum was established in 1845. This nonprofit has 750 acres of trees, 44 miles of paved roads and fifteen lakes. We never left the historic section so I have no idea what the new sections look like but the old areas are amazing.
We parked at the visitors' center (yes, they have a visitors' center) and went inside for maps and an overview from a nice man who helped to orient us. There's a printed walking tour as well as lists of notable people buried here.
From the visitors' center, you walk under an old stone railroad bridge into what feels like Heaven on Earth. I will be honest with you, we did most of the walking tour but not all. That's because every stop on the map was surrounded on all directions by other things we wanted to see.
Spring Grove had been on my radar for some time but I had never made it there for one reason or another. I had seen pictures and heard stories but none of it, and I do mean none of it, prepared me for this place.
It is stunning.
When I told Adam about it, I just described it as a cool old cemetery, purposefully trying to surprise him. Little did I know how shockingly beautiful, amazing, and jaw droppingly awesome it would be for a couple of cemetery nerds.
I suppose I should explain that trees are unwelcome in our local cemeteries. Even gorgeous old trees that people love aren't safe from being cut down if they are too near the boundaries of a cemetery. To find a place that not only has trees but celebrates them is wonderful.
The trees alone are incredible, providing comforting shade on the hot sunny days we visited. They also provide wonderful habitat for an abundance of birds that flitted about chirping and singing their little hearts out.
We were delighted by the turtles, swans and ducks that call the lakes home.
There are monuments of all sizes and mausoleums of varying architectural styles. One monument put up by the International Order of Oddfellows celebrates friendship, love and truth.
There's a sense of one-upmanship in the historic areas as one wealthy family after another built grandiose mausoleums and erected artwork at their family plots. Columns, obelisks, statuary, granite reliefs, busts and orbs are common.
The true showstopper though is the Dexter, a mausoleum and chapel that robbed me of words for a full minute.
We saw people out walking and running. The cemetery actually puts out mile marker signs along a suggested route to help folks reach their fitness goals. We saw a woman painting and a man reading book. On Sunday, a group of volunteers had convened to plant flowers and I was jealous of them all. We agreed that we would be there all the time of we lived close enough and I'm sure I would volunteer to help out.
Come back tomorrow to read about the Dexter. It has a great backstory and one worthy of its own telling.
Want to visit Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum? Click here for their website. Here you'll even find a list of upcoming events including tours and volunteer days.
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