From a30c790edea652494e7481f6798047a3bc1fd4ea Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: luxagraf Date: Fri, 28 Jul 2023 13:43:36 -0500 Subject: added a backup of old pages that are no longer live --- bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.html | 498 ++++++++++++++++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.txt | 36 ++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.html | 530 +++++++++++++++++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.txt | 50 ++ .../jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.html | 516 +++++++++++++++++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.txt | 42 ++ .../2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.html | 627 +++++++++++++++++++++ .../2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.txt | 76 +++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/index.html | 119 ++++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.html | 439 +++++++++++++++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.txt | 33 ++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.html | 483 ++++++++++++++++ bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.txt | 100 ++++ 13 files changed, 3549 insertions(+) create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.html create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.txt create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.html create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.txt create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.html create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.txt create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.html create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.txt create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/index.html create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.html create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.txt create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.html create mode 100644 bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.txt (limited to 'bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04') diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.html b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e44555c --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.html @@ -0,0 +1,498 @@ + + + + + April Fools - by Scott Gilbertson + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

+ +

Home → + +
+ + jrnl + + +

+ + +

April Fools

+ +

Raysville, Georgia, U.S.

+ – Map +

+ April 1, 2017 + +

Our original plan called for us to hit the road on the first day of spring. In reality we finally got going, fittingly enough, on April 1st.

+ +

1969 Dodge Travco at Raysville campground, GA photographed by luxagraf

+ +

We spent the morning saying goodbye to friends and family and (briefly) stopping buy a classic car show that happens once a month at a local coffee shop.

+ +

classic cars at jittery joes photographed by luxagraf

+ +

I wouldn’t say we stole the show, but we certainly dominated when it came to size. And hey, we even have a pretty much finished +interior now.

+ +

1969 Dodge Travco interior photographed by luxagraf

+ +

We finally made it out of town at the crack of 2PM and drove a whooping 80 miles before pulling in to Raysville campground near the southern end of the massive lake that is the Savannah river.

+ +

Savannah river, raysville photographed by luxagraf

+ +

If was an uneventful drive, the bus ran smooth and everything just worked for a change. For posterity’s sake I’d like to note that the person with the paper map drove straight there and the person with the GPS got lost twice. Relying on Google to navigate the back roads of the south is a recipe for disaster. There are now two paper maps and no GPS on our persons.

Raysville was nice and quiet. Or at least absent human noise. The Canadian geese roosting on the island just off shore from our campsite had frequent loud and rather involved conversations all night long. Still, it was lovely spot so we stayed a second night. A couple friends who’d been out of town when we said goodbye made the trek out from Athens the second day and spent the afternoon with us.

Mostly though we just played on the shore and got ourselves and all our clothes covered in good old red Georgia clay.

+ +

raysville campground photographed by luxagraf

+ +

Savannah river, raysville campground photographed by luxagraf

+ +

+ + + +

+ + +

+ +

+ + + + + + +

3 Comments

+ + + + + + +

+ +

+ Arva Weinstein + April 06, 2017 at 10:38 p.m. +

+ +

Love Elliott’s red clay socks!!!

+ +

+ Scott + April 07, 2017 at 8:53 a.m. +

+ +

@arva-

yeah, the red is pretty much permanent in several bathing suits. you just can’t get the Georgia all the way out.

+ +

+ Denise Hodges + April 08, 2017 at 6:48 a.m. +

+ +

Thank you for sharing! I love Linda and John and enjoy the pictures they share of family. What incredible memories you are making with your children! It is refreshing to see them playing in the mud versus playing with an electronic device! I admire your courage to venture out of ‘mainstream’ and you have my prayers for a safe and fulfilling journey.

+ +

+ + +

+ +

Thoughts?

Please leave a reply:

+ +

All comments are moderated, so you won’t see it right away. And please remember Kurt Vonnegut's rule: “god damn it, you’ve got to be kind.” You can use Markdown or HTML to format your comments. The allowed tags are <b>, <i>, <em>, <strong>, <a>. To create a new paragraph hit return twice.

+ + +

+ +

+ + + + +

+ + + + + + + diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.txt b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c5113d8 --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/april-fools.txt @@ -0,0 +1,36 @@ +April Fools +=========== + + by Scott Gilbertson + + Saturday, 01 April 2017 + +Our original plan called for us to hit the road on the first day of spring. In reality we finally got going, fittingly enough, on April 1st. + +

+ +We spent the morning saying goodbye to friends and family and (briefly) stopping buy a classic car show that happens once a month at a local coffee shop. + +

+ +I wouldn't say we stole the show, but we certainly dominated when it came to size. And hey, we even have a pretty much finished +interior now. + +

+ +We finally made it out of town at the crack of 2PM and drove a whooping 80 miles before pulling in to Raysville campground near the southern end of the massive lake that is the Savannah river. + +

+ +If was an uneventful drive, the bus ran smooth and everything just worked for a change. For posterity's sake I'd like to note that the person with the paper map drove straight there and the person with the GPS got lost twice. Relying on Google to navigate the back roads of the south is a recipe for disaster. There are now two paper maps and no GPS on our persons. + +Raysville was nice and quiet. Or at least absent human noise. The Canadian geese roosting on the island just off shore from our campsite had frequent loud and rather involved conversations all night long. Still, it was lovely spot so we stayed a second night. A couple friends who'd been out of town when we said goodbye made the trek out from Athens the second day and spent the afternoon with us. + +Mostly though we just played on the shore and got ourselves and all our clothes covered in good old red Georgia clay. + +

diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.html b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c51dbcb --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.html @@ -0,0 +1,530 @@ + + + + + Coming Home - by Scott Gilbertson + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

+ +

Home → + +
+ + jrnl + + +

+ + +

Coming Home

+ +

St. George Island, Florida, U.S.

+ – Map +

+ April 18, 2017 + +

I haven’t accurately tallied it, but my guess is that we’ve spent nearly two months on St. George Island over the years. Enough time anyway, to make it feel a little like coming home when we get here.

+ +

kids playing at beach photographed by luxagraf

+ +

This also feels a bit like coming home, or at least returning to the beginning, because this is where we were when we decided to do this trip two years ago. It’s also where we were when Corrinne found the bus on Craigslist. Yes, Corrinne found it. And yes, it took two years to get it restored. Tip for anyone reading this who’s thinking, “man, I really want to restore an older RV/Trailer”: make a budget for time and money and then double both. Then, just to be safe, double the money budget again.

It took longer than we wanted, and there were some darker moments in those last two years when everything seemed impossible, but hey, we did it. We’re here. Again.

+ +

open for business photographed by luxagraf

+ +

Ironically not in the bus though. Through all our visits to St. George Island we’ve always stayed in the same place, which is owned by some friends of the family. I tried to talk the girls into camping at the very lovely state park down at the east end of the island, but they wouldn’t hear of it. It had to be the pink beach house.

+ +

bridge to st george island photographed by luxagraf

+ +

Fine with me actually. Gave me a chance to finish the last of the bus tasks I need to knock out to call it finished. I don’t know why my wife just laughs now when I say I’m done. But really I am. The only thing left is getting a new water tank. Oh and the solar panels. And the house battery. And the ladder. And the roof rack. And the new awning. Cough.

+ +

1969 Dodge Travco at St George Island, FL photographed by luxagraf

+ +

When we got here we were leaking transmission fluid pretty bad. I had my eye on a section of the transmission cooler hose that had been replaced with what looked like some cheap rubber hose. But I had promised the family I wouldn’t spend the entire time on the island under the bus so I called around a bit and found a shop that was willing to take a look the following Monday. Good enough. I spent the next four days at the beach, hardly ever thinking about that hose, hardly ever having nightmares about failed gaskets that would require dropping the entire transmission.

Instead we played in the surf, climbed the lighthouse, ate shrimp, fried up Grouper cheeks, cooled off with shaved ice and frozen lemonades, and tried to find a cool Piggly Wiggly t-shirt. In other words, we did what you do at the beach — a whole lot of nothing.

+ +

Playing at the beach photographed by luxagraf

+ +

Shaved Ice photographed by luxagraf — Shaved ice and frozen lemonade in the shade.

+ +

cooking photographed by luxagraf — Cooking at the beach requires sunglasses.

+ +

Climbing lighthouse stairs photographed by luxagraf — 95 stairs and a 10 ft vertical ladder, she did it all. The woman selling tickets thought Lilah was too short to climb a lighthouse. I told her they’d climbed Half Dome, that shut her up.

+ +

Top of the lighthouse photographed by luxagraf — Top of the lighthouse.

+ +

One day I spent the better part of an hour with the kids, digging up tiny little clams out of the wet sand behind receding waves. The Seashells of North America guide back up at the house told me later that the slightly larger, rainbow colored clams were Florida Coquinas, while the smaller, white ones were Gulf Donax. Both pop themselves out of the sand when they feel the vibration of crashing waves so that they’re carried up and down the beach, always remaining at the edge of the tidal zone where we were sitting, digging in the sand.

We dug up the Coquinas and Donax and dumped them on the surface of the sand to watch them suck themselves back down into the wet depth. Over and over we dug, then they dug. We started to root for different clams, trying to guess which one would disappear first. There was something hypnotic about watching them, something of the same appeal perhaps of things like frog races. I started to wonder what the clams must think, the ocean gone mad, surf pounding the shore and digging them up over and over again. Or maybe they’re more seasoned than that, maybe they knew exactly what it is, fucking tourists. Or maybe they didn’t need a why at all, maybe they just sucked themselves back down without a thought. Because it is there.

On Monday we drove the bus up to Port St. Joe, which had the only mechanic that had met my criteria: shop out of the way, huge bay doors in Google Street View and not fazed by my slow sell of, “I got a dodge 318, with a 727, that’s leaking transmission fluid…” “Well, bring it in.” “Okay. One thing, it’s got a 27ft motorhome attached to it, is that okay?” “How many feet?” “27.” Pause. “That should be alright.”

Turn out to be… wait for it… transmission cooler hose. Sigh. But hey, it’s fixed and I didn’t miss any time with the kids at the beach.

+ +

kids riding bikes photographed by luxagraf — We had a mailing address for a little while, so we went ahead and got the girls their birthday presents — pedal bikes.

+ +

boy on bike photographed by luxagraf — Since the girls got new bikes, Elliott was more than happy to take one of their old ones.

+ + + +

+ + +

+ +

+ + + + + + +

2 Comments

+ + + + + + +

+ +

+ G and G Weldon + May 01, 2017 at 2:45 p.m. +

+ +

Glad y’all enjoyed the pink house,Linda had told us the girls talked about it from time to time.It is a peaceful,restful place.Glad George’s Grandfather had the wisdom to buy the lot before the bridge was built,wait 8-9 years until the bridge was built then he and his sons came over and built the house.He even cut the framing timber off his farm and stored it in a barn while he was waiting.What a gift to us the third generation to have it.Oh yes,George was glad to(big smile)to hear someone used reference books he put there.Enjoyed your blog almost as much as the one about the joys of an outdoor shower.

+ +

+ Scott + May 02, 2017 at 9:07 a.m. +

+ +

@G and G Weldon-

I didn’t know he built it himself. I would like to have seen the island back then.

And I’ve read almost all the books there. A few years ago we met an older gentleman at the nature center in Eastpoint. He talked a bit about being a ferry captain years ago and some other things about the history of the Bay. Anyway later I was reading that Voices of Apalachicola book and he was in it. We sort of got the in-person version of what was in the book. Small world down there.

+ +

+ + +

+ +

Thoughts?

Please leave a reply:

+ +

+ + +

+ +

+ + + + +

+ + + + + + + diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.txt b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7e0acdc --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/coming-home.txt @@ -0,0 +1,50 @@ +Coming Home +=========== + + by Scott Gilbertson + + Tuesday, 18 April 2017 + +I haven't accurately tallied it, but my guess is that we've spent nearly two months on St. George Island over the years. Enough time anyway, to make it feel a little like coming home when we get here. + +

+ +This also feels a bit like coming home, or at least returning to the beginning, because this is where we were when we decided to do this trip two years ago. It's also where we were when Corrinne found the bus on Craigslist. Yes, Corrinne found it. And yes, it took two years to get it restored. Tip for anyone reading this who's thinking, "man, I really want to restore an older RV/Trailer": make a budget for time and money and then double both. Then, just to be safe, double the money budget again. + +It took longer than we wanted, and there were some darker moments in those last two years when everything seemed impossible, but hey, we did it. We're here. Again. + +

+ +Ironically not in the bus though. Through all our visits to St. George Island we've always stayed in the same place, which is owned by some friends of the family. I tried to talk the girls into camping at the very lovely state park down at the east end of the island, but they wouldn't hear of it. It had to be the pink beach house. + +

+ +Fine with me actually. Gave me a chance to finish the last of the bus tasks I need to knock out to call it finished. I don't know why my wife just laughs now when I say I'm done. But really I am. The only thing left is getting a new water tank. Oh and the solar panels. And the house battery. And the ladder. And the roof rack. And the new awning. Cough. + +

+ +When we got here we were leaking transmission fluid pretty bad. I had my eye on a section of the transmission cooler hose that had been replaced with what looked like some cheap rubber hose. But I had promised the family I wouldn't spend the entire time on the island under the bus so I called around a bit and found a shop that was willing to take a look the following Monday. Good enough. I spent the next four days at the beach, hardly ever thinking about that hose, hardly ever having nightmares about failed gaskets that would require dropping the entire transmission. + +Instead we played in the surf, climbed the lighthouse, ate shrimp, fried up Grouper cheeks, cooled off with shaved ice and frozen lemonades, and tried to find a cool Piggly Wiggly t-shirt. In other words, we did what you do at the beach -- a whole lot of nothing. + +

+ +One day I spent the better part of an hour with the kids, digging up tiny little clams out of the wet sand behind receding waves. The Seashells of North America guide back up at the house told me later that the slightly larger, rainbow colored clams were Florida Coquinas, while the smaller, white ones were Gulf Donax. Both pop themselves out of the sand when they feel the vibration of crashing waves so that they're carried up and down the beach, always remaining at the edge of the tidal zone where we were sitting, digging in the sand. + +We dug up the Coquinas and Donax and dumped them on the surface of the sand to watch them suck themselves back down into the wet depth. Over and over we dug, then they dug. We started to root for different clams, trying to guess which one would disappear first. There was something hypnotic about watching them, something of the same appeal perhaps of things like frog races. I started to wonder what the clams must think, the ocean gone mad, surf pounding the shore and digging them up over and over again. Or maybe they're more seasoned than that, maybe they knew exactly what it is, fucking tourists. Or maybe they didn't need a why at all, maybe they just sucked themselves back down without a thought. Because it is there. + +On Monday we drove the bus up to Port St. Joe, which had the only mechanic that had met my criteria: shop out of the way, huge bay doors in Google Street View and not fazed by my slow sell of, "I got a dodge 318, with a 727, that's leaking transmission fluid..." "Well, bring it in." "Okay. One thing, it's got a 27ft motorhome attached to it, is that okay?" "How many feet?" "27." Pause. "That should be alright." + +Turn out to be... wait for it... transmission cooler hose. Sigh. But hey, it's fixed and I didn't miss any time with the kids at the beach. + +

diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.html b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..38663af --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.html @@ -0,0 +1,516 @@ + + + + + The Edge Of The Continent - by Scott Gilbertson + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

+ +

Home → + +
+ + jrnl + + +

+ + +

The Edge of the Continent

+ +

Edisto Island, South Carolina, U.S.

+ – Map +

+ April 4, 2017 + +

We follow the river, more or less, down out of the red Georgia mud into the Carolina coastal plain. It’s not always visible, but it is there, tracing a path down out of the hills and toward the sea.

We avoid interstates, even divided highways, sticking instead to the county roads, the thin gray lines on the map, many known only by local names, no number at all. Jones Rd. Thompson Bridge Rd. Stoney Bluff Rd. One blurs into the next as we pass down out of the tall Georgia pines, to mixed farmland, ever larger oaks and the first cordgrass hints of marsh.

In between are the occasional small towns, these days little more than scattered clusters of single wide trailers and abandoned downtown squares encircled by Popeye’s and dollar stores. Life out here feels bleak and hopeless to me. Or at least life as it is right now. Layers of peeling advertisements still clinging to collapsed billboards hint at time when it wasn’t like this.

I don’t know when it became like this out here, or even how widespread it is, but it feels widespread on this drive. We pass through several whole towns that quite simply aren’t there anymore. Just broken buildings and empty houses remain. It’s remarkable how fast the landscape reclaims what isn’t maintained.

The abandonment seems recent, within the last 20 years to judge by the advertisements still stuck inside windows here and there. But I imagine the decline started decades earlier. In fact there probably was no collapse at all. We always think things end suddenly, but with a few dramatic exceptions it seldom works out that way. Instead there’s just less and less year after year until one day the last family walks slowly out of town and disappears into somewhere else.

It’s become fashionable in the last couple of years for the big city glossies to send reporters out to places like this to do a lot of hand-wringing about what happened, what it all means. Very few seem willing to accept that maybe this is just part of the cycle of things. That there is no perpetual progress, that things rise up and eventually fall back down. If you think that cycle is something that only happens elsewhere, to other people, you need to get off the interstate.

The scene brightens a little as we pass into the Carolina lowcountry. The towns are older, they’re at different point in the cycle, having already declined and rebuilt several times. This is a land where people have been around long enough to get a better idea of what works and what doesn’t. What remains now is what has survived the cycles thus far, what has been pruned and honed.

Finally we dip down into the intertidal plain and the road becomes covered by massive Live Oaks dripping Spanish Moss. Poking above them you can see the tufted tops of the Loblolly and Long Leaf Pines. They look like pineapples on sticks thrust up into the sky.

It’s overcast, but never actually rains, which is good because I have no windshield wipers at the moment. I have a single wiper arm on the driver’s side¹ and a blade I bought at a truck stop that I’m hoping I can somehow attach, but I’m waiting for a good downpour before I tackle that project. Fortunately for me the weather holds all the way to the Edisto State Park campground.

We had been promising the kids that we’d be at the beach “soon” for about six months so we literally parked the bus in our campsite and headed straight out the beach. It was chilly, overcast and generally dismal, but no one cared. There was sand and sea and salt air and the weather really doesn’t much matter when you’re a kid and you have everything else.

There were birds to chase, sandcastles to build, dead jellyfish to investigate, shark’s teeth to gather, shells to collect and just barely enough daylight to even get started on it all before we had to head back and make dinner. Fortunately the next day was bright and sunny and apparently all you have to do if you want the shores of Edisto to yourself is show up before 11 AM.

+ +

Edisto beach, storm photographed by luxagraf

+ +

Edisto beach, storm chasing birds photographed by luxagraf

+ +

Edisto beach sunny photographed by luxagraf — When it’s sunny and nice I never remember to take pictures. This is the only image I have.

+ +

Edisto beach windy photographed by luxagraf

+ +

+
I recently noticed there’s actually a motor on the passenger’s side, though it has no arm and I have no idea if it works. A new motor and arm assembly that was recommended to me by another Travco owner goes for a cool $200. Not in hurry to drop $200 on a windshield wiper. ↩
+

Fauna and Flora

+ +

Birds
- Bald Eagle
- Belted Kingfisher
- Black Scoter
- Blue Jay
- Bonaparte's Gull
- Brown Pelican
- Carolina Chickadee
- Carolina Wren
- Double-crested Cormorant
- Eastern Phoebe
- Forster's Tern
- Gray Catbird
- Great Blue Heron
- Great Egret
- Hooded Merganser
- Northern Cardinal
- Pileated Woodpecker
- Red-bellied Woodpecker
- Red-headed Woodpecker
- Red-tailed Hawk
- Red-winged Blackbird
- Ring-billed Gull
- Ruby-crowned Kinglet
- Sanderling
- Tufted Titmouse
- Willet
- Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
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2 Comments

+ + + + + + +

+ +

+ Bennett + April 11, 2017 at 8:49 p.m. +

+ +

So… (markdown isn’t working for me)

I’m a wee bit jealous. No more breakdowns I assume? Just a road to nowhere.

There’s nothing like being on the road. With the road there is truly the feeling of being present. Casting all fears and uncertainties aside a person can throw themselves into the abyss, hold their breath and emerge with their brain completely re-wired.

Stay fearless…

+ +

+ Scott + April 12, 2017 at 9:24 p.m. +

+ +

@bennett-

I’m leaking transmission fluid at a rate that defies the possible in my opinion (doesn’t seem like there’s that much in there), but otherwise she’s running well.

For now. There will be breakdowns I’m sure, but for now at least, the road, the endless road.

(and what markdown didn’t work? I didn’t see any in your comment. It’s possible that it doesn’t render it for the preview, but it should work for the actual comment. Here, I’ll make something italic… seems to work…)

+ +

+ + +

+ +

Thoughts?

Please leave a reply:

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+ + +

+ +

+ + + + +

+ + + + + + + diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.txt b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8a07e0b --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/edge-continent.txt @@ -0,0 +1,42 @@ +The Edge of the Continent +========================= + + by Scott Gilbertson + + Tuesday, 04 April 2017 + +We follow the river, more or less, down out of the red Georgia mud into the Carolina coastal plain. It's not always visible, but it is there, tracing a path down out of the hills and toward the sea. + +We avoid interstates, even divided highways, sticking instead to the county roads, the thin gray lines on the map, many known only by local names, no number at all. Jones Rd. Thompson Bridge Rd. Stoney Bluff Rd. One blurs into the next as we pass down out of the tall Georgia pines, to mixed farmland, ever larger oaks and the first cordgrass hints of marsh. + +In between are the occasional small towns, these days little more than scattered clusters of single wide trailers and abandoned downtown squares encircled by Popeye's and dollar stores. Life out here feels bleak and hopeless to me. Or at least life as it is right now. Layers of peeling advertisements still clinging to collapsed billboards hint at time when it wasn't like this. + +I don't know when it became like this out here, or even how widespread it is, but it feels widespread on this drive. We pass through several whole towns that quite simply aren't there anymore. Just broken buildings and empty houses remain. It's remarkable how fast the landscape reclaims what isn't maintained. + +The abandonment seems recent, within the last 20 years to judge by the advertisements still stuck inside windows here and there. But I imagine the decline started decades earlier. In fact there probably was no collapse at all. We always think things end suddenly, but with a few [dramatic exceptions][1] it seldom works out that way. Instead there's just less and less year after year until one day the last family walks slowly out of town and disappears into somewhere else. + +It's become fashionable in the last couple of years for the big city glossies to send reporters out to places like this to do a lot of hand-wringing about what happened, what it all means. Very few seem willing to accept that maybe this is just part of the cycle of things. That there is no perpetual progress, that things rise up and eventually fall back down. If you think that cycle is something that only happens elsewhere, to other people, you need to get off the interstate. + +The scene brightens a little as we pass into the Carolina lowcountry. The towns are older, they're at different point in the cycle, having already declined and rebuilt several times. This is a land where people have been around long enough to get a better idea of what works and what doesn't. What remains now is what has survived the cycles thus far, what has been pruned and honed. + +Finally we dip down into the intertidal plain and the road becomes covered by massive Live Oaks dripping Spanish Moss. Poking above them you can see the tufted tops of the Loblolly and Long Leaf Pines. They look like pineapples on sticks thrust up into the sky. + +It's overcast, but never actually rains, which is good because I have no windshield wipers at the moment. I have a single wiper arm on the driver's side[^1] and a blade I bought at a truck stop that I'm hoping I can somehow attach, but I'm waiting for a good downpour before I tackle that project. Fortunately for me the weather holds all the way to the Edisto State Park campground. + +We had been promising the kids that we'd be at the beach "soon" for about six months so we literally parked the bus in our campsite and headed straight out the beach. It was chilly, overcast and generally dismal, but no one cared. There was sand and sea and salt air and the weather really doesn't much matter when you're a kid and you have everything else. + +There were birds to chase, sandcastles to build, dead jellyfish to investigate, shark's teeth to gather, shells to collect and just barely enough daylight to even get started on it all before we had to head back and make dinner. Fortunately the next day was bright and sunny and apparently all you have to do if you want the shores of Edisto to yourself is show up before 11 AM. + +

+ + + +[^1]: I recently noticed there's actually a motor on the passenger's side, though it has no arm and I have no idea if it works. A new motor and arm assembly that was recommended to me by another Travco owner goes for a cool $200. Not in hurry to drop $200 on a windshield wiper. + +[1]: /jrnl/2011/06/forever-today diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.html b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1bffd90 --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.html @@ -0,0 +1,627 @@ + + + + + Gulf Islands National Seashore - by Scott Gilbertson + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

+ +

Home → + +
+ + jrnl + + +

+ + +

Gulf Islands National Seashore

+ +

Gulf Islands National Seashore, Florida, U.S.

+ – Map +

+ April 25, 2017 + +

I could spend all day floating in the Gulf of Mexico. Coming from the Pacific I sometimes sneer at places without waves. Waves humanize the ocean, they give it rhythm, maybe even rhyme and reason. Especially big waves.

The Gulf though. It’s not much for waves, a little chop that tries to be wave like. Still, there is something utterly tranquilly magic about just floating there on your back, staring up the occasional Brown Pelican or tern hunting for fish.

+ +

Gulf Island National Seashore Fort Pickens Area photographed by luxagraf

+ +

Or at least it seems like it would be, unfortunately I don’t float for more than about five seconds. I do enjoy sit-floating in the shallows, watching the birds drift by overhead, especially Ospreys, which are in abundance around here. Having spent considerable time watching Ospreys over the last few weeks I’ve decided that, should I get the chance to have another go on this planet, I’d like to do it as an Osprey.

We ended up staying four extra days at the beach house in St. George Island. Some friends from Atlanta came down for the last couple of days and then we hit the road again, headed for the Fort Pickens area of Gulf Islands National Seashore.

I am, and will continue to be, an advocate of taking the back roads. However, there are exceptions and Florida’s 98 — not really a back road, but the only option other than I10 — is a horrid disaster of a road. It was so bad I’m not even going to describe it. I’ll just say that if I had it to do over again I’d take I10. Although I don’t know, Florida drivers are so consistently bad I’m not sure I’d want to see them going over 60. I’ve been to 45 states and Florida drivers are without question and by a very large margin consistently the worst drivers I’ve ever had the misfortune to drive among. I’ve also never seen so much garbage hurled from moving cars. Stay classy Florida.

1970s style sign for pensacola beach, FL photographed by luxagraf — Florida, where the 70s never stopped.

+ +

kids riding an old fashion store carousel photographed by luxagraf — You don’t see these much any more either.

+ +

Despite the horror of Florida roads and the drivers on them we did eventually though we made it to Gulf Islands National Seashore, which might be the prettiest beach I’ve been to in the U.S. It’s downright stunning, if you plunked me here I might guess I was in Thailand though the dunes provide a clue, the dunes are unmistakably Gulf coast barrier island dunes.

In some ways Gulf Islands is probably what St. George was like 60-70 years ago. Take away the houses and St George wouldn’t be all that different. St. George is darker though, more stars. I’ve never been anywhere on the east coast with more stars visible than St. George.

We ended up in a really nice partially shaded spot in the Fort Pickens campground, about a three minute walk from the shoreline. Not a mosquito to be found and steady breeze to keep things nice and cool. Approaching perfection.

+ +

boardwalk fort pickens campground photographed by luxagraf

The weather largely held too, we had couple days of clouds here and there, but that just meant we got the beach to ourselves. If you’re willing to put up with the occasional spit of rain, you can have an entire barrier island to yourself down here. Or at least it feels that way. I spent several hours on the beach one day with the girls and we didn’t see another soul.

+ +

Empty beach at gulf islands national seashore photographed by luxagraf

If all this sounds wonderfully Idyllic there is one, occasional, catch. This particular barrier island is right off the coast of Pensacola, home of a rather large naval air station, a rather large naval air station that happens to be home to the Blue Angels. Just down the road there’s an air force base that’s home to the Thunderbirds. Twice a week, two times a day, for the better part of two hours you get a free air show, whether you want it or not. We even got the see the Blue Angels flying in formation with the Thunderbirds, which I’m pretty sure doesn’t happen at air shows.

+ +

Blue angles practicing photographed by luxagraf

+ +

I have mixed feelings about watching 40 million dollar killing machines burn through millions more dollars in jet fuel for the sole purpose of entertainment, but the kids thought it was pretty cool. Or at least they were entertained until they noticed a Great Blue Heron that was going around to all the fishermen and women on the pier and trying to steal their fish.

+ + + +

Heron with fisherman photographed by luxagraf

+ + + + + +

+ + + +

+ +

I thought we had a close encounter with a Heron at the cabin the swamp, but that was nothing compared to this. This bird had no fear and seemed to barely care about our existence. It came within arms reach — and Great Blue Herons are very big birds — and just stared, craning its neck around, always keeping an eye on all the buckets of fish around the pier.

+ + + +

Great Blue Heron photographed by luxagraf

+ + + + + +

+ + + +

+ +

Fort Pickens itself is fairly uninteresting — big cannons, brick walls, people fighting, same old tired story — but the views from the top are nice.

+ +

View from the top of fort pickens photographed by luxagraf

+ +

photographed by luxagraf — Fort Pickens, war, blah blah blah, but on a long enough time scale life always wins.

+ +

We’re living with just a starting battery. Buying an isolator and house deep cycle battery is on the short list of things to do, but for now we have start up the bus every so often to make sure the starting battery doesn’t get too low. It gives me a chance to slowly acclimate the kids to riding in the bus.

going for a drive photographed by luxagraf — Going for a drive.

+ +

Fixing the bus photographed by luxagraf — Not sure where they got the idea, but fixing the bus is one of their favorite games now.

+ +

+ +

+ +

+ + + +

+ + +

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+ + + + + + +

4 Comments

+ + + + + + +

+ +

+ Drew Eldridge + May 01, 2017 at 3:01 p.m. +

+ +

Its time to get a super wide angle lens and capture some of those stars. So many possibilities open up at night. I love reading your adventures.

+ +

+ Scott + May 02, 2017 at 7:45 a.m. +

+ +

@Drew- That’s definitely on my list of things to figure out. I know nothing about astrophotography though, gotta do some research before we get out west to the really dark places.

I have a couple lenses that might work, a 20mm f/4 and a cheap Russian 12mm fisheye. The fisheye comes with a free softening filter for any aperture wider than f/11 :), but it might work.

+ +

+ Drew Eldridge + May 02, 2017 at 8:53 a.m. +

+ +

Its not difficult. Turn your ISO up as high as it will go. Even 3200 and 6400 work. Everything is grainy but its super dark and you cant tell.

Tripod

Use a delayed timer or a switch to fire the shutter. Set the 20mm up at about 25 seconds. Once you go longer than that you will get star trails (which can be awesome anyway).

Get a good (free) astro app for your phone. It will show you what you are looking at, where the milky way is, what time the milky way will be prime in your spot, etc.

+ +

+ Scott + May 02, 2017 at 10:00 a.m. +

+ +

@Drew-

Cool, thanks. That’s not too hard. I’ll give that a try. We’re on Dauphin Island right now, which isn’t super dark and has the offshore derricks lit up at night, but maybe I can get something to work.

+ +

+ + +

+ +

Thoughts?

Please leave a reply:

+ +

+ + +

+ +

+ + + + +

+ + + + + + + diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.txt b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b9052ec --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/gulf-islands-national-seashore.txt @@ -0,0 +1,76 @@ +Gulf Islands National Seashore +============================== + + by Scott Gilbertson + + Tuesday, 25 April 2017 + +I could spend all day floating in the Gulf of Mexico. Coming from the Pacific I sometimes sneer at places without waves. Waves humanize the ocean, they give it rhythm, maybe even rhyme and reason. Especially big waves. + +The Gulf though. It's not much for waves, a little chop that tries to be wave like. Still, there is something utterly tranquilly magic about just floating there on your back, staring up the occasional Brown Pelican or tern hunting for fish. + +

+ +Or at least it seems like it would be, unfortunately I don't float for more than about five seconds. I do enjoy sit-floating in the shallows, watching the birds drift by overhead, especially Ospreys, which are in abundance around here. Having spent considerable time watching Ospreys over the last few weeks I've decided that, should I get the chance to have another go on this planet, I'd like to do it as an Osprey. + +We ended up staying four extra days at the beach house in St. George Island. Some friends from Atlanta came down for the last couple of days and then we hit the road again, headed for the Fort Pickens area of Gulf Islands National Seashore. + +I am, and will continue to be, an advocate of taking the back roads. However, there are exceptions and Florida's 98 -- not really a back road, but the only option other than I10 -- is a horrid disaster of a road. It was so bad I'm not even going to describe it. I'll just say that if I had it to do over again I'd take I10. Although I don't know, Florida drivers are so consistently bad I'm not sure I'd want to see them going over 60. I've been to 45 states and Florida drivers are without question and by a very large margin consistently the worst drivers I've ever had the misfortune to drive among. I've also never seen so much garbage hurled from moving cars. Stay classy Florida. + +

+ +Despite the horror of Florida roads and the drivers on them we did eventually though we made it to Gulf Islands National Seashore, which might be the prettiest beach I've been to in the U.S. It's downright stunning, if you plunked me here I might guess I was in Thailand though the dunes provide a clue, the dunes are unmistakably Gulf coast barrier island dunes. + +In some ways Gulf Islands is probably what St. George was like 60-70 years ago. Take away the houses and St George wouldn't be all that different. St. George is darker though, more stars. I've never been anywhere on the east coast with more stars visible than St. George. + +We ended up in a really nice partially shaded spot in the Fort Pickens campground, about a three minute walk from the shoreline. Not a mosquito to be found and steady breeze to keep things nice and cool. Approaching perfection. + +

+ +The weather largely held too, we had couple days of clouds here and there, but that just meant we got the beach to ourselves. If you're willing to put up with the occasional spit of rain, you can have an entire barrier island to yourself down here. Or at least it feels that way. I spent several hours on the beach one day with the girls and we didn't see another soul. + +

+ +If all this sounds wonderfully Idyllic there is one, occasional, catch. This particular barrier island is right off the coast of Pensacola, home of a rather large naval air station, a rather large naval air station that happens to be home to the Blue Angels. Just down the road there's an air force base that's home to the Thunderbirds. Twice a week, two times a day, for the better part of two hours you get a free air show, whether you want it or not. We even got the see the Blue Angels flying in formation with the Thunderbirds, which I'm pretty sure doesn't happen at air shows. + +

+ +I have mixed feelings about watching 40 million dollar killing machines burn through millions more dollars in jet fuel for the sole purpose of entertainment, but the kids thought it was pretty cool. Or at least they were entertained until they noticed a Great Blue Heron that was going around to all the fishermen and women on the pier and trying to steal their fish. + +

+ +

+ +I thought we had a close encounter with a Heron at the cabin the swamp, but that was nothing compared to this. This bird had no fear and seemed to barely care about our existence. It came within arms reach -- and Great Blue Herons are very big birds -- and just stared, craning its neck around, always keeping an eye on all the buckets of fish around the pier. + +

+ +

+ +Fort Pickens itself is fairly uninteresting -- big cannons, brick walls, people fighting, same old tired story -- but the views from the top are nice. + +

+ +We're living with just a starting battery. Buying an isolator and house deep cycle battery is on the short list of things to do, but for now we have start up the bus every so often to make sure the starting battery doesn't get too low. It gives me a chance to slowly acclimate the kids to riding in the bus. + +

diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/index.html b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f6a7891 --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,119 @@ + + + + + Luxagraf - Topografical Writings: Archive + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

+ +

Home →
Journal →
2017 →
April

Archive: April 2017

Gulf Islands National Seashore + Apr 25, 2017 +
Coming Home + Apr 18, 2017 +
Swamped + Apr 10, 2017 +
Storming + Apr 06, 2017 +
The Edge of the Continent + Apr 04, 2017 +
April Fools + Apr 01, 2017 +

+ + + + +

+ + + + + + + + + diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.html b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a412a91 --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.html @@ -0,0 +1,439 @@ + + + + + Storming - by Scott Gilbertson + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

+ +

Home → + +
+ + jrnl + + +

+ + +

Storming

+ +

Edisto Island, South Carolina, U.S.

+ – Map +

+ April 6, 2017 + +

We woke up on our third day to cloudy skies and predictions of a massive storm. Seemed like a good day to head up to Charleston.

One of the downsides to camping at Edisto is that there’s no fresh water. The water table is too shallow, the sea gets in. There’s potable salt water, which works fine for showers and dishes, but if you want drinking water you have to lug your jugs down to the fire station, which apparently has the only deep well around this part of the island.

The only real problem this causes it that there’s no laundry at the campground. And if you have three kids in the sand and mud all day, you need laundry access pretty regularly. The nearest proper laundromat is in Charleston, and since we wanted to see the city anyway, especially Corrinne, who lived in Charleston for five years, we headed up to do laundry and walk around downtown a bit before the storm hit.

We managed to find a shopping center that had a laundromat, a hardware store, a pharmacy and a Thai restaurant, all our errands in one place, plus lunch. Then we headed downtown, took the kids over to see the rainbow houses and the battery park.

+ +

+ +

Then we got some ice cream and walked over to the Circular Church, which seemed unchanged since our last visit.

+ +

Circular Church graveyard photographed by luxagraf

+ +

We made it back to camp before the storm hit, but just barely. I gambled and threw some burgers on the grill and about two minutes later I lost, the deluge started. I had to race out and salvage what I could of the now soggy raw meat. We finished dinner on the stove and ate to the deafening downpour pounding on the fiberglass of the bus. There were predictions of golf ball size hail, but fortunately all we got was rain. And more rain.

The rain didn’t stop, nor did the more or less continuous thunder and lightning, for about 10 hours. It was a hell of a storm. Or so I’m told. I fell asleep amid the flashes and booms around 10. Corrinne was awake most of the night.

Surprising even me, the bus hardly leaked at all. A little water came in through a window track that was simply overwhelmed by the sheets of rain coming down, but even the leaks I know about didn’t seem to leak that night. Odd, but I’ll take it. My last thought before falling asleep was man, it would really suck to be in a tent right now.

bus decorations photographed by luxagraf — Bus decorations.

+ +

edisto environmental learning center photographed by luxagraf — It was very windy the day after the storm so we went down to the environmental learning center, which had some touch tanks.

+ +

directions in crayon photographed by luxagraf — We don’t need GPS, we always have very detailed directions.

Fauna and Flora

+ +

Birds
- Bald Eagle
- Belted Kingfisher
- Black Scoter
- Blue Jay
- Bonaparte's Gull
- Brown Pelican
- Carolina Chickadee
- Carolina Wren
- Double-crested Cormorant
- Eastern Phoebe
- Forster's Tern
- Gray Catbird
- Great Blue Heron
- Great Egret
- Hooded Merganser
- Northern Cardinal
- Pileated Woodpecker
- Red-bellied Woodpecker
- Red-headed Woodpecker
- Red-tailed Hawk
- Red-winged Blackbird
- Ring-billed Gull
- Ruby-crowned Kinglet
- Sanderling
- Tufted Titmouse
- Willet
- Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
+

+ + +

+ +

+ + + + + + +

+ +

Thoughts?

Please leave a reply:

+ +

+ + +

+ +

+ + + + +

+ + + + + + + diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.txt b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9cf037e --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/storming.txt @@ -0,0 +1,33 @@ +Storming +======== + + by Scott Gilbertson + + Thursday, 06 April 2017 + +We woke up on our third day to cloudy skies and predictions of a massive storm. Seemed like a good day to head up to Charleston. + +One of the downsides to camping at Edisto is that there's no fresh water. The water table is too shallow, the sea gets in. There's potable salt water, which works fine for showers and dishes, but if you want drinking water you have to lug your jugs down to the fire station, which apparently has the only deep well around this part of the island. + +The only real problem this causes it that there's no laundry at the campground. And if you have three kids in the sand and mud all day, you need laundry access pretty regularly. The nearest proper laundromat is in Charleston, and since we wanted to see the city anyway, especially Corrinne, who lived in Charleston for five years, we headed up to do laundry and walk around downtown a bit before the storm hit. + +We managed to find a shopping center that had a laundromat, a hardware store, a pharmacy and a Thai restaurant, all our errands in one place, plus lunch. Then we headed downtown, took the kids over to see the rainbow houses and the battery park. + +

+ +Then we got some ice cream and walked over to the Circular Church, which seemed unchanged since [our last visit][1]. + +

+ +We made it back to camp before the storm hit, but just barely. I gambled and threw some burgers on the grill and about two minutes later I lost, the deluge started. I had to race out and salvage what I could of the now soggy raw meat. We finished dinner on the stove and ate to the deafening downpour pounding on the fiberglass of the bus. There were predictions of golf ball size hail, but fortunately all we got was rain. And more rain. + +The rain didn't stop, nor did the more or less continuous thunder and lightning, for about 10 hours. It was a hell of a storm. Or so I'm told. I fell asleep amid the flashes and booms around 10. Corrinne was awake most of the night. + +Surprising even me, the bus hardly leaked at all. A little water came in through a window track that was simply overwhelmed by the sheets of rain coming down, but even the leaks I know about didn't seem to leak that night. Odd, but I'll take it. My last thought before falling asleep was man, it would really suck to be in a tent right now. + +

+ +[1]: /jrnl/2011/01/charleston-a-z diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.html b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b5978d8 --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.html @@ -0,0 +1,483 @@ + + + + + Swamped - by Scott Gilbertson + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

+ +

Home → + +
+ + jrnl + + +

+ + +

Swamped

+ +

Okefenokee Swamp, Georgia, U.S.

+ – Map +

+ April 10, 2017 + +

From Edisto we took a few back roads through the low country, headed south and west.

+ +

+ +

The winds left over from the storm made it a less than fully relaxed drive, which is to say I had both feet on the floor and both hands on the wheel. As always with wind my greatest fear wasn’t the wind, but my own accidental over-compensation for the wind.

It was all fine in the end, except for the part of the drive we decided to do on the interstate — passing through Savannah. What a boring thing driving on interstates. And American drivers these days… curious bunch, I’m somewhat surprised they all continue to live doing what they do every day. Maybe I’m just old, but I swear hardly anyone knows how to drive these days. And truckers are the only people who understand how things larger than a car move¹.

There’s actually a whole hidden communication system among truckers that I haven’t fully deciphered yet, but I recognize it now. A headlight flash here, a brake there. Nods and hat tips. I don’t pretend to know what it all means but it’s out there, happening all around you, unseen because you’re too low on the road. I get to see it, but I’m not sure I get to participate. The bus is big, but not that big. I’m twelve wheels short of that club.

We were headed for the middle of nowhere, but it was further than we wanted to go in a day. We’ve thus far kept our max driving under 200 miles a day. And frankly anything over two hours feels long. Just because we’re living in an RV doesn’t mean we want to spend all our time driving it. There’s no hurry to get anywhere after all.

In fact our destination in the middle of nowhere was mainly to pass some time. We’re not really reservations type of people, but sometimes you have to. And for Edisto we had to book way in advance. We also had to reserve the beach house we often rent in Florida ahead of time. The problem is that it worked out such that there were four days in between those two reservations.

This is a problem because, well, there just isn’t much in the South Georgia/North Florida region. Its swamp and farm land. Sometimes both, remarkably enough. In a casual conversation about this a while back we discovered that some friends of our family had a “cabin” down just west of the Okefenokee Swamp and said we were welcome to stay as long as we wanted. Sold.

We spent an interim night in one of those parking lot style RV parks at the end of the Altamaha River, an experience I am not going to comment on, save to say that everyone we talked to was very nice. The kids quickly made friends and had fun anyway.

We left early the next morning and drove north, around the top of the Okefenokee and down the west side. It was one of those drives where there wasn’t much traffic to begin with and then there was less and finally we drove at least 30 miles without seeing another car. Then we turned off that road onto a private dirt road where the only other allowed traffic was logging trucks. Several miles down that road we turned on an even smaller road, just two tire tracks really, and finally arrived at the cabin.

The middle of nowhere. Or the edge of the Okefenokee. Same thing really.

+ +

sunrise, pond outside fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

+ +

The cabin sat in the middle of a pine farm, backed up against a pond that was about a mile long and half a mile wide. I killed the engine and opened the door and it was… totally and completely silent. Still and quiet in a way I haven’t heard since I went snowshoeing in the Sierra Nevada in the dead of winter — so quiet the silence really is deafening. Your ears sound like they’re ringing even when they’re not.

Once your ears adjust it’s not quite so quiet. There are sounds in the swamp. The occasional calls of birds, a few cicadas chirping and every now and then a pig frog’s staccato, almost digital sounding croak. But if you’ve been sitting atop a 1969 Dodge 318 V8 for three hours the difference is a silence that’s nearly overwhelming. And even after four days in the cabin, there were still moments when you heard absolutely nothing.

It was glorious.

+ +

cabin interior, fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

+ +

+ +

Except for the part where it was in a swamp. I find swamps interesting in the way I find stamp collecting interesting, which is to say I recognize that some people really enjoy it and I love to hear them talk about it for a while, but it’s not really for me. I love to be in a swamp for a while, but by and large, I am not a swamp person. It is in fact the only ecosystem in which I find myself feeling distinctly ill at ease, out of place. Humans don’t seem to fit in swamps and, for me, just being there at all feels like violating some fundamental law of nature.

Fortunately the cabin came with a couple of canoes. I never feel quite so much at home as when I’m in a boat — no matter how small — and so the two things balanced each other out. I spent a couple hours a day on the water, just paddling the pond with the kids. Trying to sneak up and get a closer look at the alligators or trying to edge ever deeper into the thickets of cypress and water grass in search of herons, egrets, anhingas and the two very elusive wood ducks that would come all the way up to the patio/dock area so long as no one was around, but would flee deep into the inner sanctum of the pond the minute a door opened.

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olivia and lilah, fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

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pong outside fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

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Despite by best efforts and stealthiest paddling we never got anywhere near a gator, but I did manage to grab a feather left behind by one of the wood ducks.

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And there was no shortage of other animals around, sleek blue-tailed five-lined skinks, green anoles, carolina wrens, tiny pig frogs, great egrets, snowy egrets, great blue herons, and a sharp shinned hawk that screamed every time we went to the far side of the pond. There were supposed to be lots of snakes around too, we’d been warned to keep a close eye on the kids, but the only snake I saw was a tiny six-inch pigmy rattlesnake. Fortunately our close encounters with wildlife were limited to birds and mammals.

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frog in hand, fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

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pigmy rattlesnake, fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

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green anole, fargo ga photographed by luxagraf

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deer, fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

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One morning the girls and I were out in the canoe, slowly drifting into the one of several narrow, thicket choked channels when we flushed some kind of large bird we couldn’t quite make out.

I set the paddle down and we just drifted in silence for a minute until we slid deeper into the channel and came face to face with a black-crowned night heron. It stayed put, yellow legs wrapped tight around one of the upper branches of a dead cypress tree. It was was no more than 10 feet from the canoe and it stood there, stalk still, studying us with its huge red eyes, black head cocked slightly to the side. We stared at each other for a good five minutes, no one moving, no one talking. Then I slowly lowered in a paddle and pushed us back out again.

The birds weren’t the only close encounters we had either. White tailed deer came around regularly every day we were there. There was a trashcan full of dried corn on the back porch that served as feed for deer, raccoons, squirrels and anything else that wanted it. But the deer especially came around regularly at meal times looking for corn, which we’d fling out for them. They’d come around every morning while we ate breakfast and again in the evening when we at dinner. We ate watching them, they ate watching us. Mutual admiration society perhaps.

Later I got to thinking that maybe they weren’t watching us though. The cabin was really a hunting lodge, the vast majority of the decor was once living things shot, stuff and mounted on a wall.

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I’ve nothing a against hunting for food, but the whole notion of hunting as sport has always struck me a morally dubious. The most common dead thing on the walls of the cabin were deer and later I started thinking, maybe the deer were out there staring in, not at us, but at the heads mounted on the chimney behind us. Whatever the case, it certainly didn’t stop the deer from eating the corn. There is no moral code of the wild that includes passing up easy calories.

Explaining guns, hunting, death and lots of related topics to the kids added a wrinkle I wasn’t expecting to our time at the cabin, but we try not sugarcoat the world too much. The girls seemed mostly okay with the idea of hunting. They already know they’re eating animals when we have meat for dinner, so it wasn’t a great leap to explaining how that meat comes to be on your plate. I haven’t yet told them how the current practices of industrial farming work, which of course makes hunting seem not just okay, but downright saintly, but we’ll get there. Or we’ll take up hunting.

The other nice thing about having a cabin to stay in is that we could work on and organize the bus without upending our entire living area. And yes, we’ve already figured out enough about what works, what doesn’t and what we need to change and rearrange to warrant more or less unpacking the entire thing and re-organizing.

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The bus in fargo, ga photographed by luxagraf

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I also had time to finish up the plumbing so now the toilet flushes without needing to turn on the shower nozzle. And, much more exciting, we have, wait for it, hot water. Luxury living. The last bit of plumbing to do is tying the water tank we don’t yet own and water pump into the city water system, but I won’t be tackling that for a while.

I also went ahead and made the wiper blade work with the wiper arm. As much as I was looking forward to doing that in a hurry, at the side of the road, in the rain, I decided, meh, what the heck, I’ll do it ahead of time. This trip is turning me into a regular boy scout. Now if only I could find the source of the transmission fluid leak.

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When you pass a truck and cut over right in front of them, it is only by the grace of whatever god you believe in that you continue to exist. There’s no way the truck could stop in time if it had to; the way some people do it there wouldn’t even be time to hit the brakes before the truck drove over you. ↩
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Thoughts?

Please leave a reply:

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+ + + + + + + diff --git a/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.txt b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d6c23f9 --- /dev/null +++ b/bak/oldluxpages/jrnlold/2017/04/swamped.txt @@ -0,0 +1,100 @@ +Swamped +======= + + by Scott Gilbertson + + Monday, 10 April 2017 + +From Edisto we took a few back roads through the low country, headed south and west. + +

+ +The winds left over from the storm made it a less than fully relaxed drive, which is to say I had both feet on the floor and both hands on the wheel. As always with wind my greatest fear wasn't the wind, but my own accidental over-compensation for the wind. + +It was all fine in the end, except for the part of the drive we decided to do on the interstate -- passing through Savannah. What a boring thing driving on interstates. And American drivers these days... curious bunch, I'm somewhat surprised they all continue to live doing what they do every day. Maybe I'm just old, but I swear hardly anyone knows how to drive these days. And truckers are the only people who understand how things larger than a car move[^1]. + +There's actually a whole hidden communication system among truckers that I haven't fully deciphered yet, but I recognize it now. A headlight flash here, a brake there. Nods and hat tips. I don't pretend to know what it all means but it's out there, happening all around you, unseen because you're too low on the road. I get to see it, but I'm not sure I get to participate. The bus is big, but not that big. I'm twelve wheels short of that club. + +We were headed for the middle of nowhere, but it was further than we wanted to go in a day. We've thus far kept our max driving under 200 miles a day. And frankly anything over two hours feels long. Just because we're living in an RV doesn't mean we want to spend all our time driving it. There's no hurry to get anywhere after all. + +In fact our destination in the middle of nowhere was mainly to pass some time. We're not really reservations type of people, but sometimes you have to. And for Edisto we had to book way in advance. We also had to reserve the beach house we often rent in Florida ahead of time. The problem is that it worked out such that there were four days in between those two reservations. + +This is a problem because, well, there just isn't much in the South Georgia/North Florida region. Its swamp and farm land. Sometimes both, remarkably enough. In a casual conversation about this a while back we discovered that some friends of our family had a "cabin" down just west of the Okefenokee Swamp and said we were welcome to stay as long as we wanted. Sold. + +We spent an interim night in one of those parking lot style RV parks at the end of the Altamaha River, an experience I am not going to comment on, save to say that everyone we talked to was very nice. The kids quickly made friends and had fun anyway. + +We left early the next morning and drove north, around the top of the Okefenokee and down the west side. It was one of those drives where there wasn't much traffic to begin with and then there was less and finally we drove at least 30 miles without seeing another car. Then we turned off that road onto a private dirt road where the only other *allowed* traffic was logging trucks. Several miles down that road we turned on an even smaller road, just two tire tracks really, and finally arrived at the cabin. + +The middle of nowhere. Or the edge of the Okefenokee. Same thing really. + +

+ +The cabin sat in the middle of a pine farm, backed up against a pond that was about a mile long and half a mile wide. I killed the engine and opened the door and it was... totally and completely silent. Still and quiet in a way I haven't heard since I went snowshoeing in the Sierra Nevada in the dead of winter -- so quiet the silence really is deafening. Your ears sound like they're ringing even when they're not. + +Once your ears adjust it's not quite so quiet. There are sounds in the swamp. The occasional calls of birds, a few cicadas chirping and every now and then a pig frog's staccato, almost digital sounding croak. But if you've been sitting atop a 1969 Dodge 318 V8 for three hours the difference is a silence that's nearly overwhelming. And even after four days in the cabin, there were still moments when you heard absolutely nothing. + +It was glorious. + +

+ +Except for the part where it was in a swamp. I find swamps interesting in the way I find stamp collecting interesting, which is to say I recognize that some people really enjoy it and I love to hear them talk about it for a while, but it's not really for me. I love to be in a swamp for a while, but by and large, I am not a swamp person. It is in fact the only ecosystem in which I find myself feeling distinctly ill at ease, out of place. Humans don't seem to fit in swamps and, for me, just being there at all feels like violating some fundamental law of nature. + +Fortunately the cabin came with a couple of canoes. I never feel quite so much at home as when I'm in a boat -- no matter how small -- and so the two things balanced each other out. I spent a couple hours a day on the water, just paddling the pond with the kids. Trying to sneak up and get a closer look at the alligators or trying to edge ever deeper into the thickets of cypress and water grass in search of herons, egrets, anhingas and the two very elusive wood ducks that would come all the way up to the patio/dock area so long as no one was around, but would flee deep into the inner sanctum of the pond the minute a door opened. + +

+ +

+ +Despite by best efforts and stealthiest paddling we never got anywhere near a gator, but I did manage to grab a feather left behind by one of the wood ducks. + + + +

+ + +And there was no shortage of other animals around, sleek blue-tailed five-lined skinks, green anoles, carolina wrens, tiny pig frogs, great egrets, snowy egrets, great blue herons, and a sharp shinned hawk that screamed every time we went to the far side of the pond. There were supposed to be lots of snakes around too, we'd been warned to keep a close eye on the kids, but the only snake I saw was a tiny six-inch pigmy rattlesnake. Fortunately our close encounters with wildlife were limited to birds and mammals. + + +

+ +

+ + +

+ +

+ + +One morning the girls and I were out in the canoe, slowly drifting into the one of several narrow, thicket choked channels when we flushed some kind of large bird we couldn't quite make out. + +I set the paddle down and we just drifted in silence for a minute until we slid deeper into the channel and came face to face with a black-crowned night heron. It stayed put, yellow legs wrapped tight around one of the upper branches of a dead cypress tree. It was was no more than 10 feet from the canoe and it stood there, stalk still, studying us with its huge red eyes, black head cocked slightly to the side. We stared at each other for a good five minutes, no one moving, no one talking. Then I slowly lowered in a paddle and pushed us back out again. + +The birds weren't the only close encounters we had either. White tailed deer came around regularly every day we were there. There was a trashcan full of dried corn on the back porch that served as feed for deer, raccoons, squirrels and anything else that wanted it. But the deer especially came around regularly at meal times looking for corn, which we'd fling out for them. They'd come around every morning while we ate breakfast and again in the evening when we at dinner. We ate watching them, they ate watching us. Mutual admiration society perhaps. + +Later I got to thinking that maybe they weren't watching us though. The cabin was really a hunting lodge, the vast majority of the decor was once living things shot, stuff and mounted on a wall. + +

+ +I've nothing a against hunting for food, but the whole notion of hunting as sport has always struck me a morally dubious. The most common dead thing on the walls of the cabin were deer and later I started thinking, maybe the deer were out there staring in, not at us, but at the heads mounted on the chimney behind us. Whatever the case, it certainly didn't stop the deer from eating the corn. There is no moral code of the wild that includes passing up easy calories. + +Explaining guns, hunting, death and lots of related topics to the kids added a wrinkle I wasn't expecting to our time at the cabin, but we try not sugarcoat the world too much. The girls seemed mostly okay with the idea of hunting. They already know they're eating animals when we have meat for dinner, so it wasn't a great leap to explaining how that meat comes to be on your plate. I haven't yet told them how the current practices of industrial farming work, which of course makes hunting seem not just okay, but downright saintly, but we'll get there. Or we'll take up hunting. + +The other nice thing about having a cabin to stay in is that we could work on and organize the bus without upending our entire living area. And yes, we've already figured out enough about what works, what doesn't and what we need to change and rearrange to warrant more or less unpacking the entire thing and re-organizing. + +

+ +I also had time to finish up the plumbing so now the toilet flushes without needing to turn on the shower nozzle. And, much more exciting, we have, wait for it, hot water. Luxury living. The last bit of plumbing to do is tying the water tank we don't yet own and water pump into the city water system, but I won't be tackling that for a while. + +I also went ahead and made the wiper blade work with the wiper arm. As much as I was looking forward to doing that in a hurry, at the side of the road, in the rain, I decided, meh, what the heck, I'll do it ahead of time. This trip is turning me into a regular boy scout. Now if only I could find the source of the transmission fluid leak. + +[^1]: When you pass a truck and cut over right in front of them, it is only by the grace of whatever god you believe in that you continue to exist. There's no way the truck could stop in time if it had to; the way some people do it there wouldn't even be time to hit the brakes before the truck drove over you. -- cgit v1.2.3-70-g09d2