About Me

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Welcome to the online blog for traveler/writer/photographer Steven Barber. Come in. Relax. Take off your shoes and socks -- or any other article of clothing, this is the internet. Have a look around. I hope to intrigue, amuse, entertain, and maybe provoke you just a little. I love to find adventure. All I need is a change of clothes, my Nikon, an open mind and a strong cup of coffee.

Tuesday, August 29, 2017

SCHOOLBELLS


The town of Maggie Valley in North Carolina is rife with "photo opps".

A small schoolhouse building set aside as an historic site. Just alongside the road, as if it's completely new and modern.

You can almost hear the bell toll announcing morning classes.





Sunday, August 27, 2017

Checking Back In



You may, quite rightly, wonder where I've gone.

After the first leg of the trip we ran into bandwidth issues. Then *I* ran into bandwidth issues, metaphorically speaking. After eight hours of driving, constant Instagram and Twitter updates, plus just enjoying the trip, I ran out of energy and something had to give. So the nightly updates became...well, "infrequent".

I have hundreds of shots to review, and some notes to go over to remind me what we actually did, but we had a helluva (exhausting) time. There were many highlights - the Utah midlands; the Missouri lunch overlooking the Missouri River; the Gateway Arch; visiting with family in Annapolis, Asheville and Atlanta. (Do all members of my family live in places that start with A?)

New Orleans, as always, was wonderful. I really, really love that town. My last visit was six months after the devastation of Katrina, so it was a thrill to see the heart of the city back and beating strong.

And there were a couple of lowlights, not the least of which were the nonfunctioning elevators at Carlsbad Caverns. This prevented us from visiting the caverns themselves, a big disappointment.

The food, in most places, was fantastic. Coppins Restaurant at the Hotel Covington in Kentucky was a special surprise, as the our dinner at the Trinity Hotel in Carlsbad, New Mexico. There was a bowl of terrific seafood chowder at Flounder's Chowder in Pensacola. And, again, New Orleans was the highlight of our culinary adventures. Yes, there were martinis.

But more on all that once I've gotten my head back on straight and can stand to stay seated for more than a half hour at a time (sitting for eight hours a day is tiring, dammit!).

So here are some highlights to keep you entertained...


The Naval Academy and Annapolis from across the Severn River

New Orleans' famed French Quarter
Coffee and bagels in Vail, Colorado

The spectacular central Utah vistas

Swamp airboat tour in the Louisiana bayous

The St Louis Gateway Arch

San Antonio's Riverwalk

A sign on the window in Waynesville, NC

The white sand beaches of Pensacola

Familiar drive to many: the desert to Las Vegas

Harpers Ferry, West Virginia

Lunchtime deck overlooking the Missouri River

Delicious food at the Hotel Covington

And drinks there, too!

Thursday, August 24, 2017

FINAL TALLIES



We're back from the journey, and below are the respective tallies. I'll be doing a much more comprehensive workup using high-resolution photographs which I took along the way, but for now, here are the raw statistics:


6270 miles


25 states
(California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio*, Pennsylvania*, Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia, Tennessee*, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida*, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico) (*-added to itinerary)


20 days
(Originally 21)

Crossings
Mountains: San Bernardino; Wasatch; Rockies; Appalachians; Blue; Smoky

Rivers: Colorado (7 times+); Missouri (2); Mississippi (4); Ohio (6); Potomac (3); Shenandoah (3); Chattanooga (1); Pecos (1); Rio Grande (1)
(+ - The Interstate paralleled the Colorado in the Rockies and crossed over it multiple times...)

National Parks and Monuments/Historic Sites
Gateway Arch; Harpers Ferry; Smoky Mountains; Carlsbad Caverns

Major Cities (in order)
Las Vegas; Denver; Kansas City; St Louis; Louisville; Cincinnati; Columbus; Washington, DC; Asheville; Atlanta; Montgomery; New Orleans; Houston; San Antonio; El Paso; Tucson; Phoenix; Long Beach/LA Metro

Highlights
Central Utah Wasatch Mountains, Rockies, winery in Missouri, Gateway Arch, distillery in Kentucky, hotel in Kentucky, Harpers Ferry, Annapolis, Blue Ridge Mountains,  Biltmore Estate, Waynesville/Maggie Valley, Pensacola, New Orleans, swamp tour, trying boudin and cracklins, San Antonio Riverwalk, dinner at Trinity Hotel (Carlsbad)

Disappointments
Carlsbad Caverns elevator problem (couldn't go into the caverns)
Rerouting away from the Grand Canyon and Santa Fe (exhaustion just finally got to us.)



There are a LOT of notes and photographs (high res) to parse, but a handful of shots from the iPhone below. Stay tuned for a LOT of very cool stuff.

Central Utah


Historic Harpers Ferry, WV

Cincinnati and the Ohio River

View from the Gateway Arch in St Louis

The Mighty Colorado, in the Rockies

Coffee break in Vail. 

Lunch overlooking the Missouri River

NOW we're talking

Messages and crosses were constant


The Devil's Playground

Nevada border - the first of many state lines

Leaving Long Beach - There and Back Again

Monday, August 14, 2017

THE GRAND TOUR - First Half Recap



The last two days of the trip sort of melded into one blog entry, then vanished completely. We had a problem with the wifi at a B&B in Harper's Ferry which proved to be problematic. In the future I will post a "travelogue" of Harpers Ferry. It's a fascinating and historic site deserving of a more in-depth review.

So, on we go. Time to recap the first half of the journey as we prepare for the second leg, back to Long Beach.

We're here in Annapolis, Maryland after a madcap dash across the country. 2815 miles. The San Bernardino, Wasatch, Rocky, Blue and Appalachian mountain ranges. Five major American rivers - the Colorado, the Missouri, Mississippi, the Shenandoah and the Potomac. 14 states. Tens of thousands of acres of corn. Six major cities and dozens and dozens of small towns. "Blue" enclaves and full "red" states.

Along the way we encountered stunning scenery in Utah, expensive parking in Vail, a very tall structure in St Louis, a beautiful hotel in Cincinnati an some of the country's most important history in Harpers Ferry.

One of the premiere notes we take away from this adventure was how nice Americans are. All too often we see each other in terms of race, politics and economy. But the truth of the matter is that most people are extremely decent folk when given half a chance. America's strongest asset is its people, and those who would divide us, decrease us.

Highlights of the trip were many. Discovering even more spectacular scenery in Utah was one of the
first major revelations. I was entirely too young to admire the sights when last I transited that route. This time the view was foremost on my mind. It seemed that every turn, every wind in the road revealed something new and even more impressive that what had gone before. Obviously I'm familiar with Utah's unique set of National Parks, but just the scenery along Interstate 70 certainly earns the Westernmost strip of asphalt an award as perhaps the most beautiful scenery along an interstate any where in the country (which is saying a LOT, folks, a LOT!).

Colorado River
Following the emergence from the eastern Utah desert we crossed the Colorado River for the first of perhaps a half dozen times. Crossing and recrossing rivers is a hallmark of I-70. There are multiple passes over the Colorado, the Missouri and the Ohio - though only one of the Mississippi. The interstate parallels the Colorado's path for many miles through the Rocky Mountains, jumping from one side to the other, making the river a constant companion on the winding road up the mountains.

Expensive coffee
The first of three "just stop" areas on the trip - where we just took time out from the pall mall drive to get to Maryland - came in the ski resort town of Vail. After three days of racing down highways with only a handful of ten minute stops, we decided to take a genuine break in Vail, stopping for an hour to get coffee and bagels in the resort's central plaza. There was a fun soccer (futbol) game going on with a handful of ten to thirteen year olds. We sat, eating what were already pricey snacks, until we were done and it was time to get back on the road. Destination for that day was Denver, and we still had to crest the mountains and head back down to the Mile High City.

We made our way back to the parking structure and discovered, much to our chagrine, that the hourlong stop was a full $20 in parking fees, making our little bagels and coffee the most expensive snack we've ever eaten (we think. Haven't actually done the math).

After wincing at the net cost of our stop, we headed up the mountains towards the longest tunnel on the Interstate Highway system, the Eisenhower/Johnson tunnels which mark also the highest point in the interstates. The twin tunnels are more than a mile and a half in length, crossing under the continental divide at just above 11,000'. High enough my altitude-sensitive wife got a splitting headache - relieved only after we descended down into Denver on the far side of the Rockies.

The next few days were flat. Eastern Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois and Indiana have hilly areas, but for the most part the terrain was wide open and the visibility went for miles in every direction. Gradually the tan-browns of the plains gave way to a lush greenery as we moved east. This was helped by the large storm system we were fortunate enough to taste but not experience in its full fury. By the time we made our way to Topeka the system had moved out and we were blessed by bright skies and fluffy clouds.


Given the nature of the first half of the trip...get to Annapolis with some haste...we didn't get a chance to do much exploring. The second half of our voyage, starting a little later today, will enable us to play around a bit more to the extent we were discussing some serious re-planning of the latter part of the drive as we head into West Texas in a few days time. More about that as we refine the plans.

Continuing the review, we left St Louis and headed for Cincinnati via Louisville, Kentucky. Time-wise it made only a little difference, but enabled us to drive through the Kentucky countryside to look for horses and whiskey. We found a wonderful distillery, the Kentucky Artisan Distillery in Crestwood. Wonderful stop, unfortunately right as they were closing. We had a nice conversation with a woman named Katy who kindly stayed a little longer to allow us to purchase a couple of bottles for friends back home.

Cincinnati
We took issue with Kentucky after arriving in Covington for the night, realizing we hadn't seen a horse the entire day. It just didn't seem appropriate. The for the next few days whenever we saw horses in a pen or running through fields we noted them, wryly commenting "but it's not Kentucky".

Save for witnessing and assisting with an automobile crash in Ohio, the next day was pretty quiet. The path was kind of amusing in that we left our hotel in Kentucky and crossed immediately into Ohio. Then passed from Ohio into a sliver of West Virginia, into Pennsylvania, back into West Virginia, into Maryland, and back into West Virginia for the night. It's a slightly confusing set of state boundaries, dating back to West Virginia's secession from Virginia during the lead up to the Civil War.


Harpers Ferry

Last Friday we made the final couple of hours on the road as we crossed Maryland into the familiar environs of Annapolis, a city I regard as my East Coast home.

But as of today, we're headed away for perhaps the last time. In about an hour we start the second half, heading down across Virginia, tickling Tennessee and stopping for the next few nights in Asheville, North Carolina. Hoping the weather holds.

Follow the Thumbnail Traveler Twitter and Instagram feeds for updates throughout the day, and I'll post a recap tomorrow morning.

On to round two.

We made Harpers Ferry in eight hours and stayed at a pleasant bed and breakfast. As I stated above, I'll cover this stop in more detail in a later column.


On the Road Again

Friday, August 11, 2017

THE GRAND TOUR - Day Six Entry Delayed








WIFI ISSUES DELAYING UPDATE. WILL POST DAY SIX UPDATE LATER.

(Heading into Annapolis today!)

Thursday, August 10, 2017

THE GRAND TOUR - Day 5 - St Louis to Cincinnati - 360 miles, 6 hrs


I had more or less expected this. A day with little to report.

Day 5 was pretty much getting from point A to point Z with little in the way of fuss or muss in the middle. We zoomed along the interstates without much ado, passing across Illinois and Indiana farmland for the most part. Then, crossing the Ohio river for the first time we rocketed past Louisville and up to Cincinnati for a night in Covington - across the Ohio from Cincinnati itself.

Breakfast was in a Cracker Barrel, a regional casual dining chain familiar to people in the central United States.  I enjoyed a wonderful cinnamon apple oatmeal, which was perfect for my morning wants.

The drive was beautiful, and as we approached the eastern side of Indiana the land began to become more hilly and forested. A couple of rest areas kept us from being too stiff.

We did have a nice little side-trip, though only a short one. We saw signs for "Kentucky's Artisan Distillery", which looked promising. We headed off the highway to investigate, arriving just as the hostess, at the tasting room was shutting off the lights. Katy. Being a Kentuckian she graciously said we could look around quickly, and she would reopen the register if we wanted to make a purchase. Naturally we did, so spent a few minutes talking to her about the distillery as she worked to ring up our two bottles of bourbon - the specific bottling of which is apparently only available at the distillery. There were other bottles and types, of course, but these were of a limited set.

After the pleasantries we left Katy to finish her day and resumed our travel. In a little over an hour we

found ourselves enmeshed in Cincinnati construction traffic, finally winding our way down into Covington. The hotel, appropriately named The Hotel Covington, was a delightful surprise.

After checking in at the desk we admired the very trendy looking lobby, noting an outdoor seating area and very nicely appointed bar. A few minutes in the room to freshen up we headed down for what we both agree  was the most pleasant meal of the trip so far, at Coppin's at the Covington.

A few more pictures below, but as noted, not a terribly eventful day. And sometimes that's exactly what you need.




Louisville