Reflections 2.0

Some things tickled my inner Jeremy Clarkson on our trip.
They have roads and they have "routes" (pronounced "raowtes"). A road is a strip of tarmac or concrete (USA - pavement). A route is a way of going in a particular direction. For example Interstate 40 is East to West, US route 411 is North to South. With me so far? The result of all this is that a particular road can be several routes, not necessarily going in the same direction so... The motorway through Knoxville in one direction is the I40 West and also the I75 South. Sometimes different routes on the same bit of concrete can be going to all directions of the compass at the same time... Which makes for interesting signage and an awful lot of arrows! This takes a bit of getting used to when first encountered. Actually the signs are often ambiguous, mistimed or apparently contradictory - and when traffic is going as fast as it often does, the satnav reminds you of where you should have turned off a few seconds ago. There are few signs reminding you of where you are headed and more rarely are distances given.
Talking of signs,some of them are worth recalling. "Move car to shoulder if not injured". Which probably explains the existence of "Shoulder drop-off". And in road works, a sign proclaims "Men working when flashing". OK, I'll explain; the first means get the vehicle off the road after a minor accident, the second tells you that the hard shoulder is narrow and is flanked by a ditch. The final one has flashing lights to tell you when (rarely) something IS going on the roadworks.
Everyone drives at 10 mph or more above the advertised speed limit (when indeed it IS advertised). Great trucks ("eigthteen-wheelers") can be seen merrily overtaking ordinary cars. Pick-up trucks and SUVs can be gigantic. Which is intimidating... Especially when the big truck radiator has been painted with teeth so that looking in the mirror this great mouth looks back at you. And sometimes you witness one tractor from an eighteen-wheeler towing three other similar tractors.
Screaming bridges: Especially in the West, tarmac roads can be interrupted by bridges made of grooved concrete so that whereas you were pootling along happily in relative quiet, suddenly the bridge generates a loud scream and wakes you up.
Petrol pumps work differently in every garage so that filling up is always an adventure. A good thing is that you can lock the hose handle and pace around meditating while the car gets a drink. (In Oregon, however, you have to leave the garage attendant to fill up.) In one place, the pump had a TV screen so you watch it while the car filled itself! Prices vary enormously for no obvious reason. We did the whole trip at a rate of 7 cents (5p) / mile for petrol  / gas.
Road quality ranges from sublime to catastrophic according to the road's place in the hierarchy and the state or county you're in.The main technique seems to be fill the cracks in the concrete with tar and patch the bigger holes with anything that come to hand. You can even be driving with the left wheels on tarmac and the right ones on cracked concrete. And then you try to keep going straight.
There are rumble strips along both edges of a road and sometimes in the middle so that overtaking becomes a musical experience. (But it does keep you on the straight and narrow.)
Roadworks are advertised everywhere and often there is nothing going on in them. Or they are none. At times, you can see an "end of road work" sign all on its own!
The satnav, known to her friends a "Dashbord Lil" was annoyingly accurate in her prediction of arrival time, including the fact that she was more aware than we were of which time-zone we were in. She had, however, a speech impediment that stopped her correctly saying names with and "a" or "o" in them. She let us down only once badly by landing us in the middle of nowhere and opposite a nodding donkey (oil extractor pumps) sales yard in Texas instead of our motel. Otherwise very good when the traffic wasn't crazy (see above).
But the roads, even if sometimes a bit sub-optimal, enable you to go hundreds of miles with little trouble or tiredness. On one occasion we drove 114 miles after dinner! Of course satnav and cruise control also help...
The scenery is wonderfully varied and often beautiful, almost always interesting. Makes it all worth-while...

Reflections

When Peter started talking seriously about this trip in late spring of 2014 I immediately said I would like to do it as well.  Now only three days away from returning to the UK and I've been thinking about the things and places I've seen, the people I've met and what a totally amazing experience it's all been.

Some places have moved me to tears - Crater Lake, Oregon which has to be one of the most beautiful places on the planet, the Lincoln Memorial with the Gettysburg Address carved into the wall close by, even though it was crowded, was beautiful and to stand where Martin Luther King Junior gave his "I have a dream" speech filled me with awe.  I've loved driving along the endless roads through the mountains, forests, fields, across the rivers and all under the huge skies.  We've been blessed with fabulous weather most of the time too.

The American people have been so friendly and welcoming (provided that they aren't in their cars!!)  Everyone wants to know where we're from, they love our accent and they would love to visit England!

There have been disappointments also:  We couldn't visit The Wave - Arizona because it's protected and therefore a walk of 3 miles out into the desert - walking around it - then 3 miles back again in 100 + Fahrenheit - I know my limitations and it just wasn't possible;  we missed the Minuteman Missile silo because it wasn't signposted and we had a couple of hundred miles still to go that day!  But the joys have outweighed the small inconveniences. 

What I do know is that I won't ever forget it, it's been great, but Fall is here, the weather is changing and it's time to get back to "normal" life. [Shame! Ed.]

The Last Post

So we left Washington behind and failed to get a decent picture of the Pentagon (too much security), to visit the Air and Space Museum Extension at Dulles Airport (The satnav, "Dashboard Lil" to her friends,  could not keep up with traffic) and Monticello, president Jefferson's home, (an invasion of elderly US patriots in big SUVs stopped us visiting the house). Worst day until...

We then had beautiful drive down the Appalachians, alongside the Shenandoah valley (as in the song!) to Roanoke. We had a very good Indian (Asian that is, not American)meal that evening and then watched a program on PBS (their equivalent of our Beeb) about the Outer banks, a sandbar dozens of miles long that run down the Atlantic coast an few hundred yards out from the mainland. Seemed beautiful - some people like the seaside - we decided to go through there on the last leg of our journey. 

 

 The town we stayed in is Kitty Hawk and it is perched on one of the larger banks and this is where the Wright brothers first managed powered flight of a heavier-than-air machine. The memorial and museum are a national park and extremely well run, as ever in the States. Very interesting talk from one of the rangers, a visit to the hilltop monument followed and then we drove back West towards Tennessee, stopping one night in Salisbury, North Carolina.






The next day we drove from there to Knoxville through the southern Appalachian mountains, known locally as the "Smokeys": beautiful early Autumn colours and the wiggliest section of the interstate road system we ever saw. "Smokeys" because terpenes (Google it!) emitted by the abundant pine trees turn the distant vistas smokey blue - very beautiful. Arrived in time for a haircut (getting rid of a three-month growth that prompted a security man in Washington into enquiring what Father Christmas was doing there in October!).



So now we are staying with our son Philip's family, rejoining Linda who had been there for a week previous.
 Yesterday we went back up into the Smokeys, to an old settlement, now abandoned, called Cades Cove: Autumn-coloured trees, old cabins, farm buildings and churches and three black bears up a tree!



 
That's it for now. In a few days, Peter will put out a further post describing aspects of the trip and the "American Way" of doing roads, toilets (!) and hospitality, etc...



[We must apologise for the ragged appearance of some of our blogs - we have still not worked out how to place pictures within the text with Blogger tools. Ed.]

Peace, history, war, power

 
We left Cape Cod and drove across Massachusetts to visit the Hancock Shaker Village, a beautiful, peaceful place which is just a museum now as there are just a few Shakers left in Maine.  Their way of life meant that they would inevitably die out as they remained celibate and the only children were orphans from the nearby towns.  They were technologically very advanced, planning their buildings so that full advantage of the sun was taken for instance.








Rhode Island was next with (another) computer museum, slightly odd set-up as they have some offices and a warehouse where there is computer equipment stacked almost to the ceiling but they don't currently have the money to develop any further.  They have an educational thread, taking classes in libraries and such like and they rent equipment to film and television producers (Mad Men etc.)




Gettysburg was amazing, the tour guide for the battleground was, as always, very knowledgeable and was so enthusiastic, a quaint town, obviously very proud of its place in American history.  Gettysburg is home to the first US National Cemetery.
Driving from Gettysburg to Washington DC today we crossed the Mason/Dixon line - this is an historical line which separates the North from the South. Around Pennsylvania and Maryland at least.










Took the Metro into (Washington) DC and visited the Washington Memorial, the Reflecting Pool, the Lincoln Memorial, the Vietnam Memorial, the White House and then across to Arlington National Cemetery.  We were both moved by the Lincoln Memorial and the Gettysburg Address carved into the wall.  Joe Louis and Lee Marvin are both buried at Arlington.  We also watched the Changing of the Guard there - different from Buckingham Palace or Windsor Castle but impressive in its simplicity. 











Our second day in Washington we took in some of the Smithsonian museums with Peter visiting the Air & Space Museum and Kath taking in the National Art Gallery and then in the afternoon both visiting the American Indian Museum and viewed Capitol Hill on the way back to the Metro.

Rock, water, small town, (very) big town, arty town

Before visiting the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, we tried to find the Cleveland Cavaliers basketball team stadium!  Ended up with the satnav gettingus hopelessly lost, but the Cleveland Police came to our rescue - a wonderful sergeant Peter asked for directions ended up escorting us all the way there!

The Hall of Fame was once again really well done - the Americans have a great way with museums!  A huge tribute to Elvis of course, but the early roots of blues music, the British influence etc. was all given its place.  Kath's favourite section was a display of Herb Ritts photographs of celebrities, including Prince, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, Madonna et al.






The Hall of Fame's interpretation of the song "Another Brick in the Wall". For those who remember it...









We drove into Canada to see Niagara Falls, border checks including questions about whether we were carrying firearms or contraband!! (As if we would!!).  Although the weather wasn't brilliant, the falls are stunning, the sheer force of the water causes a mist to rise above the level of the dreadful high-rise casinos and theme park attractions that face onto the falls.


On through the Adirondacks in New York state with beautiful lakes and autumn colours, altogether a lovely drive.






From Plattsburgh, NY we took the ferry across to Vermont, plenty more autumn colours to be seen.  We stopped in Richmond, VT where there is a round church, built in 1812 by 17 families and now used as the town meeting hall.  Moving on we reached Sqwam Lake which was used in the film "On Golden Pond" and then to Lake Winnipesaukee to a strange "Bates" motel with no staff! Other inmates let us in.





Obviously we survived the night and drove on towards Boston, sadly failing to find a parking place in Cambridge so that we could visit Harvard University. We had to content ourselves with looking at the buildings from the car. We had our lunch with a local artist outside a Whole Foods supermarket - you certainly meet interesting natives this trip.

Staying on Cape Cod currently and drove to Providencetown at the far tip of the island where we spent some time walking around the harbour and the little town. Very arty but also very touristy.

Museum, windy city, museum, museum

A highlight of the journey for Peter at least. On our second day in Chippewa Falls we visited its Museum of Industry and Technology, This has a wide range of computers Seymour Cray designed and we learned a bit about his life and times in the early supercomputer era. Peter resisted adding bunny ears to a cardboard cutout of Seymour that he was photographed with. From there we drove to Joliet, a far suburb of Chicago for the night.









We took the suburban train to central / lakefront Chicago: They do not do things by half: The train was all double-decker carriages. Peter had seen this city from the air in 1998 returning from Philip's wedding and the ground view was equally impressive! On arrival, we needed directions and got them from a very friendly businessman who sounded just like Al Capone! A video team from the loacal media school interviewed us - I doubt it will make it to CNN






Next morning we visited the Joliet local history museum and watched a Route 66 video. This route ran from Chicago to south of Los Angeles and started close to the street outside! A local engineer, John Houbolt, was responsible for guidance on the 1960s moonshots - local son of Dutch immigrant made an important contribution to the space race: the quintessial American story.







Wound our way from there to Ann Arbor, Michigan in preparation for visiting The Henry Ford museum in Detroit, This was not, as we had expected, a museum to the glory of Ford but a general museum about American life in the 20th century. Very intructive, covering everyday life and technology as well as displaying a wonderful collection of American cars (all makes) including the president's cars from the year dot onward. Science Museum meets V&A meets Haynes Motor Museum...

We are now outside Cleveland, and tomrrow we visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on Philips's recommendation. Weather is getting better!

Mileage to date: 7708 miles. (Magnify the map and see the red travel line.)













Kath: We've met some very pleasant people along the way: a Highway Patrolman in Fresno, when I took a wrong turn! A waitress in Joliet (living up to the name by being very jolly); The Chicago businessman; The conductor on the Rock Island Line train; The lads from the media school; The guy at Mount Rushmore who held up Daisy Bear so that Peter could photograph her next to the Presidents (I was too short!); The couple we met in the line (queue) for the Japanese restaurant in Chippewa Falls; The ex-rodeo rider, now cafe-owner where we had breakfast in Blanding, Utah: she accidentally refilled my tea cup with coffee as we were talking; The couple we had breakfast with in Pendleton Oregon; The family we spoke to in Texarkana when the rest of the place was closed; The laundromat owner in El Paso - I could go on but all of them so polite and interested to hear what we are doing.

Culture, Custer, core, carving, corn, Cray

We stayed in Billings for one more day as after driving 727 miles on Thursday and another 450 to Yellowstone and back - we felt we deserved a rest!  Made the most of the day by visiting the Yellowstone Art Museum in downtown Billings which was a small amount of money well spent. A very creative place - poeple add their own art,,..

The Little Bighorn battlefield was next on the agenda.  The Americans have a real knack of doing this type of thing very well.  We only caught the tail end of the talk but the Ranger - a self-confessed cultural historian - spoke eloquently.  The loss of life there was not huge, less than 400 souls with probably no more than 100 of those being Native Americans, but it was significant and also it was Custer's last stand and the beginning of the end for the Indian way of life,,,.

Devil's Tower in Wyoming is pretty impressive too, being the magma chamber of an ancient volcano which was originally 1.5 miles under the ground! Over time the river has washed (and is still washing) away the sedimentary rock surrounding it.  It's similar in its make up to the Giant's Causeway in Ireland.



We then left Hulett, Wyoming, for Kimball, South Dakota, stopping on the way at Mount Rushmore in the Black Hills.  It took 17 years to carve out of the mountainside and was 90% completed with dynamite!





Driving on we arrived at the Minutemen Missile Museum, one of the newest sites on the National Parks list, but although the museum was open sadly it was a disappointment for Peter as the silo itself was located about 15 miles away and the control centre had no visits left for that day.  As we were due in Kimball (almost another 200 miles down the road), we decided we couldn't go back.


South Dakota is very flat and agricultural (as is South Minnesota) - corn (maize) as far as the eye can see!  SD is the home of Laura Ingals Wilder (Little House on the Prairie).We think nothing now of driving 400 miles (although Kath manipulated the Minneapolis traffic without any horrendous mistakes) and continued on to Chippewa Falls in Wisconsin, which is the home of the late Seymour Cray - the father of the supercomputer. Of interest to Peter as a bit of a computer  historian and collector.

Sea, lake, snow, tarmac, steam

After leaving Fort Bragg (California) we drove along more of the Pacific Highway, a long and winding road which hugs the coast and is very picturesque.  Much cooler here especially with some sea mist floating in and out.  We stopped at Eureka, another town of contrasts - the historic and the unappealing.  Drove on through yet more giant Redwoods and into Oregon to Grants Pass, which appears to be an agricultural area.  Oregon has an odd law which does not allow self-service at "Gas" stations!

Crater Lake, Oregon, has to be one of the most beautiful places on earth (IourHO), it was peaceful and from some angles the water looked like ice.  The air is crystal clear, the lake is over 6000 feet deep and there was snow on the high tops of the surrounding mountains.




Mount Hood (Oregon's highest peak) was next.  Another scenic drive, stopping to buy fruit at a roadside stall, we found that they had all gone to a local "soccer" match, leaving a note to say take what you want and leave the money in an old ammunition box - so trusting (threatening?)!  During our drive we crossed the 45th Parallel which is the mid-way point between the Equator and the North Pole.  Oregon is a lovely place - a land of trees, horses, friendly people and beautiful mountains.

Thursday was all about driving!! 727 miles to be exact (yes, we realise we may well be insane! It's Land's End to John O'Groats minus 150 miles. ) in order to get from Pendleton, Oregon to Billings, Montana.  There wasn't anything on our list that we wanted to see on the way so we just kept on crossing out the hundreds until we reached our destination. Four states: Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana: home on the range!

Yellowstone was everything we could have wanted, although we didn't see any bears.  There were lots of almost tame chipmunks when we stopped just over half way up Bear Tooth Pass - very cute, apparently very hungry. Grumpy-looking buffalo and several elk in the park.  Old Faithful didn't perform for us and as it can take anything up to two hours to do so, we moved on and looked at some of the other steamy (and quite smelly) places, such as Sulphur Cauldron and Mammoth Hot Springs, beautiful and interesting.








Peter:  driving in the US. (All that follows is from the UK point of view.) Big roads - two-lane motorways and four-lane dual-carriageways. Mostly empty. Topologically impossible road junction layouts. 70mph speed limits on country lanes. A huge number of road works where mostly nothing seems to happen. Mile-long trains (with 3 or 4 locomotives) running alongside many roads. Ambiguous and - to us - confusing road signs, especially in towns. Internationally named identical towns laid out in a gridiron pattern wherever you go.
An inch on a map is NOT 20 miles, more likely 150...

BUT a great way to move fast and far without a lot of fatigue (as we saw on Thursday). Half-price petrol. Wonderfully varied scenery - land of contrasts. Thank you Satnav, thank you cruise control - gliding along in an armchair for 6661 miles to date.
What an adventure!

Big silicon, small silicon, no silicon

The day after Sequoia, we "did" Yosemite. Similar large pine trees, then gigantic granite mountains, including El capitan, whose most difficult climbing route was only conquered this year. Serious lumps of geology! Thence to Stockton - close to San Francisco but not so close that the hotel would bankrupt us.






Yesterday, we visited the History of Computing museum in Mountain view but not before we called at one of the many Google buildings to photograph Daisy Bear on one of their signs and on a Google bike (these are simple mountain bikes whose frame and tyres are in the Google logo colours - useful for their staff moving between sites). 
The computer history museum was excellent: many exhibits from the dawn of computing in the 40s to the near future, great interpretation and numeroud videos. British contribution was acknowledged and treated, as far as I can see, very fairly.



We drove through the Golden Gate bridge - impressive in a red Art Deco sort of way and onward to...









 the Cazadero Baptist campsite in the coastal forest by the Pacific to meet another branch of the VP clan, who had turned to be Christians as well! Acquired new info on the American branch of the family (South and North). Stayed the night in a cabin among giant pines, had good food and went to the neighbouring church on Sunday morning.


After that,lunch and then up the coastal California Route 1, which follows the coast up to Fort Bragg, a small resort. Magnificent views.





Tomorrow probably as far as Oregon. Ever Northward (well, until we hit canada and swerve East. 4000 odd miles covered...

Humility, hedonism, heat, height

Before leaving St George, UT we visited the winter home of Brigham Young (founder of the Mormon Church), a graceful and relatively simple house in a pretty setting, used now as a museum.  An interesting character who tried very hard to help people in need and do the right thing.  When they first arrived in St George, he left 309 families there to start a community, they dealt well with the Paiute Indians and created a large town for the times, out of very little in an unforgiving landscape, having to travel 30 miles (a day's journey) just for wood.

Drove to Las Vegas -what a contrast!! Neither of us felt particularly comfortable there and although we took the bus tour down "The Strip" to admire the lights and the glitz, we were glad to leave it behind.

Went from LV to Fresno, CA via Death Valley, which was a mere 85F - after experiencing 103F a few days ago we found that quite cool!  It has interesting geology including salt pans, sand dunes and we had our lunch under palm trees at a small oasis.  Leaving Death Valley behind we travelled alongside the Sierra Nevada in order to get to Fresno, CA - 503 miles in one day - a slight glitch in the planning process there!

The Sequoia national park is spectacular - neither of us realised that it is on top of a mountain (approximately 7000 feet above sea level).  It was a blissful 73F so almost jacket weather.  The trees are so beautiful, but sadly the 4 year drought is taking its toll on the forest, the King's Canyon, the surrounding countryside and the farmland down in the valley.  It must be heartbreaking to be a farmer here at the moment - having to choose which fields to water and which to leave to die.





Peter: Happened on Exeter, California today, in the middle of the St Joaquin valley, the central valley that grows most of the nation's fruit and nuts. (Appropriate, you might think, as I was born in Exeter, Devon). Actually a very nice bit of "small town, USA". Interesting murals about the history of the town, founded by two chaps / guys from Exeter, UK in 1911. Serendipity rules!

Planes, cacti and rocks. many rocks

Sorry about the delay, folks... Been busy eating up the miles and staring at the extraordinary landscapes of North Arizona and South Utah.

But before that, last Friday, we spent several hours at the Pima Air and Space Museum and had a tour of Davis Monthan AFB - the US Air Force aircraft recycling centre and graveyard. The only part of the US Air Force that makes a profit! It was hot, real hot, d**n hot (as in Good norning Vietnam) but we survived... The museum had a bigger collection of aircraft than Peter had ever seen, including the ones he used to make models of as a child! And plenty of British ones.


The next day we set off for Flagstaff in the north of Arizona, visiting the Saguaro park where the typical western film cacti grow in profusion, seemingly waving arms in the air.









On Sunday, we had the privilege of visiting the Grand Canyon: more impressive tha ever. Weather had cooled and we were at 6000 feet so quite pleasant. Ish. Then on to Blanding Utah through the painted desert: pastel coloured hills - quite beautiful in a low-key sort of way.




We then hit Monument Valley- we had seen it on TV and in films but the reality is stunning. Many pictures taken.

Yesterday, through the Arches National park. What can we say? Again monumental geology in dark shades of red. Rocks perched on to columns in seemingly impossible balance. And of course arches...

Today to Las Vegas after a visit or two in the town where we spent the night: St George, Utah.
3000 miles on the clock. I will comment at some time (and length) on driving the USA - an experience in itself...
Onward... (Sorry about the slightly messy appearance of this post, we have to be out of the motel by 11am.)