travel Archives - From a Rocky Hillside

March 12, 2025March 12, 2025

Randsburg and a 94 year old redhead

This is a second post on a trip I took with Ralph to the northern Mojave in California. Click here to read about the morning at Goler Gulch.

Olga’s the first 94-year-old redhead I’ve met. I’m sure she has some artificial help; even so, her hair shows spunk. She gets around well and lives by herself. “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she confesses. She still runs “The Joint,” pulling a regular shift, tending bar. When things are not busy, she steps out front and pull weeds from the flower bed. That’s where we first saw her. Ralph and I along with Bill and his friend had stopped in Randsburg for a late lunch after our tour of Goler Gulch. As we headed to a restaurant, Ralph mumbled something about it can’t Olga pulling flowers. He recognized the woman who none of us had seen.

After lunch, Ralph and I walked down to “The Joint,” a bar in Randsburg. Olga’s washing glasses as we enter. She stops and turns to take our order. Olga doesn’t recognize Ralph, so he introduces himself. She looks at him for a minute, then smiles and comments about how much she misses his brother who’d died a couple of years earlier. The two chat for a minute about Olga’s son, who was Ralph’s age. The two of them went off to war together in 1944. Ralph asked how long she’s been tending bar at “The Joint.” We learn she and her late-husband brought the establishment in 1955. “I’ve had honest work ever since,” she tells us. I was curious about what kind of work she’d done before but decide not to interrupt their reunion.

Selling booze in a mining town was lucrative business. Selling anything liquid use to be lucrative business as water in these parts was expensive, even as late as the ‘40s. Today, there is little mining and its mostly tourists who stop in want something alcoholic. The establishment is open from Wednesday through Sunday and they close in the evening when they are no longer busy. “The Joint” is in the heart of Randsburg’s business district and one of the original structures in town. The building was first a bakery. In the 30s, it was converted to a bar and a pool hall.

Ralph and I both order a couple of Mojave Greens, a local beer made in Inyokern and named for the famous rattlesnake of the Mojave. Ralph, who grew up in this area, said he’d only seen two of these snakes in his life. She pulls us two bottles out of the cooler, opens them, and ask if we want a glass. Ralph, always the civilized one, takes a glass and slowly pours his beer into it. I shake my head, grab the bottle and tip it up to drink. Ralph and Olga continue talking until Olga pauses to fix another drink for the woman sitting at the other end of the bar.

Its then I notice Faye, who’s sitting a few stools away and looking for a refill. I’m not sure why I hadn’t noticed her earlier as she wears a barely ample halter displaying more than ample breasts. She’s attractive or certainly could be. With her tight mini-skirt and heels which must be five inches high, I wonder what kind of business she’s in. We chat for a few minutes and learn she’s the proprietor of the Silver Dollar Saloon in Red Mountain. This is her day off.

The day before, when we drove through Red Mountain, Ralph had told me earlier about the red-light district there. It was a hoping place when he was a schoolboy before the war. The saloons in Red Mountain lined the west side of the street and featured backroom gambling. Gambling was illegal in California, but this wasn’t exactly on the main highway and most people looked the other way. On the east side of the street were “cribs,” where prostitutes who free-lanced in the bars and around the gambling dens, led their clients. It was a cozy arrangement, and local authorities did little to discourage business.

But then World War 2 came along. The Navy built a base on China Lake. Since there’s not enough water in China Lake to float a canoe most years, they used the base to train pilots. Naval authorities found that after a night of drinking, gambling and whoring, the drive over the mountain was too difficult to negotiate. They lost many pilots before they had a chance to sight in on a Japanese Zero. The Navy called in the FBI, who shut down the gaming establishments and ran the women off.

A few minutes later, Faye’s partner at the Silver Dollar joined us at the bar. While I’d enjoyed glancing over at Faye as we talked, I now divert my eyes. This guy is scary. His bare skinny legs end within fancy black leather cowboy boots, with pointed toes, and scroll threading. Personally, I think wearing cowboy boots without long pants should be a misdemeanor. Wearing cowboy boots with super tight short shorts, the kind which hadn’t been seen since the 80s, should be a felony! This guy’s pants are shorter than his partner’s mini skirt.

I’m glad I’m not alone in the bar with him. Had it just been me drinking and he came in, I think I’d wallowed over to the Methodist Church and take the temperance pledge. But he joins the conversation and seems to be an okay. However, he and Faye, to say the least, are one unique couple.

Ralph and I finish our beers and head out. The darkness in the bar forces our eyes to squint as we adjust to the bright desert sky. We take the long way back to Ridgecrest, through Inyokern. I tell Ralph about my one other trip to Inyokern. It was approaching midnight. I was with Eric, another friend of mine who Ralph knows. We’d been looking for a place to stop for the night. We were on our way to do a week hike from New Army Pass, to the Pacific Crest Trail and then up the backside of Mt. Whitney, and then north along the John Muir Trail to Onion Valley. And we wanted to get an early start the next morning so we kept driving late into the night.

Eric sighted a spotlight for an airport. As a pilot, he suggested we head there and camp, telling me about camping under his plane at such places. There was no one to stop us. I slept on one side of the car and Eric on the other. The night was warm. I laid out my pad and sleeping bag and slept on top. I must have been exhausted for I don’t remember anything else until 5:00 AM, when a loudspeaker rudely awaken me as it called out for those boarding the 5:30 AM flight to LAX. Shortly afterwards, we were on the road.

Ralph, who always had a way with words, quipped something about how Eric and I must not of been living right. Ralph and I had camped out when in the wilderness. But he felt if we’re going to stay in civilization, we should, at least, find a motel.

We drive back into Ridgecrest as the light softens. The shadows of the barren peaks provide definition to the distant hills in the low warm light. It’s nearly dark when we arrive. Unlike Randsburg, Ridgecrest is a new town, built during World War II. The purpose of the town is to serve the China Lake Naval base. We drive around, looking for a place for dinner. In our search, as we navigate ubiquitous four-way stop signs, But what amazed me of the town was to see they not only had a dollar store, but also a 99-cent store and, for those who that’s even too much, a 98-cent store. Every place needs to be known for something.

February 20, 2025February 20, 2025

Goler Gulch, March 2005

Ralph at Sam's Cabin in the Majovie, near Randsburg, CA

An early morning drive in the desert

Last week, I told a story about an adventure with Ralph into Central Nevada. This week, I rewrote a piece I wrote in 2010, shortly after Ralph’s death. This trip I spent more time jotting down in my journal some of Ralph’s unique bits of wisdom. Hopefully, you’ll get a better view of my friend who died 15 years ago.

Ralph and I stayed the night in Ridgecrest. Before heading out for the desert early in the morning, we stopped at a grocery store to pick up fruit and pastries along with coffee and juice. Dawn broke as we drove along the highway toward Goler Gulch. In the soft morning light, the carpeting of highway shoulder with flowers amazed me. The wet winter had given growth to white and yellow asters, daisies and bluish heliotropes. Even beyond the road, the flowers grew under clumps of greasewood.

It was March 2005. I had flown out west the day before so I could officiate at a wedding. I picked up a rental car in Las Vegas. As I had a few extra days before the celebration, Ralph took a bus down from Cedar City and met me in Vegas. We then headed over into the Southern California desert, to see where he grew up. We’d talked about doing this trip several times while I lived in Utah, but had never gotten around to it.

Our next stop this morning was Sam’s Cabin, located just off the highway. Arriving, we sit outside on a picnic table and ate our breakfast while watching the changes in the morning light across the El Paso Mountains to our north. “You can find any kind of mineral up there in those mountains,” Ralph noted. “Just don’t start a mine, because whatever your digging will quickly disappear.” It was the words of one who knew a bit about the folly of mining.

Sam’s Cabin

I’d heard a lot about Sam, who’d built this cabin seventy-some years ago. Once, I met his daughter, who’d recently died in her mid-nineties. Sam was an old-time miner. He’d worked in Nevada and as a young man headed up to the Klondike in 1898. He supposedly made enough money up north that he didn’t have to do much work the rest of his life. In the 1930s, he showed up in the Mojave, working as a caretaker for a mining firm. It didn’t take much to live like he did. He had a wife, who lived over on the coast. Sam would go visit her a couple times a year and occasionally she’d come out to the desert, that being the extent of their marriage.

Sam's homestead in the Mojave Desert — Sam’s homestead

My favorite story of Ralph and Sam was their trip to Death Valley in Ralph’s family Model T truck, taking it across China Lake early in the World War II, before the government converted the dry lakebed to a Naval Aviation bombing site. Ralph had fond memories of the trip, including meeting Scotty of Scotty’s Castle in Death Valley. Today, this trip would be impossible because the bombing range is still in use.

We discovered Sam’s cabin in a state of “arrested decay.” The BLM keeps it from blowing down and one can rent it for up to two nights. Sam died in 1965, in his early 90s.

After breakfast, we looked around the old cabin while waiting for Bill, a friend of Ralph’s from Southern California to arrive. Rocks and boulders of all shapes, colors and sizes dot the yard. Ralph pointed to many of them and told me which gulch from which they’d been taken. Most of the rocks had been hauled in by Sam with the help of Ralph and his brother Charlie.

Sam's place in the Mojave — Another view of Sam’s homestead

Ralph’s family homestead in Goler Gulch

Bill arrive a few minutes later, driving a huge Suburban SUV. We decide to take his Suburban and leave my rental car at Sam’s Cabin. We climbed in and Ralph began the tour of Goler Gulch. The gulch has always been a placer mining district, meaning the ore is found in sediment washed down from the mountains. Attempts have been made to find the ore body from up in the mountains, but no one has ever identified the source. When Ralph was a kid, old miners held to the belief the gold had been pushed down during the last ice age, by glaciers. Of course, there is no evidence of glacier activity this far south. Another popular theory, according to Ralph, who reported this with a straight face, is that the gold came from Alaska.

Old Behren homestead in the Mojave — Ralph showing us around the old Behren homstead

Ralph’s family’s Model T

Ralph was born in Kansas. When he was an infant, his parents moved to California. They added a bed to their Model T coupe, making it into a truck in which the family made the journey. After a short stint in Los Angeles, they headed into the desert, where his dad worked as a miner and a cook. Interestingly, the Model T still runs. Ralph has driven me around in it and even let me drive it.

Ralph told about his brother Charlie and him taking the Model T on trips through the desert. In the spring or after rains, when the water would be raging in the gulch, they’d stop the car on one side of the stream, take off the fan belt and drive through the water, hooking the fan belt back up on the other side. The car seemed to go anywhere; you just had to know the tricks. If the fan was spinning, it would kick water over the distributor cap and short out the electrical system. The engine could take a little more heat than the electrical system could take water.

Behren homestead around 1930 — The homestead around 1930 with Ralph, his father and his brother and pet dog. They often slept outdoors, especially in the summer.

Ralph’s family homestead includes a collection of buildings. Ralph pointed to a building he and Sam had built at the beginning of the war for some women from Pasadena who wanted a place to flee when the Japanese invaded. “They were sure the Japanese were coming to rape them,” Ralph said sarcastically. They hired him and Sam to build them a home in the desert. Another building Ralph rescued from the Navy, who’d set up operations at China Lake during the war. Abandon as surplus, he brought it and hauled it home so he could have his own room when he returned from the Pacific.

The Old One-Room School House

We made another stop at the site of the old one room school. Ralph and his brother attended school here with eight or ten other kids from 1932, when the schooled opened, to 1936 when they were bused into Randsburg. He told us about his first-grade teacher who’d just celebrated her 100th birthday. Ralph pointed up stream and said that the girl’s outhouse was up there, and the guys were downstream. “Why didn’t they just have a unisex bathroom with a lock,” I asked, “since there were never more than a dozen students.” Ralph, in all seriousness, responded. “I assume the school board had concerns about mixing urine.”

We saw the shaft for the Yellow Aster mine, one of the larger mines in the district. As we explored, Ralph picked a leaf of Indian Tobacco and talked about as a kid he’d harvest it and sell it to an old miner. The other miners forbid the old miner from smoking it underground because it stank. He also found an “Indian pickle,” a plant with a long stem and an open chamber on the end where you could place your tobacco as you drew the smoke up the stem. The “Indian pickle” made a perfect bong. He also showed how the new growth on a greasewood (also known as Creosote bush) could be crushed and smoked for a “natural high.” “This also stinks, which is what you’d expect from such a plant,” Ralph informed us. None of us wanted to try it out for ourselves.

Heading up the gulch

We next headed into the gulch itself, a canyon where much of the mining took place. There were five shafts dug down into the dirt, named Fine Gold Number 1 though 5. Only Fine Gold #1 had a traditional gallows frame, the others being pick and shovel operations with a windlass. In time, the miners discovered that the gold was mostly deposited in the sand within a few feet of bedrock, some eighty feet down. They’d sink a shaft then work out following the bedrock as they made their way up and down the gulch.

Old miners Ralph knew

As we drove up the gulch, Ralph told us about miners he’d known growing up the desert. One was a kid, just 18, who discovered enough gold to buy himself a brand new ’36 Ford with an 85 horsepower V8 engine. Another was a guy named Happy, who was the first pot-head Ralph knew. This was before the Second World War. Happy came looking for work and the miners wanted him to work with them. So, he asked where he might find a place to prospect. One of the old-timers, to be done with him, sent him to the most unlikely place around. Happy discovered a 14-ounce nugget. He remained happy for some time thereafter.

Some of the miners were more adapt at mining outsiders, an ancient trick of the mining trade. Curly would pull out his pan anytime he saw a tourist driving by. They’d get to see him work out some nuggets from his washings. He’d tell him he dug the ore at his mine, Eagle’s Roost,” up in the mountains. It they seemed interested, he’d ask if they’d like to buy a few inches or feet of the mine from him. During the war, Curly talked to a man from Kansas. Ralph’s father, who was from Kansas, warned the man not to trust Curly. Curly moaned to the man about how everyone talked bad him and were always saying that he was dishonest because they were jealous. So, the man brought from Curly a bunch of land that wasn’t worth much and most of it, Curly didn’t even own. Afterwards, Ralph said, “Curly went into Randsburg and brought war bonds and became a hero.”

Turning around and heading for lunch

The creek ran strong, and the ground softened before we reached the end of the gulch. Bill said he had a shovel in the back if we wanted to keep going, but none of us were excited about using it. We turned around and headed back to Randsburg for lunch. That’s a story I’ll have to share at another time.

Postlude

Ralph lived in the Gulch until he graduated from High School in 1944, at which time he joined the Army Air Corp. He was hoping to become a pilot, but they had enough so he became a crew member of a B-24. He made it to the South Pacific in time for the war to end. Ralph received a combat citation, and just so no one thought of him as a hero, he loved telling the story about how some General thought he should have another medal, so the General sent several hundred airplanes into the sky to blow the hell out of some island a few Japanese soldiers had the misfortune of being marooned on as their island had been leaped over in our drive toward the Japanese homeland. “We blew the hell out of them,” Ralph said. His second mission was to drop supplies, mostly boots, into POW camps after the surrender. After the war, Ralph attended school on the GI bill and became a chemist. He spent the rest of his life in the Southwest. Ralph died in 2010. Two weeks ago, on his birthday, he would have been 99 years old.

A Great Basin Mining Adventure

Photo of Ralph's truck around Hamilton, Nevada

This was a trip I made with a friend from Cedar City in the late 1990s. I wrote this piece for another blog about 15 years ago, around the time of Ralph’s death. I bring it back out because in last Sunday’s sermon, I mentioned this trip. I have updated the writing a bit. I should go back through my slides and pick out more to feature (or maybe add a map of our travels).

Camping on Main Street, Treasure City

“This street used to be bustling with noise,” I think, as I stroll down Main Street, Treasure City. The sounds of wagons and the clicking hooves from horses, added to the cussing of teamsters, the pounding of stamp mills and the music from saloons would have too much. But I swear I can still hear voices in the brisk wind, bringing a chill the summer air. My belly is full. Ralph and I had just eaten a steak and a baked potato, along with a salad. We’d drown it with a beer. Before hitting the sack, I decide to walk the length of the road. Ralph stays behind to tend the fire. The distant mountains are turning purple. This street had once a thriving business district with forty stores and a dozen saloons, but today just the shells of collapsing rock structures remain.

By the time I get back to the truck, Ralph has let the fire die down and is already in his sleeping bag. I blow up my mattress and rolled my bag out on the other side of the truck. Plopping down, I watch the summer stars and listen to the wind and Ralph’s snoring. Soon, I too am asleep. I wake at first light. The wind has died and silence seems eerie. While the coffee perks, I explore some nearby ruins. The evening before, I stayed on the gravel road for the mountain is pitted with mine shafts. A wrong step could send you several hundred feet down and into oblivion.

History of the mining region

In the later part of the 1860s, miners from Austin and the Reese River Mining District in search of another mother lode discovered rich in what became the White Pine Mining District. One of the first discoveries, in 1865, was named Monte Christo. It’s just a few miles west of here. From there, miners set out in all directions and in 1867, discovered what became known as Treasure Hill, the mountain upon which we’d camped. The land was unforgiving. There was little shade in the summer and an altitude above 8,000 feet created brutal winters. But with some of the ore as pure silver chloride and assayed as high as $15,000 a ton, people were willing to put up with the hardships.

ruins of an old mill — Ruins of an old mill

By 1869, Treasure City with a population of 6,000 had been established on top of the mountain. There were nearly 200 mines along with ten mills to crush the ore into powder, in preparation to leaching out the silver and gold. A water company laid pipe and had the ability to pump 60,000 gallons a day to the top of the thirsty mountain. But it was all short lived. Most mines played out after a few hundred feet and the rock proved a formable challenge. Early in 1870, the excitement began to wane. By the end of 1870, only 500 people remained. In 1880, when the Post Office closed, there were only 24 people left living on the mountain.

Economic lessons for the region

A look at Treasure Hill’s rise and fall provides an economic lesson in the danger of speculation and bubbles and international finance. Western Historian W. Turrentine Jackson, in his classic study on the region, Treasure Hill, goes into great detail of the financing of the district. In the late 1860s, so much money was poured into the region, more than was ever needed to develop the mines. Much of this capital was wasted; some of it spent on bogus mining operations that existed only to mine the pockets of capitalists who hoped to make a fortune and were willing to take great risks. Then, as the availability of high grade ore begin to wane, money begin to be withdrawn from the region. John Muir visited the area after the rush and wrote in Steep Trails:

“Many of [the mines] do not represent any good accomplishment and have no right to be. They are monuments of fraud and ignorance—sin against science. The drifts and tunnels in the rocks may be regarded as the prayers of the prospectors offered for the wealth he so earnestly craves; but like prayers of any kind not in harmony with nature, they are unanswered.” (Elliott, 105)

Leaving Cedar City

Ralph and I got an early start for this remote spot in the Nevada desert. Leaving Cedar City, we drive north to Minersville and then on to Milford, where we cross the Union Pacific tracks and set out across the desert on Utah 130. Our travels take us just south of the ghost town of Frisco and north of the Wah Wah Mountains. We enter Nevada at Baker. Shortly after meeting up with Highway 50, we leave the pavement for a rough road that skirts the north boundary of Great Basin National Park.

Osceola

Our first stop is at the site of Osceola. Here, In 1872, a unique mining community for Nevada existed. Hard rock mining is the norm in Nevada. This was industrial mining. Miners dig shafts and drifts as they blast into rock for ore. The ore was then crushed and chemically treated to extract the metals. However, in Osceola, free ore existed in sediment. Placer mining, as was done in the California gold fields, was possible. All one needed were shovels and pans, some water, and perhaps a sluice box. The difficulty with placer mining here was the lack of water. Early in the town’s history, they dug a ditch up Wheeler Peak to divert water to the town. This mining district boasts the largest gold nugget ever found in Nevada. There is not much left of the town that existed here for nearly fifty years. Fires, the bane of mining camps, sent most of the town up into smoke. Modern mining operations destroyed the rest. Only the graveyard and some mining equipment used more recently remains.Interestingly, even with gold near historic lows (this was in the late-90s), there’s still a few people mining in this district.

Ely

Leaving the cemetery behind, we drive out of the canyon and head west, across an alluvial fan and toward the highway. Reconnecting to US 50, we continue on to Ely where we stop and have lunch at the historic Hotel Nevada. I suggest we eat on the road to make better time, but Ralph cringes. “If I can’t sit down and enjoy my meal, I’m not living right,” he insists. After lunch, we continue west on US 50, passing the huge open pit copper mine at Ruth and thirty minutes later, the Illipah Ranch. Somewhere between Ely and Eureka, we abandon the pavement and head south on a gravel road.

Ralph inspecting som kind of left-over equipment

Hamilton

Hamilton is our first stop, nine miles south of US 50. It sits on the north side of Treasure Hill and served as a logistical point for the various mining communities south of here. The town was first called Cave City as so many miners from the mountains sought refuge there in caves during the harsh winters. As mining flourished, they laid out a town. By the spring of 1869, more than 10,000 people lived here. It became the county seat for the newly established White Pine County. They built a courthouse. Stage coaches connected the town to Austin and Pioche and the railroad at Elko.

But the town’s life was short. The excitement lasted on a few years and by the time of the 1870 census, less than 4,000 people remained. The town struggled on. In 1873, a shopkeeper by the name of Cohen, seeing his investment falter, set his store on fire in the hopes of collecting on his insurance. The fire spread and much of the town burned. Another fire destroyed the courthouse in 1885. In 1887, the town’s future died as the county seat moved to Ely. Today, only a few ruins and a cemetery remain. There’s plenty of mining junk left out, along with the leftovers of a cyanide leaching operation and a few junked house trailers used in the last attempt to mine in the area. We see no one as we poke around.

Treasure City

After Hamilton, we head south to Treasure City, located just a mile and a half from Hamilton, but on top of the mountain. We take the wrong road and I find myself out in front of the truck with a shovel, clearing rocks as we make our way up a switchback road to the top. Had we known, another road to the west would have taken us to the top without any trouble. It’s getting time for dinner and we find a place along Main Street where we stop for the evening.

I build a charcoal fire behind the truck. As soon as we have coals, I put in two foil wrapped potatoes and, in a wire basket, begin to grill the steaks we had socked away in the cooler. As the sun drops toward the horizon, the wind picks up and soon we’re both pulling on jackets. We eat dinner, washing it down with a beer. I throw a few pieces of pinion onto the coals and the fire blazes. After chatting for a bit, I take off on my walk.

Shermantown, Eberhardt, and Charcoal Kilns

The next morning, we head south off the mountain and stop by the sites for Shermantown and Eberhardt. We link up to the Hamilton-Pioche stagecoach trail and follow it to US 6. Turning left, he head back into Ely in time for lunch and to gas up the truck. Then we head south, stopping at the Ward Charcoal Kilns, a state historic site. It’s interesting that there was a large charcoal operation in this desert region. They harvested all the pinion and juniper for miles around to feed these massive kilns. The charcoal was mostly used to roast the ore in the milling process. Leaving the kilns behind, we head down US 93, stopping at Pioche, another mining town.

Pioche and Home

Pioche is still alive and holding on now as an out-of-the-way tourist town. The community received a new lease on life in World War Two, at a time when the government was forcing the closure of gold mines as non-essential industries. But the ground around Pioche included large deposits of zinc,. Considered an essential mineral for the war effort, zinc mining lead to a revival of Pioche. They continued mining zinc around Pioche till the 1980s. We stop long enough to have dinner at the Overland Saloon, and then headed on home. At Panaca, a Mormon farming community, we leave US 93 and head east, toward Cedar City. An hour later, as we approach the city with the sun setting to our back, the red hills glow in the evening light.

A photos were slides which I digitally copied.

Camp Bangladesh: another adventure with Ralph

Sources:
Shawn Hall: Romancing Nevada’s Past: Ghost Towns and Historical Sites of Eureka, Lander and White Pine Counties(University of Nevada Press, 1994)

W. Turrentine Jackson, Treasure Hill, (University of Arizona Press, 1962)

Russell R. Elliott, History of Nevada, revised edition. (University of Nebraska Press, 1987).

_________., Nevada’s Twentieth-Century Mining Boom: Tonopah, Goldfield, Ely (University of Nevada Press, 1966).

January 15, 2025January 15, 2025

An American Ramble

title slide with a photo of the book cover

**Neil King, Jr. American Ramble: A Walk of Memory and Renewal**

Illustrations by George Hamilton (New York: Mariner Books, 2023), 354 pages including notes on writing and reading.

A friend lent me this book. When I heard what it was about, I was skeptical. King, an editor for the Wall Street Journal, walks from his home in Washington, DC, to New York City. I thought, “that’s not that long of a walk, certainly nothing like the Appalachian or Pacific Crest Trail.” Then I began to read and quickly fell in love with the story.

King, after battling cancer and Lyne disease (which resulted in paralyzed left vocal cords), and as the nation is coming out of the COVID epidemic, leaves his D.C. home. He heads out of town and toward New York City. He carries an 18-pound pack; his one luxury being a Japanese style fly rod. It was a Monday in April, the month Chaucer set off in the Canterbury Tales. But this wasn’t a quick escape. King spent months lining out a path, contacting people along the way, and learning the vast amount of history of the region.

Unlike Appalachian Trail hikers, King spends his nights in bed and breakfasts, boutique hotels, and a few traditional chain hotels. The B&Bs allows him to meet more people and, as a journalist by trade, that’s what King does best. He meets people and learns their story, while sharing parts of his own. Most people are incredibility gracious, but a few, such as the young man in an upscale neighborhood who refused to let him fill his water bottle, are not.

King’s choice for lodging also keeps him from encountering ticks which might happen if he sleeps on the ground. Having had Lyme Disease, he wants to avoid ticks which spread it, if possible.

Throughout the book, King draws on literary references. From Chaucer, the Bible, Homer, Bruce Chatwin. Edgar Allen Poe (who few suspect was also a walker), John Muir, and Henry David Thoreau.

War along the route

King’s route allows him to explore war. Battles against Native Americans (which turned William Penn’s “City of Brotherly Love” into a hotbed against the native population), to the Revolutionary and Civil Wars all occurred along his walk. He crosses the Mason Dixon Line, but even in York, Pennsylvania he finds a city who welcomed the Confederates in the days leading to up to Gettysburg. At another place, he walks the old railbed to a Y in the line at Hanover Junction. Here, Lincoln’s train took the left track for Gettysburg where he gave his address. Two years later, his train took the other Y, as his body was taken on a tour through the northeast before his burial in Springfield, Illinois.

In conversations about no trespassing signs, King reflects on how they became popular only after the end of the Civil War with millions of freed slaves trying to find their way in the world. He also finds it ironic that the middle ground in the colonies, between the north and south, were settled by pacifist (Quakers, Pietists, Dunkers, Amish, and Mennonites).

At Valley Forge and along the Delaware River, King explores the struggles of George Washington’s Continental Army during the dark days of the Revolutionary War. He even crosses the river by boat (as opposed to a bridge) to sense what Washington may have experienced. King will cross other rivers by boats as he makes his way north to Manhattan.

Learning about religion and race

Wandering through Lancaster County, King meets Amish farmers and has an opportunity to explore the role religion plays in our nation… Lancaster is the home for both James Buchanan and Thaddeus Stevens—men so similar (both lifelong bachelors) and so different as they played major roles leading up to and during the Civil War. King refers to them as America’s yin and yang. He talks with members of the African American community who has helped keep Steven’s memory alive. Steven fierce hatred of slavery came from his Vermont upbringing by Baptist parents and being born with a disability that helped him have empathy for others. Steven even decided to be buried in a small mixed-race cemetery.

While with the Amish, he reads an old book published in 1660, the Martyrs Mirror which spoke of persecution of anabaptist (Amish) in Europe and provides a glimpse for what some sought in America.

While much of King’s walk is relatively flat, his one “hill” is a garbage mountain in New Jersey. On the top, he catches his first glimpse of New York City while pondering our throw-away culture.

Recommendation

I really enjoyed this book. Particularly impressing was how King wove in so many themes (race, the land, our heritage) into his journey. I was also impressed how he didn’t shy away from unflattering pieces of our history but dealt with it all. In the end, King provides us an example of ending the division in America by humility, acknowledging that which we don’t know, while being neighborly and talking to one another.

June 5, 2024June 5, 2024

Up North

Title Slide with photo of me along the shore of Lake Huron

I’ve been wanting to post something about my time in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, but things have conspired to keep me from writing about it. After a week of Continuing Education, I took a week of vacation to head further north.

Saturday, April 13, 2024

Looking at the Presbyterian Church in DeTour Village, MI — Union Presbyterian Church, DeTour Village, MI

After finishing up with the Festival of Faith and Writing at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, I meet up with Bob, a friend of mine from my Michigan days. I had invited Bob along on this trip, as I have always enjoyed spending time with him. Professionally, he’s an editor and a saxophone player. He has incredible knowledge of plants, with a fondness of carnivorous plants. And he’s a storm chaser. Bob had a friend bring him up from Hastings, so he wouldn’t have to worry about where to leave a car. He threw his sax and his suitcase in my car, and we were on the road. As it’s over five hours, I wanted to get as much driving done before dark as we headed north.

As the sun began to set, we could see we were entering a different climate zone, as farmland disappeared and hardwoods gave way to forest of paper birch mixed with pines and spruce.

We had a great conversation, talking about several topics along with listening to some Robert Raurk short stories from The Old Man and the Boy. We didn’t stop until after dark, picking up fast food at Burger King in Kalkaska, a town featured in two short stories by Ernest Hemingway. A hour or so later, we stopped for gas in Petoskey. These were our only stops and we arrived in DeTour Village a little after midnight.

Sunday, April 14, 2024

Ship heading up to the Son — Heading toward the Soo

In a way, my time off was a busman’s holiday. The church in DeTour has a nice manse overlooking the St. Mary’s River. I agreed to preach (I reused sermons I’d preached in January) for the opportunity to stay in the Dmanse and to relax for the week. This meant that we had to get up early on Sunday morning. Knowing that I was arriving late the night before, some people in the church provided food in the refrigerator so that Bob and I could enjoy bacon and eggs with toast for breakfast the next morning.

Church came early the next morning as we were both exhausted. I preached and Bob excited the crowd by playing a couple of songs on the sax. Afterwards, we had lunch and the Mainsail, one of two restaurants open this early in the season in Detour. Afterwards, we both retreated into our bedrooms and took a nap, before going out and spending some time exploring fins along Lake Superior. These wetlands that were separated from the shore by dunes are diverse with plant life, most of which was left over from last season. Bob pointed out several carnivorous plants: pitcher plants and sundews. While he continued to look around, I hiked out onto the rocks jutting into the water and discovered a nest laid by Canadian geese.

We can back to the manse for a nice dinner of cabbage rolls made by another Bob, along with his wife Nelda, members of the church. As Bob had never seen “A River Runs Through It,” and there was a DVD of the movie in the manse, we watched it.

Canadian Geese Eggs along the shore of Lake Huron

Monday, April 15, 2024

Monday, we set what would be our routine for the week. We spent the mornings in the manse. While Bob would work on his edits, I spent the time reading and writing. We’d take an occasional break to watch a ship make its way up or down the St. Mary’s River. Bob was especially excited when I pointed out the Arthur Andersen, the ship that was behind the Edmund Fitzgerald the night it sunk in November 1975. On my first day, I read The Cellist of Sarajevo. Later in the week, I started reading Danielle Chapman’s Holler, along with sections of Augustine’s City of God, along with some writing. The afternoons were reserved for hiking.

In the afternoon, we spent time exploring some of DeTour and the trails nearby. Then, as the day sun dropped lower into the sky, we drove to Cedarville for the grocery store. We had dinner at Snows Bar and Grill, located above Snow Channel, along the north shore of Lake Huron. The place was wonderful. I had the walleye special and a Great Lakes Brewing CEO Stout while Bob had the UP special, a Cornish pastry. Afterwards, we went back to the manse and watched “The Jesus Revolution,” a movie I had brought along with me to watch in preparation of using it on a movie night at church. Bob, who is more familiar with contemporary Christian music, knew more about those portrayed in the movie than I did (Chuck Smith, Greg Laurie, and Lonnie Frisbee). We discussed this movie several times over the week.

Walleye Dinner at Snow’s Bar and Grill in Cedarville, MI

Tuesday, April 16, 2024

Tuesday afternoon, we hiked to around Cranberry Lakes to Caribou Lake, a walk of about 6 miles which I had done before. The trail takes us through cedar swamps with high ground consisting of paper birch forest mixed with spruce. It’s too early for wildflowers, but lots of smaller plants under the canopy have begun to brighten up after the winter.

After our hike, we head back to Snows Bar and Grill, where I enjoyed a wonderful Pepper Jack Burger with an Atwater Dirty Blonde. The burger was great, but the CEO Stout of the previous night I felt was superior to the Dirty Blonde. As there were a set of movies that featured Sandra Bullock. Since we both like her, we watched “Two Weeks’ Notice.” We were surprised to see Donald Trump in the movie, as he was featured much in the news with the beginning of his latest trial, as well as we recalled Sandra Bullock’s refusal to back him for the Presidency.

Wednesday, April 17, 2024

Wednesday was a rainy day. I still did a couple of miles hiking in the rain, coming home to a hot shower. We stayed close to home for dinner, eating a great burger in the DeTour Bar and Grill, where we got into a conversation with locals. We watched Sandra Bullock in “Ms. Congeniality” in the evening.

The Arthur M. Anderson freighter — Arthur Anderson, a freighter built in the 1950s
and the last ship to see the Edmund Fitzgerald afloat in 1975

Thursday, April 18, 2024

Thursday morning, I received a text from my sister, telling me that our father would be having surgery. I called, but he was already being prepped for surgery for a blockage in his intestines. I talked with my sister and brother for a bit. Little did I know this event would change my plans for the next month. She later texted to say he came through the surgery and was doing fine. We went for an early evening dinner at Snows in Cedarville, followed by a stop at the grocery store there for food to serve that evening. A group of people from the church came over and we had desert and a Bible Study.

a 1000 foot freighter — 1000 foot freighter leaving Lake Huron

Friday, April 19, 2024

Friday, Bob and I spent the day on Drummond Island. After talking with my father in the morning, we caught the ferry over the island. David and Sandra, members of the church in Detour, picked us up and toured us around the island. Then they dropped us off at Maxton Plains for a hike.

Hiking in Maxton Plains

I was hoping to make it to the cliffs along the northeast side of the island, but the recent rains had created ponds on the alvar surface. Alvar is limestone pavement. The glaciers of the last ice age had smoothed the limestone leaving only a minimal amount of topsoil. At places the pavement is like smooth finished concrete, allowing plant growth only in cracks. Unfortunately, for us, water takes longer to work though the rock, so the rains of Wednesday and Thursday have resulted in ponds which we have to work around. We make it almost to the cliffs, when we are blocked by a larger impoundment of water due to beaver activity.

Beaver dam — A beaver swamp blocking our path

As it’s getting late and we’re scheduled to be at a dinner at 6 PM, we hike back. This is my second failed attempt to make it to the cliffs, as I’d tried to find them when in the UP in 2021.

We were picked up at the trailhead by Dave and Sandra and taken to a home on the lake where a group from the Lighthouse Church on Drummond was holding a potluck. There were a few musicians present, Bob got to play the sax with them. I spent the evening getting to know new friends, especially Scott, the pastor. A former Episcopal priest, he’d been the pastor on the island for 10 years and joked about how he no longer dresses up on Sunday morning. Instead, he just finds a clean pair of jeans. We had a good time with everyone and caught the 9:30 PM ferry back to DeTour.

Saturday, April 20, 2024

A ship going through the St. Mary's River, MI — A “Saltie” (grain hauler),
making it’s way up toward the Zoo

On Saturday, winter returned. We had several snow squalls. Bob was working on a project for a new client, so I left him and hiked out on DeTour Point, through a large Nature Conservancy protected area. At times the blowing snow, mixed with sleet, pelted against me. Then the sun would make a brief appearance before the wintry mix returned. I saw several ships, both salties (ships that travel across the oceans and enter the Great Lakes through the St. Laurence Seaway and the Wellington Canal, and lakers (ships that haul mostly iron ore, coal, and limestone and are too large to leave the Great Lakes Basin. I arrived back to the manse around 6 PM and grilled steaks for dinner. Then we began to pack up.

Photo of shoreline along Detour Point — Between snow squalls

Sunday, April 21, 2024

The next morning, we had a joyful time at church where Bob again played the sax. We then went out to lunch at the Mainsail, before packing up and heading back south. I dropped Bob off in Hastings, then drove to friends in Portage Michigan for the evening. On Monday, I drove back to Virginia.

An old laker heading south toward Detroit or maybe Cleveland

Previous posts on trips to DeTour Village

July 2021

September/October 2022

Photo of author of blog in a snow squall — Selfie during a snow squall

February 8, 2024February 8, 2024

A stop at the Congaree

As I hadn’t planned on returning home until Monday, I decided to add another stop on my return. I have wanted to visit Congaree National Park in central South Carolina. The park is one of the nation’s newest, established in 2003. It’s also one of the least visited parks in the nation. The park consists of river bottom land along the Congaree River, which tends to flood. A few weeks before I arrived, 80% of the park was underwater. While I was there, the water within the park was once again rising.

Cedar Creek flows through the middle of the park, paralleling the Congaree River, which forms the park’s southern boundary. To the north, the land rises above the lowland, creating an area ideal for longleaf pine forest. Sadly, there are few longleaf, but I’ll get to that later.

Leaving Folkston, Georgia, I determined to stay off the freeways. I followed US 301, through small towns in South Georgia, Nahauta and Jessup. This was familiar territory from my time living in South Georgia. The GPS on my phone drove me nuts as it kept trying to lure me back on I-95. The GPS even said it was the safe route as the National Weather Station reported flooding on other routes. I found myself rerouted to the interstate. This I discovered this when I arrived in Hinesville. Turning the GPS off, I take a road that cuts through Fort Stewart, and picked up 301 again. I drive through Claxton (the world’s fruitcake capital) and Statesboro and Sylvania, where I stopp for a late lunch in a Chinese restaurant. While the rivers are high, they are nowhere near cresting over the bridges.

Crossing the Savannah River on an old bridge, I enter South Carolina. As I drive on, I listen to Edward Chancellor’s Devil Take the Hindmost, which is a history of economic speculation. Traveling through towns like Allendale and Bamberg, who appear to have long passed their better days gives me time to ponder what happens when an economic bubble bursts. I passed through Orangeburg, probably the largest city that I passed (Statesville might be larger, but I only skirted around it).

When I crossed Intestate 26, running from Charleston to Columbia, I stop and grabb a burger for later, knowing that I didn’t feel much like cooking.

I arrive at the Congaree National Park’s Longleaf Campsite at dusk. It’s a walk-in campsite, so I lung my waterproof bag containing my hammock, tarp, and sleeping bag a few hundred feet to my assigned site. I quickly set up my hammock, for there was heavy lightning to the north. But the storm took another path and by the time I was set to withstand the storm, the lightning has disappeared.

I then set out to explore. The waning moon, only a few days after full, rose and offered plenty of defused light. I hiked the longleaf trail to the Visitor’s Center. Of course, everything was closed, but in the darkness, I came to understand that the name of my campsite and the trail to the Center was aspirational. I was camping and hiking under loblolly pines, the type of pines loved by paper companies. When the old growth longleaf were cut, they were replanted with loblollies, as they grow faster. The loblollies have shallower roots than the longleaf, who grow deep roots before they grow tall. The only longleaf I’d seen in the dark were a few youthful plants near the outhouses.

Returning to my campsite, it begins to drizzle. I retreat into my hammock and read a few chapters of Cecile Hulse Matschat’s The Suwanee: Strange Green Land, before falling asleep to the sound of rain. It rained off and on throughout the night.

Coffee pot on my stove
(inside the fire pit because of the wind)

While I had enough water for the evening, I have to go find water for breakfast. I hike back to the Visitor’s Center and fill a couple of liter bottles. Coming back, I perk a pot of coffee and make some oatmeal. The wind slips through the pines as I enjoy breakfast. In honor of the Christian Sabbath, read several Psalms and commentaries in Robert Alter’s The Book of Psalms. The sun burns the fog and clouds away. Along with the wind, my tarp dries by the time I finish breakfast. I pack up a head back to the Visitors Center where most of the trails originate.

Boardwalk with evidence of recent flooding

The park has an amazing 2 ½ mile long boardwalk that takes you deep into the cypress lowlands. At places, the water is just below the walking path. I can see where, a few weeks ago, the water crested over the boardwalk. When I get to the trail to the river, I take it, but only make it about a half mile before the path is blocked by running water. I return to the boardwalk.

Along the way, I pass one of the largest loblolly pines I’ve seen. It’s huge. This is the natural location for such trees, as they tolerate water around their base better than the longleaf pines. These trees are obviously old growth and this one next to the boardwalk is thought to be the largest pine in South Carolina.

Water moving into bottomland. The rotten trees create bird habitat

These bottomland swamps, populated with cypress, loblollies, holly, and tupelo (gum) trees remind me of the swamps I started exploring as a teenager in Eastern North Carolina. While there is some similarity to the Okefenokee, it’s also different, especially with the amount of tupelo. After hiking about 4 miles, I make it back to my car and drive to the boat landing on Cedar Creek. I must get one more paddle in before driving home.

I eat lunch at the boat launch on the edge of the National Park boundary, a few miles from the Visitor’s Center. From the number of vehicles, it seems there are many others on the water, and a few are hiking, even though much of the trails are underwater. As I’m putting in, I speak with a guide who is bringing back a couple of patrons from a paddle. The water is high. He informs me that you can only make it about a mile upstream and three miles downstream. I head out, paddling upstream against the hard current for about 30 minutes, till I arrive at a place I can go no further without pulling my boat over a log. Then, I turn around and make it back to the takeout in only 10 minutes.

I continue going downstream for a few miles, passing many boaters struggling to fight the current as they paddle back to the takeout. This water is naturally blackish, but with the silt from the rains, it’s milk chocolate brown. As I turn around and paddle upstream, I pass many of those in small kayaks still fighting to get back to their takeout. My boat, 18 feet long, is easier to paddle against the current. I also read the water better, and am able to stay out of the fastest current.

One of the local paddlers from Columbia is impressed with my sea kayak and asks me all kinds of questions as he helps me load it on the car. He’d come down from the state capitol for a day trip and had never paddled this area. As we talk, we realize that we have probably raced against each other. He used to crew on a friend’s boat out of the Savannah Yacht Club and raced in many of the regattas I have also raced in.

A little after 3, I’m loaded up and heading north, driving the backroads of South Carolina through the Sandhill region of the state. In an old tree in a pond next to the road, I spot a bald eagle, I slow down, but there is no place to pull over. The car behind me honks his horn and gives me the “Hawaiian good luck sign” as he passes. The bird takes off. I have no idea what kind of hurry he was in, but he missed seeing a beautiful bird. As I enter North Carolina, the light fades. I cut over and take Interstate 77 toward home. Stopping only for dinner and gas, I arrive home a little after nine.

February 1, 2024February 9, 2024

My recent Okefenokee Adventure

I’ve been away (taking my last week of vacation from 2023), and spending time paddling in the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. It’s a place I’ve been many times. In May 2019, I did a five day trip into the Okefenokee which you can read about by clicking here. From my count, I have spent 15 nights in the swamp and paddled in it 20 days. After my recent trip, I have paddled all the canoe trails in the wilderness area of the swamp.

Drops of water hit just above my head as I wake from a dream of helping a college student host a seminar for families who have hosted exchange students. I have no idea of the genesis of that dream, but before I attempt to process it, I need to relieve my bladder. It’s 5:15 AM. I crawl out from my hammock, realizing the rain of the last couple of hours have stopped. Water still drops from the branches of trees. The full moon has moved to the west and, with the morning fog, brings an eerie light into the swamp. The moon also reflects off the dark water of the canal. The insects, so active earlier in the evening, have quieted. In the distance, I heard a large splash followed by a squeal. Did a gator find dinner?

Bill and I are camping at Canal Run, in the heart of the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. The water in the swamp is as high as I’ve seen and flows hard toward the Suwanee. Yesterday’s paddle of a little more than 7 miles was tough, especially for Bill who paddled one of his Blue Hole Canoes.

We’d left Stephen Foster State Park on the Southwest corner of the swamp yesterday morning around 10 AM, just as the fog rose. The current as we paddled the length of Billy’s Lake wasn’t too bad and it took just an hour to make it to Billy’s Island. We stopped to explore then took an early lunch. The island has long been inhabited by humans. The Lee family lived there for 50 years in a self-sufficient homestead. They raised crops, chickens, hogs, and cows, but also lived off the wild bounty of the swamp. Sadly, having never obtained title for their land, the logging company forced them out in the 1920s. Next came a logging camp which existed for a few years while they logged the swamp of its cypress and pine. Today, the island remains uninhabited, with only a few pieces of rusting logging equipment and a cemetery remaining.

A short way up from Billy’s Island, the channel narrowed as we entered the wilderness area. From here on, motors are not allowed. We entered a quiet world. We pushed our way eastward. At times, I had to make multiple turns in my 18-foot kayak to navigate the winding narrow channel. The real difficulty was in the first couple of miles, then the old canal straightened out, allowing us to make better time. Land speculators dug the canal in the late 19^th Century with the hopes of draining the swamp and opening it up to farming. The plan was to drain the water through the St. Mary’s River to the Atlantic, which was an engineering mistake as most of the swamp drains through the Suwanee River.

As the canal straightened and widen, I paddled ahead of Bill. Once I found the campsite, I backtracked and gave him the good news. Arriving at the campsite was a milestone for me, for it meant I have paddled all the canoe trails within the swamp. It took us four hours to make the five-mile upstream paddle from Billy’s Island. Along the way, we saw many alligators, a few turtles, a couple of cardinals, plenty of ducks, and one great blue heron.

Bill (dress coordinated with his Blue Hole)

We set up camp. Afterwards, Bill prepared the hot dogs he brought for dinner. I took his canoe and paddled upstream a bit more, collecting pieces of wood for a fire. Most of the campsites in the swamp are on platforms and fires prohibited. However, Canal Run is along the canal bank, so there is land and a campfire ring. We enjoyed a campfire and talked of folks we knew when we both lived in Hickory, NC back in the mid-80s. As we talked, the moon rose, and we could see it’s light through the trees and reflected across the waters.

We both turned in before nine, but I laid awake in my hammock for a while reading a chapter in Cecile Hulse Matschat’s Suwannee River. She had traveled in the swamp and then down the Suwannee in the early 1930s, to study orchids and came out with a handful of tales. She told about Snake Woman and her pet king snake. Some of the boys of the island caught an old rattlesnake with 21 rattlers. They let the two snakes fight it out. Everyone knew the king snake would kill the rattlesnake, but the wagers were on how long the old rattler could survive. After a chapter, I fell asleep to the night sounds of the swamp. I only woke up one before 5:15. Around 2:15, to the sound of raindrops. Checking to make sure things stayed dry, I fell back asleep to the sound of raindrops.

Canal Run campsite (the fire pit was to the left)

At 7 AM, I crawl out of my hammock and start heating water for oatmeal while perking coffee. We eat and takeour time packing up, discussing what to do next. Our plan had planned to continue down the Suwannee River, but it is so high, we know we would have a hard time finding camping spots. We discuss going down to Florida, where there are campsites up on bluffs, but when I suggest how much different the other side of the Okefenokee was than the west side, Bill decides he would like to see it.

It was just after 9 when we pushed off to make our way back to Stephen Foster State Park. The sky clears. With a warm sun, we see more alligators than the day before. We again stop at Billy’s Island for lunch. As I paddle into the boat ramp at the park, I noticed a gator with a square box on her head. Then I saw the tag on her tail with the number 209. As we pulled ashore, I ask a ranger alligator 209. “That’s Sophia,” he said. “She’s part of a study. Go to the University of Georgia’s website to learn more.”

Having packed up, we drive across the bottom of the swamp to St. Mary’s, where we picked up some ice and beer before heading north. We stop at Okefenokee Pastimes, a public campground just outside the Suwanee Canal Recreation Area. Interestingly, as I’ll later learn, the grandmother of the woman who runs the campground, was born on Billy’s Island.

After setting up camp, we plan to head into Folkston for dinner, but discover the campground has their own restaurant (serving dinner and on weekends, breakfast). We eat there both evenings and had breakfast together before we left on Saturday. I highly recommend their cheeseburger and their Philly cheese steak sandwiches. The place has a party atmosphere that includes some locals and a lot of folks from Jacksonville. We hear a lot of stories from colorful individuals including the former drummer of 38 Special. He travels around in a sleek airstream camper, and this is one of his regular campgrounds. One of the patrons even offered us a shot of “swine,” a local home brew mixture of moonshine and sweet wine. I tried it. It was okay, but not good enough to ask for a second round.

After sunset photo, Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge, 2015 — Cedar Hammock Sunset, 2015

On Saturday, Bill and I set out to explore the east side of the swamp. I leave my kayak on the car and take a position in the stern of his Blue Hole canoe. This side of the swamp is more open with large swampy areas known as prairies. As the water is high, we could paddle most anywhere we wanted to go. We explored Chesser and Mizzell prairies and stop at Cedar Hammock platform. I remember taking some incredible sunset photos from here in 2015. We see lots of large birds including sandhill cranes, egrets, and hawks. There are plenty of alligators and turtles. While few of the flowers are in bloom, we see lots of dried pitcher plants, which will come back to life later in the spring. We also hear the bellowing of bull gators, which seemed a little in the year.

After paddling maybe 8 miles, we toured the Chesser homestead and hiked out to an observation tower over Chesser prairie. After dinner at Okefenokee Pastimes, we built a fire and sat around enjoying it. Bill plays guitar and we talk till bedtime. The next morning, after breakfast, Bill heads home and I head into Folkston to watch some trains, before my next adventure (which I’ll write about later).

a long train of mostly tank cars running the “Folkston Funnel”

January 16, 2024January 16, 2024

Coming Home to Pittsburgh, 1987

Title slide with photos taken from the Capitol Limited along the Potomac River in winter

This is a follow-up story to the one I posted before Christmas, when I wrote about my first long distant train trip from Pittsburgh to Florida and the only train wreck I’ve experienced. Click hereto read the story. Click here to read about my visit to Pittsburgh last summer.

New Years Day 1987

Soon after the conductor checked me in and shortly after pulling out of the DC Station, I headed to the lounge car for a beer and a sandwich for dinner. In a corner booth, several obviously intoxicated guys played cards. I sat diagonally across from them, in the only open seat. Across from me, another conductor did paperwork. We exchanged greetings. He went back to his work, and I took a bite into my sandwich and looked out the window.

Darkness was upon us. But every so often the flashing red lights at gates dispelled the descending darkness as we crossed highways. Leaving DC, the tracks snaked along the Potomac. The icy winter mix we’d been experiencing all day had changed to big snowy flakes by the time we reached Harper’s Ferry. After finishing my sandwich, I purchased another beer and pulled out The Bridge Over the River Kwai. I only had a few pages left, which I read while downing my beer.

The guys in the poker table in the corner kept hollering and then one of them told a racist joke. The car attendant came over and told them they’d been inappropriate and need to return to their seats. When they asked for another beer to take with them, he refused, saying they’d had enough. The game broke up and all but one walked away. This guy became louder, shouting obscenities and racial slurs. The conductor immediately stood up in support of the car attendant, as he called for assistance on his radio.

I wondered if I was going to witness my first mobile bar fight. The three men, the drunk on one side, the conductor and attendant on the other, appeared locked in a stand-off, waiting for someone to blink. The man was told again that had better go back to his seat or he’d be removed from the train. He refused and sat back down in defiance.

I’m not sure who made the call, perhaps the other conductor who had stepped into the car and stood at the back. Everyone remained quiet, with the drunk staring at the attendant and conductor. A few minutes later the train slowed. At a lonely snow-covered road, with the flashing lights of a sheriff’s car competing with the crossing lights, the train came stopped. The engineer had parked the lounge car in the middle of the road.

The attendant opened the door, and two sheriff deputies entered. They spoke briefly to the conductor, and then to the drunk’s amazement, told him he was under arrest. He asked if he could go back to his seat but was cuffed and led out into the night. The conductor made a call from his radio, the whistle blew, and the train jerked forward. Everyone in the lounge car remained quiet, surprised by what we’d witnessed.

The day, cold and gray, had started early as I’d boarded the Silver Star in Southern Pines, North Carolina. I’d spent New Year’s Eve with my Grandma, barely making it till midnight. I was in bed soon after Dick Clark finished clicking off the seconds of 1986 at Times Square.

Boarding the train, I was seated in a coach that I soon learned had a malfunctioning heating unit. Everyone was cold and the attendant had given out every blanket he had. I pulled my sleeping bag from my backpack and sat down, sliding my legs into it. My eyes alternating from the barren winter landscape outside to the pages of The Bridge over the River Kwai.

In Raleigh they tried to fix the heating unit, and again in Petersburg, but in both cases, as soon as we were running, the unit kicked out. The train, filled with folks heading home for the holidays, was full. There were no available seats in the other cars. That afternoon, I napped, warm in my bag, as sleet and freezing rain pounded against the window. There wasn’t a second to pause when we reached Washington, D. C. We were late and I had to immediately board the Capitol Limited for its run toward Chicago. Winded, I was at least pleased to find a warm coach with a working heat unit.

After my light dinner and the evening entertainment, I’d returned to my seat. The train crossed over the Appalachians and began the downhill dart through coal towns nestled along the Youghiogheny. The snow piled up. When we stopped at the little hamlets, folks getting off the train would leave footprints in the powder as they head toward the station or awaiting cars. Some looked around, as if waiting for someone who wasn’t there to greet them. This was such a lonely scene, I thought. As the tracks approached Pittsburgh, running through the Monongahela Valley, I saw flames coming from the few steel mills still operating. Their red glow cutting though the darkness. A few minutes later, we pulled into Pittsburgh. As I got off, I wonder if I’ll have a ride, if Rusty has been able to make it through the snow to pick me up.

Sure enough, Rusty was waiting in the station. Pittsburgh had received nearly a foot of snow, but he was used to driving in it. The roads were vacant as we drove through town. Once we got back to the school, I dropped my bags in my apartment, pulled on my boots and headed outside. It was early in the morning, January 2nd, but I couldn’t sleep. Outside something magical happened. The dreary day had been transformed and now, at night, the snow added a cheerfulness to the air. I walked along Highland Avenue, enjoying the left-over Christmas lights that pierced the darkness. I was home.

Church steeple high over a Pittsburgh neighborhood in January 1987 — Taken from the 3rd Floor of Fisher Hall at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in January 1987. Sadly, the Catholic Church with the high spires closed two decades ago. Many of its slate shingles had fallen off when I was in Pittsburgh last summer.

Postscript: Two days later, my mother called to make sure I was okay. She had heard of a terrible train wreck in Maryland. I don’t know why she worried that I was on that train unless she felt that my former trip’s wreck made me unlucky on trains. The accident turned out to be the one of the worse rail accidents in Amtrak history as a set of Conrail engines ignored lights and crossed in front of the Amtrak train.

December 13, 2023December 16, 2023

Doubly Late on the Silver Meteor

This past week, I was on vacation, which is why there was no sermon on Sunday. I reworked this story for posting here. You may have read a lot of my train stories, from all over the world, but this was my first overnight long distance trip. I made the trip in December 1986. I can’t find photos of this trip, which was long before digital photography became available.

picture of me in front of a steel mill — That’s me, 1989, in front of the old Homestead Steel Works, outside of Pittsburgh

Suddenly, everything slid forward. Brakes squealed. To keep upright, I grabbed the overhead luggage rack and held on tight. There was a bang, then a clicking sound ran outside of the car, for the length of the train. We stopped.

The conductor had been walking down the aisle toward me. He, too, grabbed the overhead bar to keep from falling. His face immediately changed, displaying concern. From his expression, I knew whatever had happened wasn’t normal. As soon as we stopped, he started speaking into his radio as he turned around and headed toward the front of the train. Still not sure what had happened, I looked outside. Shingles, boards, and bits of insulation littered both sides of the tracks.

After about five minutes, the conductor came over the intercom. He informed us we’d just hit a house and were indefinitely delayed. I headed back to the lounge car, where I ran into Marylin. We headed to back of the train. In the fading light, from the back window, we could see two halves of a house sitting beside the tracks. I joked that Abe Lincoln had nothing on me: “I, too, have seen a house divided.”

We were 30 or 45 minutes from West Palm Beach, riding through orange groves south of Sebring, Florida, when the accident happened. I had just left my new friend, Marylin, a grad student studying genetics at the University of West Virginia in Morgantown. We had seen each other in Pittsburgh when we both boarded the train but didn’t get to know each other until waiting to board our second train in Washington. I was heading to West Palm Beach to meet up with my sister while she was going home for the holiday break in Miami.

A friend had dropped me off at the Pittsburgh train station in the predawn hours the day before. In contrast to warm and sunny Florida, it was a dreary December day in the Steel City. But that wasn’t unusual, almost all winter days in Pittsburgh are dreary. My train, the Capitol Limited which runs from Chicago to Washington, was late. I sat on my luggage reading and napping as my stomach gnawed. I had planned to eat breakfast on the train and there was no place in station to get anything to eat.

The train finally arrived just as it was getting light. After finding a seat and having my ticket punched, I headed to the dining car for a French toast breakfast. The train ran along the Monongahela River, past the old J&L and Homestead Steel Mills. A few mills were still running and from the window I saw the glow of the furnaces. At McKeesport, the tracks followed the Youghiogheny, a river I’d never paddled, but knew of its reputation from my kayaking days. The rain and fog made everything seem sad.

Along the way, the train kept having to stop. Late that morning, talking to the conductor in the lounge, I learned that one of the baggage cars had a hot wheel that kept overheating. Every time we stopped, we lost another half hour or so. I worried if I would miss my connection south. We were several hours late arriving in Cumberland, Maryland, where the tracks began to follow the Potomac River toward D.C. In Harper’s Ferry, they uncoupled the train and placed the trouble car off on a siding. It was too late. We’d arrive in Washington after my train to Florida was scheduled to depart.

There are two trains daily that make the run from New York to Miami. The first, the Silver Star, was my train. Luckily, there was room on the second train, the Silver Meteor. It runs a couple hours behind the first train. I called my sister and let her know that I’d be on the later train. She wasn’t home, but I left a message. I ate dinner in the crowded station (the Washington station was in the process of being rebuilt) as I passed the hours reading.

It was night by the time we boarded. After a beer in the lounge car, I headed off to sleep, enjoying the rocking of the southbound train rolling through Virginia and the Carolinas. The long day of waiting on top of a long semester in school had taken its toll. I was tired.

I woke to the sun rising in a clear sky. We ran though forests of pines and wire grass, paralleling Interstate 95. The flat land was strangely familiar. I’d grown up in such country. The weather was also warmer. I changed from my jeans to shorts and a tee-shirt and found my flip flops, before heading to the lounge car for coffee.

We got into Savannah around mid-morning. I got off the train and stretch my legs as it made a 15-minute stop. I’d learned that during the night, we’d lost several hours of time. I again tried to call my sister. I left her another message, telling her to be sure to call Amtrak before driving to West Palm to pick me up. Sometime after Savannah, I met up again with Marylin, the grad student from West Virginia. We spent much of the day in the lounge car talking with each other and to other students. We also spent time napping in her roomette. The two of us made an interesting couple. I’d just finished my first semester of seminary and she was Jewish but considered herself an atheist. It was her company that I had just left when I headed back to pack up by stuff when the accident occurred.

Sadly, with the train running so late, they ran out of food. The dining car didn’t have enough grub to open for dinner and what few sandwiches were available in the lounge car were quickly snatched up. They tried to make it up for people by offering a free drink, but they quickly ran out. We waited. The operating crew had to be replaced. Railroad rules: if you’re in an accident, a drug test was required. Seeing a house in the middle of the tracks almost sounds like someone was on drugs, but this was too real. Also, a safety crew had to inspect the train before they could move again. We sat in the dark in the middle of an orange grove.

Rumors spread. They may have been true, but we had no way to know. This was long before smart phones. One had to do with the fact that we had two engines pulling the train as they were trying to make up time. Normally, when the southbound trains arrived in Orlando, they split the train. One group goes to Tampa, the other to Miami. Both trains are pulled by a single engine. Having two engines worked in our favor, as the first we learned had been badly damaged by the metal I-beams which supported the house. We were told by the new crew that luck kept the train from jumping the track, which would have made the collusion much worse. After the inspectors checked out, they were able to back us up on the second engine and reroute us on a different track.

The other tale had to do with the house. The tracks were built up and the semi pulled the house up on the tracks, but it bottomed out. Knowing they were in a pickle; they disconnected the semi from the house instead of walking around the curve and placing flares to warn the train and perhaps give the train enough time to stop.

After about five hours of waiting and grumbling, we finally resumed our journey. When I debarked in West Palm Beach, there was my sister. She was nearly as exhausted as me.

Had I been on the Silver Star, the train I was supposed to be on, I would have arrived early that morning in West Palm. She had worked that night in the hospital and then, since she was closer to West Palm, was to pick me up. She waited and never saw me get off the train. When she asked, they told her that all passengers coming from the West had been rebooked on the Silver Meteor. They suggested that before she return to the station, she should call to make sure of the time as the train was already running several hours late. She did, but since she lived almost an hour from West Palm, in Stewart, she left home about the time of the accident. While I waited on the train, she waited in the station.

It was after midnight when we got to her home. The next day, she had planned to take me to Epcot for my Christmas present. So, we got up early to make the drive to Orlando. We had a great time, but we were both exhausted.

Other train travel stories:
Trains and Karl Barth (train ride from Danville, VA to Atlanta, GA)
Heading to Iona (Edinburgh to Oban)
Ride of a lifetime (in the cab of the V&T in Nevada)
From Bangkok to Seim Reap
Riding the International (Butterworth, Malaysia to Bangkok, Thailand
Malaysia’s Jungle Train (Singapore to Kota Bharu
Southwest Chief (Flagstaff, AZ to Kalamazoo, MI)
City of New Orleans (Battle Creek, MI to New Orleans, LA)
Morning train to Seoul (Masan to Seoul)

July 27, 2023July 28, 2023

Returning to Pittsburgh

In front of the seminary, looking toward East Liberty Presbyterian Church

Have you noticed that I’ve been absent the past two weeks?

I’ve walked North Highland Avenue many times, but it’s been over 3 decades since I last made this trek. I pass the old homes lining the avenue, which have changed little since the 80s. At the corner of Bryant, I stop at Tazza D’Oro, a coffee shop, for breakfast. This wasn’t here before. The cafeteria at the seminary, where I am staying, is closed during the summer. Coffee and a breakfast sandwich cost me $16. Spending a few minutes reading Karl Barth while eating. I notice the crowd seems different. The people are much younger than those I remember being around these parts. No do I remember having such a meager breakfast at such a price.

The coffee shop is just around the corner from Dinos, a dive bar I frequented. In 1986, I could get a 12-ounce glass of IC Light (pronounced Icy Light in Pittsburghese). Their top shelf liquors were only $2, but sadly the establishment closed after the death of the bartender in 1989. Today, the storefront host the Kyoto Restaurant, an upscale looking Japanese establishment which won’t open until much later in the day.

I continue walking north on Euclid Avenue, passing the ironic Azimuth Way, as I head toward Highland Park. The entrance is neat and clean with flowers blooming in the beds surrounding foundations. In the grass to the side, a yoga class is being held. I climb the steps leading to the walkway around the reservoir, a walk I took hundreds of time before. With a fast clip, I walk around the reservoir as I am meeting friends for lunch and need to shower as I have worked up a sweat thanks to the humidity. I head back to the seminary, having walked a little over 3 miles.

After cleaning up, I drive the same route I just walked, and then work my way around the park and zoo to the Highland Park Bridge, where I cross the Allegheny River. The bridge is being worked on, which isn’t anything new. When my parents first visited me in Pittsburgh, the bridge had holes in which you could look down into the river. I took my parents over the bridge to Aspinwall for dinner and my mother insisted we not drive back across that bridge again. She also ordered me not to drive across it, which became a mute request for soon they’d closed the bridge in order to rebuild it.

I’m meeting for lunch two of my professors (Charles Partee and Don Gowan) and the former seminary’s Director of Placement, Jean Henderson. The three of them, who have all lost their spouses and are in their 80s and 90s, live in a large continuing care facility in Cranberry Township.

After lunch, I return to the seminary and in the late afternoon take a walk south of the Seminary, around East Liberty (pronounced s’berty in Pittsburghese). Back in the 80s, I used to occasionally help feed the homeless men at the shelter housed by the East Liberty Presbyterian Church. It was eye opening, as many of the men would come in and pour hydroperoxide on the needle marks on their arms to keep them from becoming infected. I seldom walked this direction by myself at night, and when I did, I left my wallet in my apartment and only took a few dollars as it wasn’t uncommon for someone to be mugged.

Today, East Liberty is undergoing renovation. The high-rise low-income apartments have been torn down and replaced by more appealing apartment-like buildings. The old Sears and the buildings around it have been razed and a new Home Depot now sits in the area. The old Giant Eagle, a grocery store, is now a Senior Center. I wonder where the young men who used to hang out around the pay phone, waiting to receive a call for a lift. While this was frowned on, especially by the taxi companies, in the age before cell phones and Uber, it was efficient and met a need within the community. I’m not sure what other services beyond transportation they supplied, but they hustled.

There’s a lot of work being done on the roads around East Liberty. I walk pass Eastminster and East Liberty Presbyterian. Both are grand churches. Eastminster has wonderful Tiffany windows, while East Liberty is the closest thing we Presbyterians have to a cathedral. There was an older church at the site that was torn down so this one could be rebuilt. It was funded by Richard Mellon, from the prominent Mellon family of Pittsburgh, who in addition to working at the family bank with his brother Andrew, headed Alcoa and was involved in other business in the region. His hope was to create jobs during the Depression, and he has left an amazing structure. Inside, he and his wife’s remains are parked in a small prayer chapel off the main nave. As the sanctuary is massive, the seminary uses it for graduation. I continue to walk South, across the sunken railroad tracks and the bus way which allows buses to take you downtown without traffic in minutes. Then I cross over into the Shadyside neighborhood. Only a few things seem familiar.

For dinner, I drive back across the Allegheny River, looking for another favorite dive bar where, in the 80s, one could get a plate of eight whole chicken wings (not the cut up kind) for three bucks. They were so hot that you also ate the celery with ranch dressing along with several beers to down it all. It’s not there and I end up eating at a new Thai Restaurant at Waterworks. I’m back in my room at the seminary before dark and spend the rest of the evening preparing for the week’s seminar.

The next morning, I head out to an old Eat’n Park in Etna, where I often ate breakfast on Sunday mornings as I north headed to Butler and the church where I worked at from 1986 to 1988. I’m sure most of the waitresses weren’t even born when I lived here. I found myself wondering what ever happened to Lydia, one of the regular waitresses in the 80s.

Then I head downtown. I’m meeting two former classmates at the Willie Stargel statue by the ballpark on the north side. Back in the day, I would walk across the Roberto Clemente Bridge, the first of the “Three Sisters” (identical yellow bridges that cross the Allegheny). As the Clemente Bridge is closed for reconstruction, I take an option that wasn’t available in the 80s. The subway has now been extended to the Northside. It travels under the Allegheny River and drops you off right beside the stadium. Of course, the stadium is also new and is much nicer than the old Three River Colosseum, where I saw many Pirate and a few Steeler games.

We meet at 11:30, buy tickets for seats up above the third base line. It’s a beautiful day, a little warm, but not terrible. The game is competitive and at the end of nine is tied. We go into an extra inning, but the Giants blow out the Pirates in the 10^th. Afterwards, we plan to go to dinner with another classmate (who had to preach this morning and was unable to make the game). We meet at Bakery Square, which is near the seminary. In the 1980s, it was a large Nabisco Bakery, but today consists of restaurants, offices, apartment flats, and a fitness center. I would eat here three more times over the next four days, as I meet with a theology group from Monday through Thursday.

Sunday afternoon at PNC Park. This is a magnificent ballpark!

By the end of my second full day in Pittsburgh, I realize that most everything I knew about the city has changed, except for the work on the Highland Park Bridge and the Pirates losing. Our group would also go to a night game at PNC Park. The Pirates lost again, this time to the Cleveland Guardians.