Inaugural Post / First Light
Hello and welcome to my Travel Blog. I’m currently in between semesters at my College and doing some traveling. I hope someone — anyone — finds this of some interest.
I just finished a brutal 10–week stretch of compressed Physics courses at my institution, Camden County College in Blackwood, NJ. These Summer courses pack what ordinarily is a 15–week course taught 2 hours and 45 minutes a day, two days a week, into 5 weeks taught 4 hours a day, four days a week. It’s tough on me and inexpressably more difficult for my poor students.
I’ve been teaching 100% online using the Zoom platform and some techie tools on my laptop to try to provide my students with the closest experience to face–to–face classroom courses I can manage. It hasn’t been perfect, but I’ve managed to put together something that approximates a classroom experience. But that ended this week, and I have the whole month of August off before real, no kidding live classroom courses begin in the Fall.
So I’m doing some traveling, and I hope to relate my experiences here, solely to keep my friends posted without having to send out an endless stream of emails. If this somehow proves possible to monetize, well… Lucky me, I guess. But that isn’t my goal.
I posted my grades on Wednesday, 08/04 and took a couple of days to plan my getaway and figure out what to take with me. First on the list is my motorcyle:
Wherever I go, I want this beauty with me. So I recently bought a trailer for it, and this is what it looks like locked and loaded:
I departed yesterday, Friday 08/06 and headed up to the Poconos, where I am staying in a charming AirBNB home with a couple of wonderful hosts. I’m the only guest this weekend and have the run of the place, though I plan to spend a big chunk of time out in the beautiful countryside, on two wheels. The altitude, almost 1500 feet above my apartment in Broomall, PA, promotes the cleansing of both mind and body. The air is fresh and the temperature more moderate and less humid than down below.
The drive up here was just over two hours on pretty good roads, at least until I got close. I made three test drives prior to departing yesterday, and once I learned how to tie everything down, the bike and trailer were rock solid, even on rough roads. Upon arrival I unloaded the bike and necessities for a 3–day stay, came in and dressed for the road, and took off on the bike. That was my plan all along — isn’t it great when things go as planned??
With no destination in mind, I headed North for about ten miles on State Road 296 and picked up U.S. Route 6 Westbound. The terrain alternates between relatively broad, level cleared tracts on the crests of mountain ridges, and serpentine, undulating trails through dense forest in deep shadow, where the temperature is some ten degrees cooler than in open sunshine.
I love riding on twisty mountain roads. Riding a motorcycle is about as far removed from driving a car as the vast gulf between Velveeta and cheese. It is a holistic experience, requiring the use of both feet, both hands, both eyes, both ears, and both sides of the brain. It involves the operation of all five physical senses, including taste, when bugs become lodged between the teeth or in the back of the throat. Oh well, protein when and where one finds it, I guess.
The senses must be put on high alert and kept there at all times. The consequences of even one moment’s inattention are best left unrealized. The experience is similar in some ways to that of combat; stretches of relatively manageable activity punctuated by moments of terror. It is not often that the road veers abruptly left or right instants after cresting a ridge, but neither is it completely unknown. One must anticipate trouble before it might occur. Riding a motorcycle has made me a much safer automobile driver.
Not long after turning West on U.S. Route 6, I passed through the town of Carbondale. This is the site of the first large scale coal mining operation in the U.S., and coal is deeply embedded not just in the ground, but in the hearts and memories of its residents. I came down a steep decline lined on either side by homes, with nothing but forest behind them, into the town center nestled in a vale between ridges. It is an otherwise unremarkable little town like so many others in this area, except possibly for one of the tallest buildings in the town with ANTHRACITE spelled vertically in huge block letters down the front of the structure. It used to be a bank building but has been renovated and is now the town’s premier office space and event center. I guess it is impossible to wipe the coal from memory, or to completely clean it out from beneath the fingernails.
Carbondale is in Lackawanna County, and it was not long before I passed through another small town where a sign caught my eye — Lackawanna River Heritage Trail. I was thinking great, just what I came up here to see and experience, the history and people of rural Pennsylvania, this great and beautiful sylvan state we live in. I found the entrance and turned in, motoring along very slowly in first gear. There were very few others on the trail, a couple walking their dogs, another couple jogging, and a third on bicycles. At least she was, standing on the bank. He was ankle–deep in the river, fishing.
I say “river” with some reservations, because the water really was only about ankle–deep and no more than 15 feet wide there. It would be charitable at best to call it a stream or a creek. At any rate, I soon encountered a sign that explained that the trail was under the governance of the Lackawanna River Sewer Authority and had been made public by some solemnly sworn treaty. The trail ran between the river and a set of railroad tracks, heavily forested on both sides, with not much else to see. I don’t know what heritage was being perpetuated. Oh, and then I came upon the Waste Treatment facility, I had forgotten about that, or perhaps I had flushed it from immediate recall.
After three miles I exited the trail and found myself in the Borough of Archbald, that’s Archbald not Archibald. From there I navigated to another ten mile stretch of up and down, left and right, intensely somatic ride through the deepening twilight and back to the house and safety. You have to be very careful when riding a bike on these mountain roads. When going around a curve to the right, oncoming traffic is going around the curve to the left. I don’t know why people cannot stay in their lane. Invariably they cut the curve short, which means they cross the yellow double line and enter MY LANE. I have learned to hug the road as far to the right as possible, and so far I have avoided getting splatted like a bug. Sometimes it is close though — one of those punctuating moments of terror. WOW does that pump up the fight or flight hormones. I’ve never felt more alive, and grateful for that.
OK I hope today is as full of joy (and terror) as yesterday. I don’t know exactly where I’m going today, either. I’m just going to head in the general direction of Lake Wallenpaupack, about 10 miles to the East. On these kinds of excursions, I usually take a wrong turn somewhere along the way, winding up DOG knows where and hopelessly lost were it not for Google Maps and the GPS built into my phone. My new phone, the replacement for my old one with the cracked screen. The one on which I was told I could keep my old number.
But the people who told me that are packs of lying liars telling packs of lying lies. Hours after I left the AT&T store, and yes I believe strongly in corporate shaming, I discovered I had a new number, and one with an Atlanta, GA area code at that. Those lying liars. When I get back I’m going to shame them some more, face to mask–covered face, up close, so they can feel the faint brush of my breath coming through my mask and impinging on theirs. In the meantime, if you have been trying to reach me (what for I dunno) at 610–657–7416 that number is not in service, at least for now. The new number is (404)863–6919, so if you get a call from me you can block me of course, but please not just because your phone is telling you the call is from Atlanta. Just because I’m on a getaway from it all doesn’t mean I want to get away from you.
All the best, and provided you can stomach it stay tuned for more.
On Saturday, 08/07 from Lake Ariel, PA
Rex
