Toughts From Places: Pennsylvania

Our trip over the past few days took us to a lot of small towns in Pennsylvania.  They call this area the rust belt, on account that it used to be busy with steel, industry, and activity, however now days it's lost a lot of those jobs.  The towns we visited and stayed in certainly had that feeling of a once busy town that had aged and declined from its former glory.  There were main streets, but the shop windows were run down and many were boarded up.  Often driving we would wonder what people did with their free time.  Surely there are plenty of outdoor activities, but what about the young people?  There was a theatre, but it only showed one movie.  There wasn't much in the way of places to go, or things to do.

As we were eating our breakfast I noticed that the woman working the breakfast bar was pretty young.  The night before Tori and I were talking about what young people might do here, and she wondered why any young person would stay in a town that seemed to have little opportunity.  There were no clear jobs, there were few shops or restaurants, and the educational opportunities seemed slim.  What kind of careers would a young person staying in a town like this hope to have.  I was reminded of this when I saw the twenty something girl refilling the eggs.  Was this the best job she'd ever have?  What kind of dreams did she think of growing up.  Would she work at this hotel for the rest of her life?  Is this the best opportunity she would have?  Does she care, and perhaps she sees this as the best option and maybe she's happy?  Perhaps she dreams about leaving and going somewhere else.  From the outside there was really not much I could see that would keep a young person in a town like this.

This made me think of all the kids I worked with back home who talk about "getting out".  It's not the greatest job market back home, and sure everyone wants to go explore the world, but when they talk about how they were able to "get out of Ypsi" all I can think is that if only they could stand in this town and look around at the lack of opportunity and future then they may reconsider what it means to "get out" and what exactly they are "getting out" of.  I won't begrudge anyone who wants to explore and see the world, but when I stand in these rusting towns and look around I realize how good it is to be where we are.  We have two major universities, and multiple other small colleges.  There are jobs, opportunities, entertainment, restaurants, night life, activities.  There are places to go, things to see, and when you run out of stuff nearby there is a short drive to more areas, or airports, or trains that can whisk you away to other exciting adventures.

How fortunate we are to have so many options, and when we talk of escaping such a place seems to show a total lack of understanding what it's really like to be trapped in a place where you have nothing better to look forward to than changing eggs out of a dining room in a hotel.  Everyone wishes to have new experiences, but perhaps visiting places like this gives you a little perspective of the world and that perhaps things aren't as bad as you might think.

Picture(s) of the Day

Picture 144

Rollin' Down The River

The weather god must love us, because not only did the weather forecast change to cut the rain in the morning, it actually was sunny.  In fact I got a bit of sunburn on my arm from the canoe trip. We had to get up earlyish today so we could make the hour drive to our canoe rental location.  It was in the middle of a rather industrial town called Warren.  It was a little annoying that we got there on time, but then had to wait around nearly an hour before we made it to the river for our trip to begin.  During breakfast we randomly picked pairs for the canoes.  Michele and Eli ended up together, then Sean and Keely, Tori was with Becky, and Jasmine was with me.

I hadn't been in a canoe since I was in 5th grade, and that was actually the only time I've ever done it.  When we first got on the water and started our journey I wondered what I had gotten us all into.  After a minute or two Jasmine and I figured out our bearings and how to navigate down the river.  It was generally a nice river, though there was a gross foam in the boat launch area.  It was a little less rural than I expected, with a lot of houses along the river, but then there were areas that were uninhabited.  There was a bit of a delay with each group because Keely, Jasmine and Eli went to the restroom.  That gave Tori and Becky a huge head start.  Sean and Keely made it out next, and then there was quite a delay for Jasmine and then Eli so for the first part of the trip everyone was quite a distance apart.  Eventually they waited and we all made it back into a group.

It was really nice moving along the water, and we saw some birds but that was about it for nature.  The guy from the canoe rental place said they had a group try to save a black lab that was  having a hard time swimming before they realized it was actually a black bear that was having trouble swimming.  They also said it was a good temperature for swimming, but I have to say it was freaking cold, and there was no way I'd swim in that water.  It was nice to just be floating around and watching nature, enjoying the view, and spending some time on the water.

As we were heading down Jasmine and I noticed an area on one island that seemed to have a easy place to pull off and explore an uninhabited island.  Everyone else kept on trekking but we thought why not, and decide to make a pit stop and take a few minutes to see what was on the island.  We found that it seems like it's a very popular place to stop as there were at least three old camp fires right near where we docked.  There were also a lot of names carved into a rather large old tree that was right in the "camp" area we found.

It was very quiet on the island, and while there were a lot of trees they weren't very densely packed.  There were also a lot of ferns growing, but no sign of any wildlife.  I assume there were probably some small animals hiding out, but we didn't take too much time to explore the area because we didn't want to get too far behind.  We did find what looked like a very old oil or gas pumping site.   I decided to pose like a crazy old prospector in front of it.  Before too long we headed back and began the rest of our journey.  We actually didn't end up too far behind everyone and were able to catch up pretty quickly.  For our first canoe trip it turned out to be a pretty good time.  I felt like perhaps we were going a bit to fast and could have taken it at a much slower pace, but the weather was possibly going to be uncooperative so it was best to finish early.

After our canoe adventure we grabbed a quick bit at Wendy's and then headed to Erie, PA for our final night before heading home.  I guess people were pretty tired because after check in there was a bit of nap time for a lot of people.  Once everyone was up and moving again we decided to head in and play a little mini golf.  It was actually really fun because instead of just playing regular mini golf they had a wheel for you to spin at the start of every hole that gave you either some kind of help or made it more difficult.  So for example it might say you get to take one stroke off your score, or it might say that you had to putt with your club behind your back.  It was a ton of fun, and the course was really nice and had some fun obstacles in it.  After golf we found a nearby Japanese steakhouse for dinner.  The food was pretty good, and I really like that for their garlic butter they took putter and then just threw some garlic on it, so it had a great flavor!  All in all it was a lovely final day for our little trip to Pennsylvania.


Picture(s) of the Day

Picture 140
Tori took a nice panorama for me which managed to get everyone into the picture except her of course.  This was shortly after we all were able to catch up to each other.



Picture 141
Jasmine and I decided to stop for a quick adventure and explored an island in the middle of the river.








Picture 142
This is a sign for the restaurant we went to.  I really liked the inside, they had it done up really well.  The bathroom was a bit freaky because everything was black granite.  It was like being in space!







Picture 143

After a long day of canoeing and playing putt putt we decided to get some food.  There was a very reasonably priced Japanese Steak House near our hotel, and it turned out to be delicious.  What a wonderful last meal of our little adventure.

Falls And Bridges

Yesterday we decided to head up to Niagara Falls.  I don't believe any of us had ever been to the American side, and Jasmine and Tori have never seen them at all.  I have to say that in comparison I prefer the Canadian side.  It was a complete zoo to park, it was a whole lot more tourist trap feeling, and you had to wade through insanity to get to the actual park.  Once you were in the park it was a lot better.  It was interesting to see the falls from this side, where you're looking straight down the river toward the end.  The Canadian side you're more looking out over the edge and you don't get the same context of the falls heading over the edge of the gorge.  I'd love to visit again and go out onto the island the separates the American Falls and the Horseshoe Falls.

We also decided to ride the Maid of the Mist, which was really cool!  It seems like something that is totally touristy, which maybe it is, but it's also really awesome to be on a boat so close to the water.  The wind that comes off the falls surprising. We were standing on the back of the boat and as we got close it was like a hurricane was blowing in.  I really have to recommend doing it!  In fact I think I may count it as the 5th new experience of the year.  It was exciting, and I would do it again, but this time stand on the upper level to get the full 365 degree view of it!

After spending our time in Niagara we got lunch at the closest restaurant which turned out to be the Hard Rock Cafe then made the drive back to Pennsylvania.  Before heading back to the hotel we stopped at the Kinzua Bridge.  This is an old rail bridge that apparently was the highest and longest when it was first constructed.  It got shut down back in the 1950s, and then in the early 2000s it got knocked down by a tornado.  They reopened it as a walking path that has a platform at the end with a glass floor.



I have to say the views were amazing.  You can walk the tracks as you head out to the observation platform, which is interesting because there are obviously small openings between the railroad ties.  So as you're walking up the track you can see straight down to the valley floor.  They have a regular floor also along each side of the tracks if you feel like seeing down is too freaky.  It was so quite out, and being around 8:00pm there weren't a lot of people visiting it.  There were a few people, and one of them agreed to take our picture for us, which was nice. 

Overall it was an excellent day.  There wasn't much of a timeline to meet, and we got to see some pretty cool nature stuff.  Today is our last big event, which will be a canoe trip down about 7.5 miles of river.  We're supposed to get rain and thunderstorms, so it may not work out.  Fingers crossed I guess.

Picture(s) of the Day:

Picture 138
The girls decided to get as face first to the glass floor as they could.  Keely was a little nervous about it at first.  Quite obviously Tori was fearless.  And Becky got to snap a few pictures of the drop straight down.





Picture 139
I decided to take a picture of myself laying on the glass floor.  I think it would have been a lot more interesting if they didn't have the marks in the glass.  I didn't feel nearly as dizzy as I did at the Sears Tower in their glass floor area.

Second Star To The Right

Pennsylvania isn't your typical choice for one of my vacations.  Generally I like to visit the ocean, or places far away, not something that I could get to in a few hours.  Well the entire trip was actually centered around visiting Cherry Springs State Park.  Cherry Springs is a park recognized the the International Dark-Sky Association.  The association designates parks that have great sky viewing conditions, and gives all parks a rating of either Bronze, Silver, or Gold.  This is the only Gold level park east of the Mississippi.  There is a silver park in Michigan up near the bridge, and in Ohio somewhere.  And of course there are areas of the country that have great conditions but just aren't listed.

Well, I was very worried about actually getting to the park because the weather wasn't looking great.  Leaving for vacation the prediction was that there would be rain and thunderstorms the entire trip.  In fact yesterday morning it was generally blah looking outside.  Well luck has really been on our side because while there was a 40% chance of rain tonight, the skies cleared up around 7:00 and we headed out to the park in hopes that we'd get a little clear sky to see some stars.  Turns out conditions were pretty good.  The clouds disappeared and we got pretty good viewing in my opinion (even thought the ranger said that it was only a 4 out of 10 in terms of viewing).

There was no way to be disappointed with what we saw last night. As it started to get dark you could see a few stars starting to shine.  It was very much like being at home, so I wondered if it would be all that awesome as I thought it would be.  At the very lease they had park attendants with very large telescopes set up, so we'd at least be able to see something.  It seemed like it took forever for the sun to set and it to actually get dark.  It was still pretty light out when we started looking through the telescope.  First we got to see Saturn, which looked pretty good.  Then the clouds broke up a bit and there was a very bright light near the horizon, which turned out to be Venus, so we got to look at that.  I didn't get much time to see it because the clouds came back and obscured it.

Finally it started to get pretty dark and the host of the event gave us some background about the park, how it started and what we would be able to see tonight.  I was amazed when he said that the Milky Way on perfect condition nights was bright enough it could cast shadows! WHAT!?  Apparently September/October is the best viewing, so perhaps that's something I'll have to look into for the fall.  He then told us about some of the constellations and a little bit about the history.

By this point it was dark and the stars were on full power.  I've looked up at the sky before, I love space, I've been able to pick out things like the dippers, Orion, etc.  I have never before seen so many stars.  It was amazing and breathtaking.  They tried to point out the constellations using very high powered lasers, but there were just so many stars I couldn't even figure out which one they were trying to point out.  The sky was completely filled with stars.  Imagine the best night you've ever seen and multiply it by 1,000 and then you may be halfway there.  With it being cloudy at first it looked like there were some clouds rolling back in, but it turns out it was actually the Milky Way. 

There were tons of shooting stars.  You could easily see satellites crossing the sky.  There was one point where a satellite turned and reflected the sun off of the solar panels.  I just missed it because I was turned the wrong way, but apparently it was really cool.   The telescopes were really cool too.  I got to see a planetary nebula (which wasn't as cool as you'd hope), Saturn and Venus, but by far the most amazing thing was the star cluster.  The scope was pointed to what looked like a single star, but when you looked into the lens it looked like someone had poured sugar crystals onto it.  There were tons of beautiful dots of light, the guy said it actually had 1.5 million stars in that cluster.  The other awesome sight was a binary system that looked like a single star, but when you saw it through the telescope it was actually two, a red and a blue star. 

It was an amazing evening, and I probably could have just layed there for a few hours and looked at the sky. I will certainly be going back, and possibly try to visit the one in Michigan.  This was certainly my 4th of seven new experiences.  To see the sky like this was amazing.  I don't think people understand how much light pollution there is. You go out and you can see stars, but you have no idea how much you're missing.  You hear about the vastness of space, but to actually stand there on that mountain and see how full the sky was with stars really brings home how small we are and how big the universe actually is.  10/10!  Everyone should do this!

Picture(s) of the Day

Picture 137
Bunch of foolishness before heading to the park.  What a silly bunch.

The Eye Of The Beholder

Today we headed back to Pittsburgh to visit the Andy Warhol Museum.  I don't know if I've said much about art, or my thoughts on art before.  I'm not one that can sit and stare at a painting for ages.  I can certainly appreciate the skill and talent required, I actually really enjoy statues and carvings because I find it absolutely amazing that a person can carve solid stone into something that looks like flowing fabric. 

That being said, I'm going to turn into an old person here and say that I don't understand modern art, and have a hard time finding any redeeming qualities to it.  Congratulations, you managed to paint a solid stripe down a blank canvas.  You just splattered paint from a distance, you must have gone to the very prestigious Academy of Arts Kindergarten.  I think the problem I often have with modern art is that it's just trying too hard.  There's some bullshit, drug induced background that you read about that the artist is trying to convey, but the problem is it's always so far up its own ass that it's just a load of malarkey.  I get that way with a lot of poetry too that's trying to say something but it means nothing to anyone except the person who wrote it, which makes me think they should just get a journal and keep their shit to themselves. 

Now, I'm paining with a broad brush here (punpunpun), and certainly there are elements that I will like of modern art, and of poetry as well.  However, I'm making a generalization here about my opinion overall.  Just like I don't like "scary" movies, but find the Scream movies amusing. 

So, back to Warhol.  I went through all seven floors and got to the end and couldn't help but wonder what the big deal was.  Why was this guy famous?  I really saw nothing compelling, interesting, or even all that interesting.  I think the most enjoyable part was the room where they displayed his photos of celebrities.  Seven pictures of Elvis that have been distressed?  That's some Trading Spaces bullshit that you do to a dresser to give it that "old" feel.  Or the weird toy glued together like that car driving around town with toys glued to it.  What?  I read the little explanations, and all I can think is, none of this says anything.  What is the point?  It's not visually appealing, it doesn't convey a message.  I feel like the only way any of this makes sense is if you're high, and then it doesn't make sense,  you're just high and think it makes sense.

I will say that the 7th floor was not Warhol's art, and that I didn't care for at all.  The subject matter felt vaguely violent and harmful.  It didn't sit well with me and I didn't spend a lot of time on the floor.  Also, there was some weird collages of Polaroid pictures, things with blood on them, and just all around bizarre stuff.  I was glad to get off that floor.  I also found the video floor made me feel very uncomfortable.  There was nothing really weird in the videos, like it wasn't anything special or interesting, but it felt weird and ominous.

Given my opinion of this you'd think that I had a bad time.  While I'm terribly critical I didn't feel like my time was wasted.  I got to see things that aren't in my norm, I got to see things from the point of view of someone else, and I got to see things that other people connect to.  Yes, I didn't like the art, but the experience was still worthy.  

Picture(s) of the Day

Picture 134
One of the many bridges in Pittsburgh.  We were standing on one a block away that looked identical, and there were many others the crossed the river.






Picture 135
Tori and Keely considering art?  I'm not sure exactly what this pose is about, but that's ok because I'm not exactly sure what the point of the cow is about.  Was this guy famous for doing things like this pre-Photoshop? 





Picture 136
Apparently there was a flood, and this was the high water mark line.  I found this was probably most interesting item in the museum and I wish they had a sign or something to explain what that was all about.

Monkeying Around

Happy Independence Day from Pittsburgh!  Today was the first day of our little adventure into Western Pennsylvania and we started the day out heading to the Pittsburgh Zoo!  I'm generally really critical of zoos because I have my thing about animal treatment, and often I don't think they have much to look at.  I love the National Zoo, but it's really rather large, it's free, and it seems like the people they have working there are more in it to study animals than they are to show them off to people.  This zoo wasn't too bad, though some of the enclosures were really too small for the animals that they had in them.  The Elephant and Giraffe areas were quite large, but the poor Leopards were in pens that were just tiny.

Overall it wasn't a bad zoo, it was much nicer than the Detroit Zoo, which while that's not saying much, it was nicer.  It wasn't too crowded, and they had an interesting variety of animals to see.  I think the highlight was probably the baby Tiger.  The Tigers were the one of the first exhibit, and they were very active today instead of laying around taking naps like is often the case when I see Tigers.  The adult Tiger decided it wanted to go down a steep hill to a pool and take a swim, so the baby decided to follow and then promptly got "yelled at" by the mother who finally got up and made the baby go back to the top of the hill and then picked up the baby and took him to a corner in the fence and then gave him a bath.  It was almost like a time out, and was rather hilarious.

Other than the super awesome tigers we got to see some beautiful flamingos right up close, a snow leopard, a regular leopard, elephants, giraffes, antelope, the butt of a rhino, and a polar bear that kept backing into a cave, then walking out, then backing in, and walking out.  We sat there and watched him for probably five minutes.  The zoo attendant says that the bear does that every day, so it sounds to me like that bear may have a little OCD.  Though, the way that he would bob his head going in and out made it look almost like he was trying to dance, and maybe we just needed to find the right song for him.

The zoo also had an aquarium, which wasn't large but was enough and had some interesting animals.  I'm generally not that into fish, but this had some nice interesting things to see.  One of my favorite was the jelly fish, which they had rotating lights on so sometimes they would shine blue into the water, sometimes red, and sometimes green.  I think the blue gave you the most definition in the pictures.  I think the pictures actually turned out really well.  I turned off the flash and was pretty excited when I loaded the photos onto the computer because they weren't blurry at all and were actually kind of cool.

After finishing up at the zoo we headed to a local mall to grab some food at the food court.  It was a little weird because driving up to it, it looked like maybe it was Briarwood quality, but then going in the first thing we saw was Tiffany & Co. and the whole placed looked like Somerset.  It was a good decision I think because everyone go to pick something different if they wanted, and then we met back up in the seating area to eat together.  It was a bit different because they had a lot of people out giving away samples and trying to get you to come to their counter.  But it was fun, and everyone got their food.

 After lunch we headed to a placed called North Park for our Go Ape zip line reservation.  I have to admit driving up to it was got to see most of the course, and it wasn't quite what I expected.  I was a little worried it was going to be super lame like like that South Park episode where the boys go zip lining and have a terrible time.  Turns out, it was a ton of fun, and I think this is going to definitely count as my third of seven new experiences for the year.

Going in I wasn't sure exactly what to expect, they said there were mid-air obstacles and then you have four zip lines.  I thought it would be more in the forest, but it turns out it was in a less densely forested area.  I also had no idea that some of the obstacles would be so hard.  The picture to the right was pretty difficult, but wasn't the hardest.  It seems easy when you look at it, but when you're up there and realize that you're hanging by ropes that sway and move a lot you are going to have to work hard to get across to the other side.  I think the obstacle I disliked the most was the cargo net.  It doesn't seem like it would be that hard, but in fact it was a terrible pain.  I think part of the issue I had was that I got twisted pretty bad when swinging into the net, so I didn't have the full mobility I needed.  Even so, it was really difficult to climb up to the top and get back on the platform.

The other obstacle that was a total pain was a long rope with a ring at the end.  The way to get across was to put your foot in a ring, and then try to put your other foot in the next ring while holding onto the rope.  It was so strenuous that I felt like I was going to hurl after it.  At the end of each course you got to take a zip line down so you could head to the next course, which meant climbing another rope ladder.  It was fun, and I had a great time.  So hooray for that new experience!  I think I'd like to go again, but perhaps somewhere with longer zip lines.  I'll have to research.

Picture(s) of the Day:

Picture 131
This was the check in trailer for the Go Ape zip line adventure.  Really it is just a shipping container with a window that's been turned into a small office.  It wasn't quite what I expected to see when I booked it, but whatever, it's still good.







Picture 132

Clearly we are both very afraid of what is about to happen at the zip line.  I believe we're probably going to die.  Not really.  I wasn't nervous at all for this, they have you strapped in so tight that I think the whole tree would have to go in order to take you out.


Picture 133

This was Eli on the first obstacle of the event.  I think across the way you can see Keely and Tori who already completed it and were about to head to the cargo net.

The Journey Begins

I think the hardest parts of a vacation are the last day before you leave, and then the day you have to go back home.  Today is the first of those days, and I thought that it was going to drag, but it turns out it didn't at all.  The day actually went by very quickly and before I knew it, I was heading home to leave. There were a lot of last minute chores to get done too.  The Vibe's air conditioning isn't working anymore so we decided to see if we could get the AC in the Focus charged up, otherwise we would have to rent a car.  Well turns out the AC in the Focus did just need a recharge, so that meant that I needed to get an oil change for the Focus, which has been sitting around for about a year without being driven. The guy at the oil change place gave me crap about how dirty the oil was, but I think it's their job to do that and then try to up sell the engine cleaning stuff.

Despite all the last minute running around, we got out of the house on time and began our trek to Pennsylvania.  It was a short ride, only about four hours, and for the most part uneventful.  The last 20 minutes or so got a little crazy with the rain, and there were a few times I didn't feel like the car was actually sitting on the ground but rather was floating above the water.  This was especially weird when we were driving up hills that were rather steep.  The sensation was not fun to feel like you were trying to drive up a waterfall.  However, we made it to the hotel, and are now all checked in.  Tomorrow we'll be enjoying some activities in Pittsburgh, then in the coming days will be heading up to more rural regions of PA for some outdoors activities.  SUPER EXCITED!


Picture(s) of the Day:

Picture 130
Hotel art.  I wonder if this artist thought, "someday I want to make art that can be mass produced, printed out by the thousand, and hung in a Holiday Inn Express."  I often wonder about things like this.  Is the artist super excited that his or her work was purchased?  Or, given modern technology, is this some guy playing on Photoshop for 5 seconds and then printing it off back at the Holiday Inn corporate office?  Either way, this is what I'm looking at right now.

Just A Day, Just An Ordinary Day

 I never know what to write about on uneventful days.  Today was certainly uneventful.

...


Yeah. I'm just sitting here looking at a blank screen.  I mean I got my picture of the day going, but that was probably the most exciting thing that happened today.

It's quite at work, so nothing interesting is happening.  I mean usually nothing interesting is happening, but it's not pissing me off so I can't rage about it.  We had rehearsal today, and that went as usual.  We played some games and had a good laugh, but again it was just a typical ordinary day.  Tomorrow is the last day of the week for me, and then it's 5 days traveling on a trip that will have a lot of nature in it.  So that should be fun.

Ok, I'm struggling here, so I'm going to leave it at that.

Picture(s) of the Day:

Picture 129
This has been my breakfast recently.  I love blueberries and Rice Krispies, it's one of my favorite things.  I usually eat it a lot when the blueberries come into season, and they're great right now.

Trip Planned

Well, I finally got most everything in line for our 4th of July trip.  I really didn't plan ahead as well as I normally would, but I am constantly bothered by the idea that because I'm planning things everyone is going to think I'm being a controlling dick.  There's a lot of indecision in our group, so someone has to plan it, but because everyone just goes along I feel like that puts me in a place where I'm making choices that I like and others are just going along.  I guess I often have a level of discomfort in planning things because I don't want to be the one deciding everything, but because I'm planning things I automatically have that bias. I don't think that's necessarily the case, I didn't pick the zoo, or the zipline, or the Warhol museum, so I think we're getting a good selection of everyone's wishes. 

My biggest concern now is that the skies stop being asshats and clear up.  The entire trip is formed around wanting to go to the Cherry Springs State Park which is a registered Dark Sky area.  The skies are exceptionally dark so we should be able to see amazing star stuff.  However, right now the forecast is saying mostly cloudy!  This is really going to cheese me off if we get all the way out there and the one thing this whole trip is centered around doesn't happen.  I mean, I'm not going to be angry, there's plenty of sky that we can see another time, but this is what we wanted to do!  And I've been looking forward to it since the day we were at Vero Beach and the stars were a lot brighter what with the lack of ambient light where we were.  I JUST WANNA SEE SOME AWESOME STARS! 

Anyhow, watch for some exciting events later in the week.

Picture(s) of the Day:

Picture 128
GROSS!  Who does this.  I can't even deal.