SSSSTANLEY TRIP COLLECTED

 

For those of you who have never suffered through one of these farragoes of nonsense,  every second year or so I get the urge to travel, and Mary, being the loving wife she is, agrees to go along for the ride. This time we’re off to various destinations having to do with Stanley Steam Automobiles, as we own one. (You’ll find out where we’re going as this epic unfolds.) We left Victoria the morning of September 29th on the 7 AM ferry, and stopped to visit my young cousin Lynn (well younger than I by at least four months), her husband Peter, and her mother, my aunt Marg, now in her - gee, 97th year?   Hope I’m that alert when I reach that age. Hell, I hope I reach that age.

 

Left White Rock at 11, and headed up Highway 3, the Crowsnest Pass route. It’s changed since I last drove it. The road through Manning Park is better, there’s not much construction going on, and we pulled into the Kettle River Provincial Park campsite at 4:30, where, for the first time in a loooooong time I set up the chairs in the shade, as it was at least 24 C in the sun.  (Mary and I travel in the shoulder seasons, when the roads and campgrounds are less crowded, and generally look for sun to sit in at the end of the day.) Great campground. Nice river, trees, quiet. I suspect summer would be a zoo, since there’s a playground  in the middle, and it’s an obvious place to bring all your screaming kids. But at the moment, it’s paradise.

 

Next day through the Crowsnest Pass, which is by far the best way through the Rockies. There’s a little construction on Highway 3 at the moment, but not a big deal. 100 kph all the way, and they close a blind eye to 110. And we did 100 to 110 virtually all the way, except for the hills, of course, where I was lucky to get it up to 75 most of the time.

 

We took a break at a rest stop in the middle of the Pass, and right where we parked was a patch of shaggy manes. So I picked half a dozen for dinner. Which we had at a park east of  Coleman, and if you’re ever going that way, I recommend Lundbreck Falls Regional Park. We had a site right on the rapids, steps to the rest rooms, lovely. And there were wind turbines in the distance, much to Mary’s delight. They reminded me of Gabby Roseau. “Have we ever had a better campground?” I asked.

 

“Not that I can think of,” Mary replied, and I was so happy I didn’t even correct her grammar. Sat in the sun, drank wine, and as darkness fell Mary fired up the cooktop and boiled water for coffee and washing up, and cooked the tortellini with Alfredo sauce. She put the mushrooms in the pan, started to sauté them - and the propane ran out. In my defence, there is no way to know how much there is in the tank, and the burners and the fridge use hardly any, and on several occasions we’ve stopped to fill up and it’s taken about $2 worth, and even if I give the attendant a tip I feel guilty. So I tend to push our luck. (Note the prepositional play there.) Mary poured the boiling water from the pasta over the mushrooms, put the cheese and sauce on the pasta, and the mushrooms were delicious poached.

 

On the road bright and early, to breakfast in Lethbridge, a very nice town, although not nice as it was when Brenda still decorated it. On the road we eat huge breakfasts and skip lunch, and so it was. Then I filled up with propane, and for the next five hours Mary fretted about the smell, and what happens when you breathe propane, and how flammable it is, and so on. I tried to assuage her feeling of dread by telling her that propane is inflammable, but she didn’t seem to understand that when you put ‘in’ on the front of a word, it means ‘not’. And I agree, I could smell it. I figured that the young woman who filled it got it so full that it was bleeding off through the relief valve as the temperature rose (from 5 C to 20 C), but Mary wasn’t convinced.

 

As I write this, we are in a regional park in Ponteix, Saskatchewan, on Highway 31, the ‘Red Coat Trail.’ For a while I was thinking that ‘trail’ was more accurate than ‘highway’, but it got better, and we were back to 100 kph. The ‘park’ is a grassy stretch beside the irrigation canal with locusts (trees, not bugs) for shade in the summer, with swimming pool (closed) and washrooms (open) and power and water if needed. The latter isn’t, but the former is, as my laptop was flat. I asked the kid in the gas station how Ponteix is pronounced, as neither of us could remember the rule for ‘eix’, and he said, “Pon’ tex”. No matter. The sun is shining, the breeze is blowing, and Gaby Rosseau (pronounced ‘Ross oh’) was right when she said,

 

Who has seen the wind?

Neither you nor I.

But we can see the rotors turning

When the wind is passing by.

 

Sorry – that was last night. Tonight it’s the leaves trembling, not the rotors turning. But still a strong indication of wind. This is almost as good as a Yukon gravel pit. Warmer, too. And they have showers with hot water, which I had. (The shower, not the hot water. Well, that too, I guess.)

 

Morning, nice sunrise over the prairie, and it’s a balmy 7 C. We’re off to breakfast somewhere down the road.

 

“Somewhere down the road” was Devil’s Lake North Dakota, and what I’m sure will be a highlight of the trip – or any trip. We wanted to camp at the state park. Following the camp book directions, we turned off Highway 2 to go five miles along the western edge of the lake. Fine. Turned left to go five miles along the northern edge. Nope. The moment we turned, we found a temporary traffic light with a sign saying, “Wait for pilot car”. Stretching into the distance (and the lake) was a ribbon of red clay 20 metres wide, one metre higher that the road we were on. Along one edge of it was the continuation of our road. It turns out that Devil’s Lake has lots of inlets, but no outlet. When rain is more than evaporation, as it has been for 25 years, the lake rises. They were raising the road, which was flooded last winter. 20 km long, that’s 10000M, X 20 X 1 = 200000 cu m of fill, or 20000 very large truck loads. The mind boggles. (At least, this mind does.)

 

Nice night, then off to Ann Lake Park, Monticello, Minnesota, (pronounced “Mon ti cello” as in ‘cellophane’ by the locals), where we were awakened by the first shotgun blasts of the day (duck season) slashing the leaves in the trees at the edge of our campsite.

 

Then to Appleton, Wisconsin, where Mary spent part of her childhood and didn’t recognize at all (you really can’t go home again, if you lived in Appleton) and then to Racine, where we got lost and ended up in a Comfort Inn from whence comes this.

 

“Here is the Johnson Wax building?” I asked the desk clerk. She told me.

 

“Why do you want to know?” she asked.

 

“Frank Lloyd Wright designed it,” I said.

 

“Frank Lloyd Wright designed lots of buildings in Racine,” she said, “And they all leak. Including the school my husband is Chief Administrator of.” (As we are guests, and she knew we are Canadian, I didn’t correct her grammar.) So here we are, and here you are.

 

More later.

 

SSSSSSSTANLEY TRIP, PART 2

 

And here we are in Chicago. Well, Oakbrook Terrace, to be exact. Left Racine this morning, after looking at the Johnston Wax campus, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. They have tours on Friday, but of course this is Tuesday, so we didn’t get one. Furthermore, the campus is fenced and gated, and so we couldn’t get in to see the buildings up close. Still, very impressive. Then we made our first mistake of the day, and asked the Magellan lady for the shortest distance to our chosen motel in Chicago. (Well, actually it wasn’t completely a mistake as we first asked for the shortest time, but when she wanted us to take the freeway Mary balked, and so we chose the shortest distance.) But the shortest distance had several road closures, and it took forever to get to the motel. And when we got there they didn’t have any rooms clean, so we checked in and went off to Oak Park, where Frank Lloyd Wright (are you beginning to see a pattern here?) started his practise. We visited the FLW home and studio, took the tour, walked around the area where he designed various homes, and came back to the motel. Want some advice? Don’t go to Chicago, or if you do, don’t drive, or if you drive, take the freeway no matter how much you dislike it. Every bloody street in the city is torn up. It’s as bad as Boston during the BIG DIG (see my report of our Round the Continent Trip a few years ago.) That’s what happens when the president who’s going to put everyone back to work comes from your town, I guess. Your guys get put back to work with a vengeance.  But here we are, and not in the Tijuana jail. Quite a nice motel, actually. But not central, if you’re a tourist. Not at all.

 

And today we went into downtown Chicago and Robey house, designed by guess whom? And visited the Smith Stained Glass Museum on Navy Pier, on the lake. Free. What a bargain. Parking $20 for the day, or part thereof. Not a bargain. The museum was great. About 200 stained glass windows, dating from ca 1850 to 2000. Chicago was one of the centres of stained glass in the early 20th century, for a number of reasons, and a family named Smith collected stained glass windows as buildings were demolished.  And there they are. Wow.

 

Off to the south, then east, then north, to Berrien Springs to visit Tom Kimmel, president of the Steam Car Club of NA. Interesting guy, interesting collection of steam stuff, mostly 1940 to 1980. Didn’t know there were steam cars built during that time, huh? Yep. Mostly pipe-dreams, and mostly ineffective, but there they are, anyway.

 

Spent the night in Jackson, MI. There are more towns in the USA  named ‘Jackson’ than there are named ‘Cameron’, which is saying something. I notice these two names because we have friends named Jackson, and ‘Cameron’ is – well – memorable. On the road early and drove like mad to get to Detroit by 10 AM to take part in the Lionel Train factory tour, which takes place at 10 AM on Thursdays. Except it doesn’t. “We haven’t done those tours for at least two years,” said the lady. “Why is it on the web?” I asked. “Well, it isn’t on our website. It’s on places like the Michigan tourist bureau site.” “Yes, but your site doesn’t say there aren’t any tours. Why don’t you put a notice up?” “Gee, I don’t know.”

 

And so to Toronto, to spend two hours with Alex before she headed off to Boston to visit a boyfriend. Toronto is a better place in which to drive than Chicago, but not much. Too many cars, too many trolley cars, too many lights, too many everything. And the parking isn’t much cheaper either.  Tomorrow, Niagara Falls, and with luck, back to camping. If the weather holds. So far, wonderful. Not a cloud have we seen. 20 C today. Hope it holds. Until next time.

 

SSSSSTANLEY TRIP

 

PART THREE

 

“Oh, Rochester. Oh, Rochester.”

 

“Comin, Boss. What can ah do for you, Boss?”

 

“Oh, Rochester, if you were going to have breakfast in your eponymic city, what would you have, and where?”

 

“If I was goin to have breakfass in my ma what kind of city?”

 

“Eponymic. The city with your name.”

 

“Oh, you shoulda said that. That’s easy. I’d have corned beef hash at the Liberty diner.”

 

“Thank you Rochester. Oh, Dennis.”

 

“Yes, Mr. Benny?”

 

“Oh, there you are, Dennis.”

 

“Yes, here I am, Mr. Benny.”

 

“Dennis, if you were going to visit somewhere in Rochester, New York, where would it be?”

“It’d be in Rochester, Mr. Benny.”

 

“Yes, but what would the place be?”

 

“That’s easy, Mr. Benny. It would be the home of George Eastman, the guy who started the Kodak company.”

 

And that’s what we did. But first, we drove to Niagara Falls, so Mary could see the falls. And on the way, we did something that will, I suspect, be the highlight of the trip. As we were passing Hamilton, Mary said, “Steam Museum.” To me, those are the two magic words. Well, two of the magic words, anyway. So we turned off on the next exit, and found our way to the Hamilton, Ontario water works. Where, ca 1850, there was a cholera epidemic (in Hamilton, not at the water works, which didn’t exist), and the town fathers decided to build a modern water plant, as opposed to having wells and outhouses in close proximity as was the case. They hired a Scottish engineer, who designed and built a pump that would take water from Lake Ontario and pump it up to reservoir on a hill above the city.

 

The pump was powered by what must have been the largest steam engines in the world at the time (and might be the largest still extant), supplied by four huge boilers. The boilers are gone, but the two engines are still there, and still in running condition. One is connected to an electric motor, and turns over as if running. The engines are double acting compound twins, as follows (measurements are my estimates, in cm)

 

                                    Bore                            Stroke

 

Primary                        30                                200

 

Secondary                   75                                200

 

Don’t worry if you don’t know what that means. Tony will. The conrods are about five metres long, vertical, and power an overhead walking beam (well, two beams, one per engine) about ten metres long. I’ve never seen an engine anywhere near that size in my life, and doubt that I ever will again. It occupies, fully, a five story building. They also have a dozen or so working models of 19th C stationary engines,  designed by all the greats, Maudsley, Stevenson, et al, made by a guy in Toronto back in the 40’s and 50’s. All in all, worth the entire trip.

 

Then to Niagara Falls, which is a hell of a lot of water, and a hell of a lot of schlock. And a hell of a lot of Americans who come over the bridge so they can see the falls, which are essentially invisible from the American side.

 

And thence to Rochester, where we started this chapter of our epic in media res. The Eastman home is, of course, huge, and has all the original stuff in it. Virtually on his deathbed, Eastman called in 20 or so prominent locals, including lawyers, judges, professors, etc, and talked with them at some length before signing his will, which left all his estate to a university, thus ensuring that his relatives could not claim that he was ‘of unsound mind’.

 

Then on through the fall colours (oops, sorry, colors) to Rome, and thence to Delta Lake State Park, where I refused to pay $30, partly out of cheapness, but mostly out of principle. They advertise $15. But it’s the weekend, so that adds $5. Add to that out-of-state cost of $5, and (and this is what got me) walk-in reservation of $2.50.

 

“What’s the alternative to walk-up reservation?” I asked.

 

“Phone in or internet,” said the kid at the desk.

 

“So that’s free?”

 

“No, that’s $7.50.”

 

“So the cheapest rate, if you live in New York State, is $17.50?”

 

“Yep.”

 

“Why don’t you advertise the rate as $17.50?”

 

“That’s just the way it is.”

 

Not for me, it isn’t. On to Boonville, where I write this, in a very questionable motel with a leaking toilet, which comes on every minute to replenish the tank, and which I finally turned off so I could get to sleep. At a loss of .25 litre every minute, that’s 15 litres an hour, or 450 litres a day. Pretty expensive. And wasteful.

 

And so onto and into the Adirondacks, ‘the most visited mountain region in the world’. Only, I’m sure, because it’s not that far north of the populated areas of New York.

The Adirondacks are nice, but nothing special. Lots of small lakes, mixed deciduous/coniferous forest, nice enough but no big deal. But there was one thing that drew us here, although it was different for each of us. (I guess that makes it two things.) . For me, it was that one of the favourite (sorry: favourite) series of books in my childhood was Walter Brook’s adventures of Freddy the pig. Freddy lived, as nearly as can be told from the series, about 30 miles southwest or maybe east of Syracuse. The Adirondacks figure in several of the books, and I’ve always wanted to visit them.

 

We had breakfast in Old Forge, a nice enough small town with 1,000 people looking at coloured (sorry, colored) leaves. And then took a ride on the Reading (or rather the Adirondacks RR) for two hours. It was once the NY Central RR, and ran from Utica to Montreal from 1890 to 1960, and was then discontinued. A group of enthusiasts revived it, and now run tourist excursions. Boy, do I like trains.

 

On Mary’s part, she wanted to see Lake Placid. Which we did. The lake may be placid, but the town isn’t. Wall to wall people, traffic crawling along. Reminded me of Banff in the 1990’s. Deadly. Didn’t stop. Through the Adirondacks to Lake Champlain, where we took the ferry to Burlington, Vermont, with 15 churches with white spires and 15 public buildings with white cupolas. I think there’s a law. Every town in Vermont has to have buildings with white, vertical accents. Tomorrow, the Stanley museum in Kingfield, Maine. More later.

 

Trivia questions: Without looking it up, what is the license plate descriptor of Vermont?  What is the state animal? (One of you should know that.)

 

SSSTANLEY TRIP, PART FOUR

 

It’s been a while since I sat down to this. (“Not long enough”, you say? Well, you know the story of life. After you’ve suffered enough, you die. Consider this part of the first stage. Or maybe the second.)

 

First, to those who responded to my various episodes, thanks and apologies for not answering your messages more fully. Bob’s internet connection doesn’t want to work on my computer, so I had to use his, with that stupid QUERTYIOP keyboard, which I can’t use any more.

 

The Americans do some things better than Canadians. For one thing, they realize that when someone is on a highway in a car, he probably wants to go somewhere. If he didn’t, he’d be on a bicycle or foot. They evince this understanding in various ways, including high speed limits (which everyone ignores) but nowhere more so than in the way they handle accidents.

 

We left Burlington early in the morning, and headed southeast. 30 minutes later we came upon the scene of a fairly serious accident – an 18 passenger bus had broadsided an SUV. I don’t know what the casualty total was, but I bet it was high. There were two fire trucks, an incident truck, four cop cars, and about ten cops, all doing various things. And one cop directing traffic around the scene in a single lane, in alternating files. Total wait time, on a busy road, five minutes. In Canada, at least three hours, including on the Malahat, the one road into Victoria from up-island, where, whenever there is an accident, traffic is lined up for hours, while they use up all the cop-type equipment they got hangin’ around the po-leece station, takin’ measurements and photographs and drawin’ diagrams and all like that.

 

On to breakfast in a quaint New England diner, and then to one of those incidents that make me wonder if my mantra (“If it weren’t for bad luck, there’d be none at all”) is true.  We were about five km outside of Woodstock, when I said, “Y’ know, I don’t know that Don actually lives in Woodstock. He’s on a farm, so it might be anywhere. I’d better ask someone.” Ahead, on the right side of the road, was a hardware store. This was in real country, just a few farm houses, but there was an Ace Hardware. I went in and asked the guy at the counter if by chance he knew Don Bourdon, pronouncing it in the French fashion.

 

“Don Boordaw?” he said. “Don Boordaw?”  His face cleared. “Oh, Don Borden. Sure. You come in from the west? Go back to the covered bridge about a quarter mile back” (as if there were dozens from which to choose) “go across it, turn right on a dirt road, after a mile you’ll come to a sign saying, ‘Bourdon Road’, go up that and you’re in his driveway.”

 

What are the chances of that happening? So we drove across the bridge, through the small crowd of tourists taking pictures of each other in the entrance, and found the house. Don had just arrived. Don Bourdon is a very nice man, a bit younger than I, who retired a few years back and started a new career, or rather two. He produces maple syrup from his 30 ha woodlot, in a state-of-the-art sugar shack full of reverse osmosis filters and stainless steel tanks, and he restores Stanley cars. Mary bought some syrup, we looked at his collection of Stanleys, and the ones he’s restoring, looked at his shop, which is huge and very well equipped, and admired his workmanship. And discussed the boiler he’s going to make for me.

 

Off north, first going through Woodbridge, supposedly one of New England’s nicest villages, and supposedly one of the best places to live in the US, through bumper to bumper traffic and hoards of leaf peepers, as the locals somewhat disparagingly call those who come to look at the fall colours.

 

Stayed the night in the White Mountain National Forest, in a campsite with one other car, way at the other side. We may as well have had it to ourselves. In the morning the GPS lady took us through the park via a tertiary or even quartenary road, where we actually saw a couple of moose, after hundreds of warning signs. And after more spectacular scenery, we arrived at Kingfield, Maine, the home of the Stanley museum. The Stanley twins were born in Kingfield, and the school they attended is now a museum of their accomplishments. It’s a two story, square building, with an entrance hall full of stuff for sale: books about the Stanleys and their cars; other steam cars; clothing with the Stanley logo. The room to the right has three cars and things like engines and boilers, and the walls are covered with pictures and information about the brothers and their cars. Totally lacking on information about how the cars work, and the controls on the cars are not labelled. It would be interesting to explain to visitors what you have to do to fire a Stanley, all 30 steps. (See last page.)

 

The room on the left of the hall has another car and various Stanley memorabilia, and the walls are covered with information about their inventions. The Stanleys invented various things, three of note. The first grew out of the early occupation of one of them, who took photographic portraits, mostly of children. In order to touch up large portraits, he designed and patented an improved atomizer, which was the direct ancestor of the airbrush. Out of his work, the Stanleys invented a mechanical way of coating glass plates, which were the photographic medium of the time (ca 1880). Before the Stanleys, a skilled worker could coat 60 plates an hour. Their invention meant that any idiot could turn out 600 plates per hour. They made a fortune selling plates, and another when they sold out to Eastman, of Eastman Kodak. Then they designed and built the car which bears their name, becoming the most successful steam car company in history.  One whole wall of the museum is devoted to photography and their part in its development. One and a half rooms are devoted to their cars. The atomizer has one picture, of the original patent drawing, and no discussion at all.

 

But here’s the thing. The dry plate hasn’t been used for 100 years, and I bet there aren’t more than 500 operating steam cars in the world, including perhaps 300 Stanleys, and at any given time I doubt there would be one on the road, anywhere. But the atomizer is the father of the airbrush, the mainstay of commercial art, with millions in use around the world, every day. You’d think the museum would make more of it, with examples of airbrushes old and new, and art produced by them.

 

Anyway, we saw the museum and headed south, stopping for the breakfast at the famous Red Arrow Diner in Manchester, New Hampshire, and spent the night by the Housatonic river in the day-use part of a state park that was supposed to be open for camping but wasn’t. Stopped and looked at the site of John Goffe’s Mill, in Bedford, near Manchester. The mill was resurrected in the late 1930’s by Dr. George Woodbury, who had been an anthropologist at Harvard, but left academia to become a millwright, and wrote a wonderful book about it. He also wrote a wonderful book entitled Story of a Stanley Steamer, which I read as a kid and which got me hooked on steam cars.

 

On through the Delaware Water Gap to Nazareth,  Pennsylvania, where we toured the Martin Guitar factory, and to Jim Thorp, where we looked at a very large HO model railway. JimThorp is a built on the side of a small mountain, as are so many coal towns, and has an interesting history, or at least the name does. You can look it up if you care. About then it started to rain, the first of the trip, and once again we arrived at the Gottliebs, in Lancaster PA, on a dark and rainy night. B ob and Dorothy welcomed us with open arms and an excellent dinner, and Mary took a two hour shower. And so to bed, and this is being written next morning, October 15, exactly half-way through the odyssey.

 

TRIVIA

 

Congratulations to my cousin Colleen, Fran, and Mark, who knew that Vermont is ‘The Green Mountain State’ and that its state animal is the Morgan horse. (Fran and Colleen should have known that, given that they have owned one.) Colleen also knew that Justin Morgan did not breed the first one, and Mark informed me that the state insect is the honey bee.

 

SSSTANLEY TRIP PART FIVE

 

I’ve been catching up on the news while in Lancaster. Not about Canada, of course, as there’s nothing in the local paper about Canada, even though the Lancaster Intelligencer Leader is a far better paper than the Victoria rag. But even the Financial Post, to which Bob subscribes, has virtually no mention of Canada. (Two, to be exact.)

 

But there’s lots about the American election season, which is approaching its zenith. The papers are full of stuff about the election, and, in this part of the world, in particular the doings and sayings of a woman named Christine O’Donnell, running for the Republican party in Delaware. At various times she has said that she was a witch, that she believes that scientists are breeding mice to have human intelligence, and that she does NOT believe in evolution. Among other oddities. And, of course, the economy, which takes up at least 20% of local papers, and 80% of the WSJ. Which, by the way, ran a piece on one of my favourite authors, Bill Bryson, wherein he said that he wants to do a book on Canada, to which proposal his publishers responded, “No-one would buy a book about Canada. Not even Canadians.” (That’s one mention of Canada. The other was a passing reference to the fact that a noted currency guru was born in Canada.)

 

Dorothy took Mary and me to two of the area’s (read ‘areas’ as within 100 km) great attractions: Winterthur and Longwood. Winterthur (pronounced winter tour) was the home of Henry Francis du Pont, who decided to build the definitive museum of Americana, ca 1750 to 1860. To which end he turned one of the family homes, a 12 room farmhouse, into 175 rooms full of the finest examples of furniture, silver, china, glass, paintings, rugs and so on that were available in 18th and early 19th century USA. (Much of the china, wall coverings, rugs and the like were not made in the US at that time, but after about 1850 everything was.)  And this is not schlock: I quote the tour guide: “This late 18th century folding games table, made by Hungerdunger and Whosit of Boston, is one of three in existence. One sold at auction three years ago for $8.2 million.” (The details of the piece may not be exact, but the price is.) The grounds, all 400 ha of them, are also pretty nice. If you care, HF was the premier breeder of Holstein cows, which now produce 90% of the milk sold in North America. Probably the most influential, if not the largest breeding program in the world. And we owe it all to him.

 

Then on to Longwood, the creation of Peirre (sic) S. du Pont, 100 or so acres of landscaping, including the largest glass-covered area I’ve ever seen.  In fact, one of the largest covered areas I’ve ever seen, period. Large areas devoted to tropicals, orchids, ferns, bromeliads, croteans, you name it. And a concert hall which is the home of the world’s largest pipe organ, by a factor of 30 or so. 10,000 pipes? Or was it 20,000? Well, a lot. And you get to walk around the back of the pipe chamber and look at them. I can imagine being in there when the thing is being played.

 

The evening was spent at friends of the Gottliebs, who invited us for dinner, and who turned out to be my sort of people – Zin and 1960’s folk music. To be exact, when I asked (on a very slight pretext) what member of a well-known folk group was born in Lebanon, PA, mine host knew the answer. And had several albums made by the Chad Mitchell Trio, to which we listened after dinner.

 

We left Lancaster the next morning for a 700 km detour, and a minor disappointment. Who would have thought that a small country house, in the middle of October and nowhere, Pennsylvania, would attract hundreds of people? I didn’t. The guidebook said, “Self-guided tours of the grounds, $8; house tours $16, reservations required. In-depth tours $45, pre-paid.”

 

 “Ah, we’ll be able to take a tour,” I said. “They won’t be that busy,” I said. Wrong. Got to the entrance booth at 3:30, said to the lady, “I know we’re late, but can we sign up for a tour now or tomorrow morning?” “Sorry,” she said, “First available spot for a tour is late tomorrow afternoon. You can take a tour of the grounds and see the house from outside. The grounds close at 6.”

 

My advice is: if you want to see the inside of Falling Waters, reserve your spot early. We did walk around the outside, and you can see a lot of the inside (FLW liked lots of windows) but I wish we’d been able to go through the houses. (Main, guest, and servants’.) Very impressive. Roofs leak but, like all FLW buildings.

 

Spent the night at Ohio Pyle State Park, in the wilderness on top of a small mountain but within earshot of a mainline, at least ten trains during the night. Maybe more: ten that I counted. Up in the morning and drove east almost back to where we started, but a bit south in Maryland, to have breakfast at a chain that specializes in buffets. The breakfast version had lots of variety, including salads and fruit, for $6.99. Everyone in the place (but us) was eating French toast or pancakes with whipped cream and syrup. I don’t see why all Americans don’t weigh 100 kgs. (Course, a lot do.)

 

Next stop, the (and as I think I and many others have said, “There’s an oxymoron for you,”) civil war battlefield at Antietam or, as the Southrons would call it, Sharpsburg. (The south named battles for nearby towns, the north for nearby streams.) I won’t go into the statistics, but you have to wonder how anyone could be so eager to waste human lives as were the generals who fought that war. What’s worse, some of the generals who saw the results of their ‘tactics’ (or lack of tactics) at Antietam did it again at Gettysburg, notably that idiot Pickett, of ‘last charge’ fame. Then a brief visit to Harpers Ferry, where John Brown went down in history as the patron saint of idiotic endevours. We were surprised at Harpers Ferry – it’s down in a deep and fairly narrow valley, with a very small amount of flat land next to the river, and most of the town built on the steep side of the valley. Not what I expected from the paintings I’ve seen. Very full of tourists.

 

Then to Charlottesville, Virginia, where we ate at a restaurant highly recommended by Bob and Dorothy, and if you ever get to Charlottesville, go to Savour, on Emmet. Wow. You might also visit Monticello, as did we. And were disappointed. The visitors’ centre (sorry, center) is modern, spotless, and full of nice people; the grounds are as they were in Jefferson’s day (more or less: the trees are bigger); the house looks as it does on the verso of the US nickel; and the tour guide was knowlegable, friendly, and gave a great tour. But the rooms are small. The largest of them is about 5x5 M. I had the impression that Jefferson entertained: that Monticello was famous for the meeting of great minds. Either the great minds were in very small bodies, or there weren’t very many of them at a time, or they met in different rooms. Why anyone would build a grand house with titchy rooms is beyond me.

 

Then to Luray, Virginia, and the famous eponymous cavern. Well worth the visit. It’s a classic stalagtites and mites cave: lots and lots of each. (You know how to remember the difference, don’t you? It’s like ants in the pants: when the mites go up the tights come down. You didn’t know that? Neither did the tour guide.) Luray is at the north end of the Shenandoah valley, and after the tour we drove back to the ridge road, paid our $15 park entrance fee (the entire ridge road is a park) and headed south. The views are spectacular: first the land drops away on one side, and then on the other. You can see for miles – about 100 on either side. We camped at one of the campsites in the park, and I awoke in the right to the sound of rain pattering on the top. Moved all the stuff from the upper bed into the front seats and closed the top. (We’re not interested in driving around with three square metres of wet canvas dripping on us.)  In the morning, we were in the clouds. Couldn’t see five metres away, let alone the view for which we had paid.  Had breakfast at the park café, and headed off down the road at about 20 k. 20 km on, and several hundred metres lower, the mist cleared, and we left the park and hit the freeway. Mary then turned us onto a secondary highway to avoid a toll road (I’m not the only cheapskate in the family) and for 100 miles we wound our way through into the hills and hollers of West Virginia, where coal is king.

 

We had a burger in South Charleston, KY, and then on to Carter Caves State Park campground, where we got a ‘rustic’ site, ‘rustic’ meaning it didn’t have power or water. There was, however, a streetlight 100 metres away, and flush toilets about the same distance.

 

Up in the morning, out on the job, work like the devil for my pay, while…oops, sorry. Wrong song. Drove through the rolling hills of Kentucky, where signs asking us to vote for various candidates were everywhere. Sample: VOTE JOHN (BUBBIE) BLOGG FOR JAILER. THE MAN WITH EXPERIENCE.)  Into Lexington, horse country, took pictures of Red Mile Raceway for Fran (it’s a harness racing track made of red clay, and it’s 1.6 km long, but they call it the Red Mile track) and on to breakfast. Went into the diner, Mary told me to order the usual (very lightly poached eggs, sausage, hash browns, wheat toast) and headed to the washroom.

 

Waitress arrived, brought orange juice, and then came back and said, “Yawl lack ass?”

 

“What?” I said. “Oh, no, not at all. I’m with my wife. She’s in the washroom.”

 

The look on her face told me I’d erred. The pitcher in her hand told me that she wanted to know if I desired ice in my OJ.

 

By the time we got that straightened out, we were the best of friends, and I jess knew I was goin to lake Kaintucky.

 

(OK, no more dialect jokes, and no more attempts to reproduce the speech in my writing. I promise.)

 

Let’s see. Visited a model railroad museum in Versailles (pronounced Ver SALES) and thence south through the rolling countryside (lot of that around those parts) to Mammoth Caves National Park where we camped for the night and in the morning took one of the tours through the world’s largest cave system, as the guide told us several times. Not at all like Luray, as it’s a dry cavern, but way, way, WAY bigger. 360 miles of caves, to be sort of exact. (They keep finding more.)  The tour ended at 11, then more rolling hills, then more freeway, more freeway, more free-----well, you get the idea. And here we are in St. Louis, after a marathon drive.

 

That that that’s all, folks. For the time being, at least.

 

SSSSTANLEY TRIP PART SIX

 

I suppose I should change the name of this junket – ‘getting home’ would be more accurate at this point. Although we do have one more steam stop to make – in Sedro Wooley, Washington. Back to St. Louis, where I write this in the morning. Had a not-bad dinner last night in the touristy part of town – horse-drawn carriages, exactly like Victoria;  restaurants; a huge casino (which Mary insisted on walking through, to gape at the hundreds of fools being parted from their money: none of them looked like the gorgeous, happy people in the ads); and now, at 9:00 AM, we’re off to walk the downtown area. More later.

 

It’s later. We dropped in to the Missouri Athletic Club, a couple of blocks from our motel, being taken by the wonderful brickwork on the exterior. The desk man informed us it’s a private club, but as there were no members on the premises he gave us a tour. Eight floors of luxury for the sportsmen (and women) of St. Louis. Their art collection is spectacular.

 

If the motto of St. Louis (by the way, they pronounce it to rhyme with ‘brewis’) isn’t ‘the land of the free’, it should be. We found the best two freebies of the trip here. First, the Museum of the West, beneath the arch on the river. Not really a museum, as they have very little in the way of artefacts, it’s more a diorama of the history of the American West, especially the Lewis and Clarke expedition. (Interesting that Canada had dozens of explorers, all of whom travelled over vast regions, and we make nothing of any of them. The Americans had two, and do they ever play them up.) You could spend a day there with no trouble at all. Then to the Anheuser-Busch brewery. Not actually as interesting as the Martin Guitar factory, but Martin didn’t give me a free guitar. AB gave each of us two free beer samples, and they probably would have given us 10 if we’d asked. They actually make a couple of pretty good brews: their bock is as good as any I’ve tasted. And I was ready for it. The temperature was – are you ready, especially those of you in Victoria? 28 degrees C. That’s twenty eight degrees centigrade. (Or is it Celsius?) Well, whatever it is, it’s hot. HOT. HOT.

 

And then to Kansas City, but not quite, as we pulled up short to have dinner at Zarda, one of the great KC BBQ institutions, this one in Blue Springs, about 30 km east of KC.  Ordered the rib dinner for two, and staggered out an hour later.  (Amount of food, not wine, as they don’t serve wine, just beer, which pleased Mary-the-beer- drinker no end. [Did I mention whose idea it was to visit the brewery? No? Well, guess.]) And from dinner took with us enough ribs for three more meals. I don’t know who the ‘two’ are who were supposed to eat all those ribs. Not these two, that’s for sure.

 

Next morning, after a motel breakfast that – you know, I don’t think I’ve talked about motel breakfasts, have I? Well, let me rectify that. There are four classes of motel breakfast. Five if you count not having one at all. Really really cheap motels with no competition don’t offer breakfast. Motels with competition offer a ‘continental breakfast’, which means a tray full of doughnuts and coffee, or a toaster, a loaf of bread, and some jam. And coffee. At the other end of the scale is the Drury Inn chain, which offers what amounts to a small scale buffet breakfast and dinner. In between are the regular motels, which offer do-it-yourself waffles and toast, ersatz scrambled eggs, biscuits with sawmill gravy (read ‘library paste’) juice, coffee, sweet rolls, fruit, yoghurt, and cold cereal. All of which has sugar in it. (Not just the cereal, but everything else as well.) But when the room costs $70, and you get two $8 breakfasts included, it makes the room pretty cheap. And if you’re travelling with two teenagers, as a lot of people seem to be (don’t kids go to school any more?) and you get two $8 breakfasts and two $12 ones (the teens) the room is almost free.

 

Where were we? Oh, right. After a motel breakfast, we drove to Kansas City MO, contiguous with KC KA, and visited what must be the world’s biggest bargain, the Nelson Atkins Art Museum. It’s huge, and it’s free. (Donation.) And, when we got there, it was closed, opening at noon, almost three hours after we arrived. We didn’t want to spend the time waiting for it to open, but we walked around the grounds to view the largest collection of Henry Moore sculptures in North America. Plus a couple of Renoirs, plus other plusses. Apparently one can spend three days in the museum and not look at anything twice.

 

Then through Nebraska, via the scenic route, which is scenic only in Nebraska. Or maybe Saskatchewan. Stopped for the night at the Nebraska National Forest. Well, there are trees, so I guess it qualifies as a forest, although it was planted by man in the early 20th century. We got a site with power, which is why this is so long. (My laptop refuses to recognize its battery, so I can only write when we have power, and there’s not much else to do in this campsite, hence this endless instalment.) As we are near the edge of the Central Time Zone, it’s now 6 PM and still full daylight. But that’s it for the moment. Except to note that there are coal trains, coming (I think) from Utah, to fuel the power plants of America, one every 20 minutes, and I’m not kidding. 120 hopper cars each. And, of course, empties going back. Also one every 20 minutes. They all honk where the road into the campsite crosses the track. I hope they don’t run all night.

 

(By the way, 10% of the electricity in the US is produced by coal. I don’t see where Americans get off complaining about our oil sands as being polluting. True, they are, but not a fraction of the pollution and global warming produced by burning coal to produce electricity, not to mention the cost in particulates in getting the coal from Utah to the east coast.)

 

Next morning. They did. (Run all night.)  It started spitting, so we arose, closed the top, and drove 120 miles to Alliance, and breakfast. Came as close as I’ve ever done to hitting deer in the overcast. Looked at Carhenge, which you can Google if you care, and then headed north through a strong wind to Mount Rushmore, which, surprise, surprise, looks just like all the pictures. And then through hail to Deadwood, where I write this. Remember my complaints about the 28 C temperature two days ago? Well at the moment it’s 4. That’s four degrees C. We saw 3 C during the drive. We may be home early, if we can get out of Deadwood. Deadwood, by the way, is an interesting place. It, of course, a wide-open hell hole in the late 19th Century, when it was a gold-rush town, and was the scene of the murder of Wild Bill Hickok, who was buried in the nearby cemetery, also the final resting place of Calamity Jane. It’s full of ornate buildings, mostly of sandstone, from the 1900 to 1920 period. And at the moment it’s 8:00 AM, the wind has died to 25 knots, but they’re predicting 30 knots and gusts to 40 later today. We’re getting out of here, although Wyoming might not be much better. At least we’re not in St. Louis, where they’re really getting it.

 

More later. I hope.

 

SSSTANLEY TRIP PART 7

 

We left Deadwood at 8:30 in light snow and 2 C.  For the next three hours, as we drove west, the temperature varied from 1 C to 3 C, there was more or less snow, and the winds were 20 to 30 knots. Then we started over the Powder River pass (9666 feet), through the Bighorn Range, to Cody. By the time we got to the top, the temperature was -8 C, the road was covered with snow, and the snow was blowing off the road. Not bad enough to be called a ‘whiteout’, but bad enough to get us down to 30 kph at times. However, we pressed on and came out the other side into nice weather, and here we are in Cody, just east of Yellowstone, which we understand is closed because of snow.  Wyoming may not be as varied as BC, but it’s a hell of a lot more varied than anywhere else we’ve been on this trip. Mountains, plains, up, down, and around.

 

If you ever get to Cody, plan on spending two days just for the Buffalo Bill Museum, which is five large sections: Buffalo Bill’s life; firearms; Indians; natural history; art of the American West. Each one has hundreds of whatever: paintings and sculptures, guns, Cody family effects, stuffed animals, native art, it’s all endless. Our four-hour stay was hardly enough for a walk-through. Spectacular.

 

And then to Yellowstone, through the east entrance, which had been opened that morning and was ploughed and sanded, but icy in spots, through Yellowstone to Old Faithful, which obliged by spraying water into the air while 40 or so tourists watched, as opposed to the 4000 that watch each eruption in the summer. The roads, which are bumper to bumper in the summer, were virtually deserted. We saw two cars on the 80 km from the east entrance to the main junction in the park. In fact, we saw more buffalo than cars. And more elk. I’m glad we came when we did. Summer must be a nightmare.

 

Spent the night in a motel in West Yellowstone, a village just outside the west entrance of the park, where 12 of the 18 restaurants are close for the year, which tells you something about the number of tourists they get in the summer. We had a middlin’ fair pizza for $18 (large, meaning huge), and a pretty good Zin for $16. One of the things I don’t like about visiting the US is the price of wine in restaurants, which is typically about ½ the price in B.C. When I get home, it takes me months to get used to the rip-off prices.

 

Spent the evening after dinner watching TV, and all the places we visited and left over the past three weeks are experiencing tornadoes, hurricanes, snow storms, or other unpleasantness. Here it’s cold but clear, and with luck, tomorrow and the next few days will be the same.

 

I had emailed Pat Farrell, the dean of west coast steam guys, and asked if we could drop in. His  response was waiting for me: “By all means. You’re invited to the HCCA run and potluck. Be at my place by 10 AM.” As the HCCC is the Horseless Carriage Club of America, limited to cars built before 1916, we (I) couldn’t pass that up. “We’ll be there,” I emailed back.

 

Next morning we left West Yellowstone and headed north via a slightly circuitous route so we could visit Cameron, Montana. Not worth the detour. The entire town, all one building, is for sale. At a very cheap price, I would guess. But it would probably come with as many ha of pretty good pasture as one could ask for. Hmmmm. Fran? Are you there?

 

And on through some interesting country, where fly-fishing is king. Lots of rivers, lots of lodges, lots of guides, lots of fishing. We stopped at Deerlodge, where the state prison, located in the middle of town and declared uninhabitable in the 1980’s, has been turned into the ‘Old Prison Museum’, starring almost 300 old cars, 98% of them American, and 25% of those Fords. Still, an interesting look at the evolution of the car in the US.

 

Out of Montana, over a pass with – surprise, surprise – light snow – and into a motel in Pesthole, Idaho. (Sorry: Mary says it’s Post Falls. Whatever.) And now it’s 7 AM and here I am wide awake because my body thinks it’s 8, or maybe 8:30. Time zones are odd. In Canada, of course, they are nice and straight, except for the Mountain/Pacific boundary in B.C., which wanders a couple of times. But in the US, the boundaries wander all over the place, the eastern boundary of the Mountain zone being the worst. Driving north to south, you could go in and out of that zone about ten times. North Dakota is especially weird, as the northwestern part of the state is in the Central zone, while directly to the south, the southwestern part is in Mountain time.

 

Up in the morning, out on the road, work like the devil – oops, sorry, wrong song. Into Spokane in driving rain on a six lane interstate at 120 kph. Survived. Onto 2 West, and one of the best drives of the trip. Almost no traffic, sun, good road, interesting scenery. I recommend it. Into Cashmere, where we visited the Aplets/Cotlets plant so Mary could stock up, and over the Stevens Pass again on a deserted road, to the Pacific side of the coast range, and bumper to bumper traffic, although moving fairly well. And thence to a motel in Burlington, where this is written. And where we walked to the next-door supermarket and bought two boxes of fish and chips, fried to order, for $8 for three pieces, and three bottles of excellent Carmenere for $5.50 each. Oh, and salad to take to the potluck lunch of the HCCA.

 

Which we attended Saturday morning, met a bunch of nice people, went for a 40 km ride in a very nice non-condensing Stanley, trailing a huge cloud of water vapour in the chill air, and had a great pot-luck lunch.

 

Ended the trip as we started it, by visiting aunt Marg, cousin Lynn, and Peter in White Rock, and left at 3:20 to get the 5 PM ferry. “You don’t have to leave yet, unless you want to get the 4,” Peter said. “There’s no 4 off season,” I replied. “Then you’ll sit there for an hour,” he said. He was right, and he was wrong. The 3 was delayed, and was just landing as we got there at 3:50. It’s 5:20, we’re just out of Active Pass, and we’ll be home by 6:30. Thus endeth the latest journey. I’ll do a wrap-up of lessons learned in a day or so. 

 

SSSTANLEY TRIP

 

FINAL THOUGHTS

 

Some final thoughts on the trip. I know that most of you won’t do anything like this, but some might, and our experience may provide some help. So here you go.

 

STATS

 

We were away 31 nights. We drove 14,232 km (8843 miles). We got an average of 10 km per L, or 22.2 mpg. We slept in the van 13 nights, in motels 15, with friends (thanks, Bob and Dorothy) three. Costs: gas $1400, ferries $150, accommodation $1500, food $1500, admission to whatever $400. Total, $5000. (All costs are approximate, but it’ll be within $500.)

 

OVERALL COMMENTS

 

Was it worth doing? Sure. We saw a lot of things that we’ve read about, or heard about, or seen pictures of, and es ist immer gut etwas zu sehen. I enjoyed it more than did Mary: she’d rather have stayed home, but she’s a good sport.

 

HIGHS

 

The best part for me was meetings the steam car guys. I know only one of you reading this would find that interesting, but all of you have an interest in something, be it chamber music or Shetland ponies or Moorcroft pottery, and you could do what I did: join a club (in my case the Steam Automobile Club of America), get a list of members, email and tell them you’re coming and could you drop in? If they’re like the steam car folks, they’ll be delighted to see you, show you their prides and joys, and offer advice on what to do in the area. Under the same heading, visiting Alex and Bob and Dorothy.

 

Yellowstone and Cody, Wyoming.  The steam plant in Hamilton, Ontario. The battlefield at Antietam. St. Louis and Kansas City.

 

LOWS

 

Shenandoah. It’s nice, but not as nice as most of B.C. Monticello. If you’re right there, sure. Don’t drive too far just to see it. Same with Falling Water and Carhenge.

 

What would I do differently? I’d either take a week more time, or not go as far. Too much driving, not enough time to look at things.

 

TIMING

 

I’d start earlier. We were lucky not to get snowed in at the end. Or do it the other way round – start with Yellowstone and work east. It’s not the date that gets you – it’s the elevation. But it sure is nice to miss the crowds, and we did that. We were almost the only people at some places that have huge waits in the high season.

 

MOTELS

 

For reliable accommodation, you can’t beat the chains. Not very interesting, but mostly the same. You can save quite a bit by making sure the place has breakfast: an $80 room with two breakfasts is cheaper than a $60 room where you have to eat at a restaurant. Our pick is the Comfort Inn: not as reliable as the Holiday Inn, Garden, or Hilton, but cheaper and generally pretty good. You can save money by travelling in the off season, and the more off the more you save. There’s a limit, of course: they can’t make money unless they charge enough to cover the housekeeping, laundry, wear and tear and soap, but $60 will do that, even in the better chains.

 

CAMPING

 

Provincial or state parks are our choice hands down. Prices vary a lot: the cheapest was $9 a night, the most expensive $28 (NY state, which is a rip-off: they advertise $18, but there’s a weekend surcharge, an out-of-state surcharge, and in some parks a charge to enter the park. By the time you find out, it’s too late to go elsewhere.)

 

MONEY

 

We rely on credit cards, but most campsites don’t accept them, so you have to have some cash. We started out with $200 and ran out in Maine, so I tried to use my debit card to get cash in New Hampshire, first at the ATM in the Old Trust in West Squidsuck and when that didn’t work, at the First Bank of  East Yokelknocker. No luck. Then Mary managed it at the TD Bank, which, the teller informed her, was not part of the Canadian bank of the same name. Sure. So be warned. But more importantly (and I’m sure some of you know this but perhaps not all) DO NOT ask for money from a credit card. Don’t use a credit card in an ATM, and don’t ask the cashier for money when you make a purchase. If you do, the credit card company will start charging you interest right away, not just on the loan, but on your entire balance. Mary and I put about $5000 on our cards, and we’ll pay it off immediately  when the bill comes in, so there is no charge. Had we borrowed $100 on the card, we would have to pay the 1.5% charge on the entire $5100, which comes to $75. Pretty expensive.

 

So that’s it. If you’ve got questions, ask. We’ll do our best to answer them. Thanks for putting up with this. I hope it was interesting and informative. Or at least one of the two.