Day 109 – PA to OH. Punxsutawney Phil + Home Safely at Trip’s End

Sunday November 18th, 2018 (full photo album here)

I woke up, and we had a large breakfast after some all-important dog petting and corralling:

This was important because the truck needed some tender loving car, and also some hard love. The frustrating but hopeful reality… those check engine lights from the day before were all gone, we could not get them to come back, and could not narrow the lights and codes down to a source. [As explained in the previous post, this would not be fully resolved until January 2019.] At the time, it was positive – the truck seemed likely to make it home without hiccups, and that was great.

The pre-planned maintenance was the next order of business. I knew that the tires on my truck, with close to 67,000 miles on them, were VERY much in need of replacement. This process was made easier by Rick’s shop and the lift therein…

… but only when we got them off did I fully comprehend how bad the tread was, and on the inside edges in particular:

Not to put too fine a point on it: with all the weight I was carrying, and the intensity of those Canadian unpaved “roads” a week prior in Labrador… it is approaching miraculous that I did not have a flat tire on the entire trip. I had those extra 2 spare tires, so 2 weeks ahead of time I had Rick order 2 additional tires. We swapped those new tires onto the stock wheels, leaving me with 2 empty brand new wheels (plus the original, untouched spare tire), and then did a transmission fluid flush. The truck was ready for another grand trek. But I would have to settle for the relatively short road home to Ohio.

I wished Rick and his wife well and thanked them both again, deeply. I was looking at the sun disappearing over the horizon, and recognized that, try as I might to fight it, I would need to depart and therefore be on the final drive for my grand trek.

It seemed reasonable to capture a snapshot of those “mountains” closest to home, the foothills of the Appalachians, as I zoomed north and west:

I had the time and wherewithal to squeeze in one final thing to see, and it was a damned good one. After years of driving by it on my way to and from Washington DC for college, I was going to go and pay homage to the holy city of one of my favorite films of all time. I was going out of my way to visit Gobbler’s Knob in Punxsuatawny PA.

I knew, as the snow flew down over me and then the rain took over for its own shift… I knew I would get there far too late and without anything close to sufficient natural lighting to get a decent picture.

I did not care.

It took a bunch of tries, but I got a halfway decent photo in the drizzling sky’s tears, showing me with my color-matched sweatshirt and the official sign for the place:

Passers-by may have diagnosed me as crazy, as I ran back and forth to the camera to adjust it. They may well have been correct. I did not care. On the end of the trip which often felt as though it was going to keep going on forever and ever so long as I kept setting up that tent and then driving for hours the next day… I had visited the nexus of such eternal dispositions. I could go home, finally.

The final 3 hours of my trip passed by almost imperceptibly. The rain and fog intermixed themselves with sleet and sometimes a touch of snow.

 

On 11/18/2018, at exactly 10:35pm, I made it home safely. I reached this final stop with an odometer reading 67,831 miles; under my own power; with all of the gear still affixed to the truck, and some 4 months older and 40 years wiser. I was even nearly 45 lbs lighter than when I started. But these are all details, to be explored in the next summarizing post to come.

At that moment, I took a look at what I saw, and knew that I was home safely…

… and I had succeeded at my lofty, unreasonable goals.

Unpacking [of material goods, new ideas, worries and hopes] would happen later of course. For that moment, it was sufficient to take my CPAP and pajamas into the house with me. A bed and a desk awaited me, maybe a bit more dusty than when I departed…

… but things were different, somehow. Imperceptibly, in some ways and more blatant in others.

I was far too tired and scattered to do much of anything besides brush my teeth and then crawl into a bed NOT mounted atop a pickup truck.

I don’t think I needed to do too much more.

I had made it home, safe and sound. 109 days of trip, over 33,000 miles of driving. A continent explored, with a stroll into Mexico, all 13 provinces in Canada, and all 50 of the US states (with the federal District of Columbia thrown in for good measure!). Incredibly, I had set out to do something unreasonable and maybe unwise, and I had succeeded fully.

Behind me was a colorful and vibrant jaunt around the states AND the provinces.

Difficult to discern if I was walking from teethbrushing to bed with a newly earned swagger, or exhaustion-induced stumbling. I think the balance is tipped towards swagger, if the growing panache of my storytelling and conversations of the past months were any indication.

Analysis of any sort at the time was lost in a roiling sea of emotion.

I was home safely.

My grand trek was over and done.

Day 108 – NY to PA. 50 States Complete + Clocks Galore + Visiting a Friend

Saturday November 17, 2018 (full photo album here)

The blaring of my alarm to wake up hit like a truck; the recognition that this was the last full day of my grand trek… that hit like a second, larger, and more ornery truck.

Where in the hell had 107 days gone? What manner of magicks had transpired to transport me such an inordinate number of miles safely and with a tan gained and an aversion to freeze-dried food earned?

I knew the answer to ~none of these things.

I packed up and had a quick meal at a restaurant nearby. My early rise was a necessity, as I was going to try and make it to Columbia PA. More specifically, to the National Clock and Watch Museum.

There was an Exciting New Experience, though, before the successful arrival at the Museum.

On 11/17/2018 at 10:46am: I was 5 minutes away from the Pennsylvania border with New York. Therefore, I was 5 minutes away from successfully completing the original goal of my trip, to hit all 50 states in a row by myself. So, what happened? OF COURSE I had a Christmas tree’s worth of instrument cluster lights (check engine, ABS, traction control, and TPMS) all wink into being, casting their angry amber glow onto my disappointed visage. Gaze upon my instrument cluster woes and know despair:

The codes were accompanied by the engine revving a lot more, the transmission shifting very late given the highway speeds, and just making me uncomfortable with the notion of the unknown problem[s] happening as I hurtled south. At the same time: know as well that I was galvanized into perhaps the most resolute desire I will ever know in my life. Through gritted teeth (and equally gritted spirit), I could not help but shout in anger “I DON’T CARE IF THE TRUCK IS WRECKED AS A RESULT, I AM GOING TO ROLL ACROSS INTO PA UNDER MY OWN POWER.”

On 11/17/2018 at 10:51am: I rolled across the PA border under my own power, thus succeeding at the primary goal of my trip…

No kindly old lady was present to offer me a sewn Revolutionary War flag, but it was good to have made it into PA. It was better to have a welcome center and rest stop mere minutes later, to be able to get out and visually inspect the engine bay and underneath the truck; and also to scan for codes. That could wait.

First, I added the final sticker, Pennsylvania, to the tailgate:

This completed the United States…

… and thus balanced out the day prior’s completion of Canadian exploration in sticker form:

What a juxtaposition of emotions, in that snow- and slush-infested parking lot. SO EXCITED at having succeeded against all odds. And yet *SO INCREDIBLY FRUSTRATED* to have such a slew of problems pop up, still so far from home. ……. and yet and yet, I was thankful as all hell at this level of problems [editor: or, more accurately these implied problems] occurring within the USA and not, say, merely 5 or 6 days earlier on the intensely challenging Trans-Labrador Highway in the middle of nowhere in Canada.

Thankfully, my mechanic buddy Rick was able to talk me through a few other potential diagnostic options, all of which I tried. Two lines of conclusion:

• AT THE TIME: it is almost certainly a transmission or driveline-related sensor, passing faulty data, and the data is so far outside of the normal range that the engine computer AND transmission computer have put themselves into a limp mode. No way of visually diagnosing this, and my code reader gave me clues but nothing concrete. The truck was very likely to continue to run poorly (revving too high, delayed shifts, etc), but it would work well enough to safely make it.
• 3 MONTHS LATER, IN JANUARY 2019: in retrospect, and to make a very long and frustrating process worse… it turned to be the right rear wheel speed sensor, being intermittently faulty. It caused a total of 11 check engine and ABS codes, all because the truck was smart enough to know that “there is no way that one wheel is spinning at 120mph when the others are at 65mph” and also smart enough to protect itself by reducing the complexity of the systems in operation. It just wasn’t smart enough to recognize that the intermittent nature of the problem was that specific sensor (so it took a LOT of diagnostic sleuthing to figure the damned thing out).

Sigh.

I made my decision – I would drive as far as I could to my next stop. It would be just as expensive to be towed to Cleveland from northeast PA as it would be from southeast (in the worst case scenario). So I did it.

I rushed south until I was parking in the lot outside the National Clock and Watch Museum. I resolved to see as much as I could, and enjoy it. Many other pictures in the day’s album/enjoy the highlights below:

• Ancient timepieces, including those based on water drips:

• More grandfather clocks from more centuries than you ever thought possible:

• One of a kind clock-related novelties such as the so-called Eighth Wonder of the World:

• … there was a LOT more besides. I was dazzled by learning details of everything from the way in which daylight savings time emerged; to the realities of train conductors influencing time zones, and lot more besides. If ever you have the chance, please do go and visit that grand museum.

This was my last public venue visited on the trip, and I think it was rather fitting to have it be an edifice dedicated to time. My trek had seen me sample the varieties of time, many I had known before in my life, but also many new ones besides. Boredom can take on contours and dimensions which are mesmerizing. And, even so, I had discovered that some of the most productive times in my life were enabled by that level of extended boredom. Driving along the splendor of nature for such a long time that it almost became mundane were rendered all the more poignant when I rounded a curve and involuntarily sat up straighter in my seat, struggling to incorporate the newest unbelievable beauty into my disbelieving eyes. I cannot fully explain it (neither at the end of the trip in 11/2018, nor at time of writing this post in 3/2019). But nevertheless, it was the leavening of time spent, time to soak in, time survived. This trip was my own safari through time and a chance to better understand my willingness to accept the strictures of it. The trek had of course involving me traveling through a LOT of space, mile upon mile upon mile.

And those miles were not quite done. I got onto the road, and took the time to soak in the final sunset, in my last state, on the last full day of the trip away from home:

Speaking of my mechanic buddy Rick, earlier? It was to his house, in Waynesboro PA, where I was headed to that final evening of the trip. I was going to visit him, his wife, and their beloved dogs.

Eventually, I rolled into their driveway, and with a great sense of relief turned my truck off for the second time that day. I went inside, out of the cold, and was warmed by their hospitality and the symbol of their house as my having made it… somewhere. I was not yet home, and I still had undiagnosed truck concerns. But I had made it to a place I knew, with people I care about and who looked after me. It helps that Rick is a master mechanic, who would be able to lend me a second set of eyes on the problems afoot.

I had made it.

I got to bunk indoors, which was much obliged (with such a cold night, so much exhaustion leading to a thoroughly ragged immune system, and home life to soon try to reenter). Sleep came rather quickly, and I was glad of it. I did not want to worry about the trip ending, but rather just live into the time as it was unfolding.

I had made it.

Day 107 – NU to ON to NY. Flying South + Finishing all of Canada + 49 States Down…

Friday November 16th, 2018 (full photo album here)

[Editor’s note – as described in the previous post, I had actually squeezed in a LOT to the morning before departure from Iqaluit. I will still catalog a few of things here, but to get the whole story you will need to read Day 106 as well]

Up and at ’em.

Rachel was gracious enough to pick me up and take me around to various sites, from the “Road to Nowhere” to the other and unlabeled road to nowhere, both of which disappeared into a white and snowy wasteland. I could live there for the rest of my life, in some ways. We zipped around and she even got in a stop at her final work site for her business trip.

Then, it was time to drive to the airport, take in the sub-Arctic rainbow over the runway…

… and head inside the terminal. With only 2 gates, there was not a lot of space for Inuit artwork, but they made judicious use of the larger flat surfaces with excellent works:

Only 2 gates = only a handful of television screens with flight information – it was officially chilly all across Nunavut that morning!

With the sea frozen, and especially with the idiocy of teenage arsonists having burned down the food warehouse, the only way to bring in supplies (the modified front portion of the passenger planes, turned into an easy-access cargo hold) was higher priority than getting us paying customers onto the plane. Still, it was pretty cool to watch the hatch open like the gull-wing door on a DeLorean:

Maybe the most important moment in Canada for me was next – I got to wear shorts in around -15 degree F wind-chill, as I walked to the plane on the tarmac. Rachel surreptitiously snapped evidence of my (stylish) boots-and-shorts combo, and I got the satisfaction of Inuit people and Canadians shoveling their jaws off the asphalt when they saw me in that bitter and cold wind. Perfect:

My seat turned out to be right behind the cargo bay, and that wall was surprisingly poorly insulated. My cojones in wearing shorts for the walk made for an unpleasant flight, but there were two consolation prizes. Neither of them took the sting out of the highway robbery pricing for tickets to fly, but the warmed and gooey chocolate chip cookie was good…

… and the hot chocolate was great:

Even better – my seat was by itself so I was able to lean over and get some FANTASTIC photographs of the barren wilderness in its splendor and glory:

Eventually, that flight heading straight south reached Ottawa International Airport and my chilly legs were afforded a chance to debark. I walked into the terminal from the tarmac (always a weird experience) and gathered up my belongings. I wished Rachel the very best, trying my best to convey my gratitude at her having driven me to the places I would not have reached otherwise (and for becoming my friend). With a hug, she was off towards her next flight to get home. I was off towards the parking lot.

Or, rather, I tried to go that way. “Young man! YOUNG MAN!!” I turned, discerning from the voice that at 30 years of age, I could still qualify for that moniker. I turned around and eyed the source of that call. An elderly Inuit woman, who I recognized as someone who had been on the flight down from Iqaluit, caught up with me. She looked me right in the eye, and in perhaps the most unexpected pagan blessing I will ever receive, she told me the following:

“Young man, you should thank whichever hunter caught the seal you ate,” she explained, looking down from my eyes at my still bare legs, then back up at my eyes. “That hunter was very good, as you ate the flesh of that seal and gained its strength and spirit. That is the only way you could handle the cold, in those short pants.”

I was taken aback, and for a split second I suspect that my confusion played across my face. It was abundantly clear to me that she was entirely sincere – her religious explanation for my incomprehensible choice in wearing shorts was her best guess at trying to understand. In one fell swoop, I got a pagan omen in favor of my ever growing sense that perhaps I should move to Alaska for a few years in the shorter term (to make use of my inner spirit of the seal, you see); and also was blindsided once again by the satisfaction which is possible from interacting with a total stranger in a positive way without any sort of saccharine reference to social media likes or following or other disingenuous “connection” which is not really there.

What is life, if not a series of brief encounters by chance? Invigorating, then, to just have a chance meeting and a smile at the joy of those positive times in life which can be neither planned for nor expected.

I recovered from my confusion, and thanked her for her kind words indeed. I wished her well in the comparative warmth of Ottawa.

Then I walked outside and ran into “neither planned for nor expected” many inches of snow had fallen and encrusted my truck. This time, unlike up in Labrador, I did not have a hotel concierge to loan me a broom to try and clear the truck…

… so one of many tools crammed into the truck came to my rescue. A tiny and flimsy cheap handheld broom (for use with dustpan), to Bob Ross my way out of snowy truck encrustation:

My work of art took a while, but I got it done. I always do.

The truck was warmed up enough to put a very satisfying address into the GPS. The home country. But after such a long day of Nunavut adventuring; a chilly flight; and an Inuit blessing in an international airport… I was going to drive back down into those United States.

First, though, I *completed* the Canadian map on my tailgate, adding both Ontario and Nunavut. What a rush:

The next “rush” was me, following the speed limit all the way down to the border with New York state. Google Maps (what I ended up switching to, after a construction traffic snarl) was nice enough to offer me a personal welcome as I blazed back across to the land of franchises, litigation, and decency-gridlocked-by-headache.

The US of A:

The exhaustion, on schedule, had set in. I was in no shape to look for a campground but I did at a fuel stop. Nothing free near me, it was past midnight and I was burned too many times in the south by “show up and hope to pay in the morning, to find a locked gate barring my entry” so that option was out. I did that unpleasant calculus of “too tired to keep going, but no hotel near me, but need to make distance” – by this point in the trip, I was an expert. The equation spit out “somehow make it to the La Quinta of Johnson City, NY” and so I did it.

The night clerk was friendly, looked about half as tired as I felt, and inquisitive as to what brought me to Johnson City at such a late hour. I think I mumbled something semi-intelligible, it may have even been in English. I couldn’t tell you what it was. That room in my memory is a blur, as I stumbled in, set up my CPAP on muscle memory alone (my vision was faulty by that point) and I passed out, 1500 miles from where I woke up.

Day 98 – ME to NB to PEI. Bridges + Borders + Beaches

Wednesday November 7, 2018 (full photo album here)

The Canadian border beckoned and was within reach. Game on.

I had me a very early start into a surprisingly warm day at 55 degrees around 7 in the morning. I wished Mark and Terry the very best, and thanked them for their hospitality. Between a chance at shower and laundry; a warm bed; entertaining discussion; and a short breather, I was well-suited for the race ahead of me. I took in the beauty of their yard…

… and got on the road. A fuel-up was followed by a LOT of winding Maine roads, which eventually led me to the Penobscot Bridge. I had previously photographed it during a Nor’easter, the last time I went through Maine (which is when I got to meet Mark and Terry in person for the first time) and I am proud to report that I got an even doofier face for this photo, thanks to the angle of the sun:

Great success! Not falling ice shards to dodge this time, either, so it made for an easier crossing. I continued weaving my way north along US Highway 1 towards Calais to cross into New Brunswick.

My memory of the obscenely expensive fuel in western Canada did not have me fooled for a second about the potential for cheaper fuel in eastern Canada. I stopped in Calais, topping off the truck and refilling all 24 gallons of jerry can capacity for the first time since the Yukon Territory – the extra weight was well worth the extra weight. This level of thinking about fuel consumption and costs was forward-thinking and also fear-inspiring. I had carefully tracked and logged fuel consumption for months and so I was all too familiar with beaucoup spacebucks being spent on diesel for my oil-burner. And, at the same time, I am also fully confident that these costs in time, fuel, gear, and stress are all worth every iota of value for the outcomes in my heart, mind, and spirit.

Fueled up and ready to rock and roll. Arriving at the Canadian border, I managed both of those, but not the way I wanted – I hit the rock of polite Canadian border police “well even though you have the paperwork from Western Canada, and even though you’re clearly camping, and even though you plan to camp in areas of Labrador and Quebec which are crawling with bears… you aren’t allowed to bring that shotgun into eastern Canada.” Subsequently, with a scowl and the grumble of my truck’s engine matched in volume and timbre by the grumble in my voice, I was forced to roll back into the United States. I managed to extend my scowl when there was a bunch of hullabaloo about the shotgun I had with me (again, in spite of having the proper American paperwork too) until a uniformed border patrol officer wandered over and conversationally quipped “wait, he is back? I just saw him rumbling into Canada 15 minutes ago!” That simple statement got me sped through – funny how that works.

At the advice of the Canadian border patrol officer I turned around and went over to Johnson’s True Value Hardware. For problems just like mine, and also given the remoteness of this small town, the hardware store included a small sporting goods shop (including a federal firearms licensed dealer, or FFL) and a bank of PO Boxes with an associated shipping department. Condensed into simple form, this meant that I had a place where I could ship the shotgun back home – specifically to the firearms shop nearest my house, where my old friend Mark works. I rushed in to the store like a cyclone hopped up on too much coffee, excitedly trying to explain that I needed to ship out a firearm to Ohio and quickly. Not a lot of steps, just 1) ship a firearm and 2) to Ohio, quickly. The store was very busy but eventually I impressed the alacrity required by step 2 until I got to speak with the person who could effect the paperwork needed for step 1. They packaged it up in a box which could hold the existing soft case and added the specialized label which all the various shipping carriers require to ship firearms. I thanked them and cyclone’d my way back out to the truck. All told, I had lost almost 2 hours because of the border shenanigans and then requirements to get the shipping set up. A small price to pay compared with having found no FFL and shipping option right near the border.

Entering eastern Canada, round 2 – this time I had no issues crossing into New Brunswick. I think it may have been the fastest of any border crossing all trip, either into or out of Canada. Just like that, I was facing a friendly Canadian welcome sign and friendly Canadian speed limit signs in their fake units of measure:

I got about a mile from the border and found a roadside pull-off where I could safely exit the vehicle for that most important of choices – adding a sticker onto a tailgate, regardless of weather:

My grin of satisfaction was so wide that I couldn’t help but get a picture of it (especially after a jaw sore from grimacing at the afternoon’s border frustration), but for the requisite full picture of the updated map:

Now the open road beckoned anew. Now, the truck rumbled up to cruising speed and stayed that way for a good bunch of hours. As per usual the sun began to set. Slightly less typical was seeing the skies turn into a veritable Mordor’s worth of Sauron’s angry red smoke:

All told, it was maybe the ideal afternoon: adoring the gorgeous views; surprised at the unseasonably warm weather at 50 degrees; annoyed that my 75 minute delay to cross the border had burned daylight; but OK with the outcome.

I was zooming along the increasingly rough (and therefore normal) Canadian highways – I was, after all, trying my damnedest to reach the Hopewell Rocks park on time to see them in the last smidgen of daylight. To make a short story shorter, I failed. I got there after dark and decided that the ~1.2 million signs warning about the treacherous beach and tide were serious enough to pay attention to – this is as close as I got to the invisible, fog-shrouded sea:

As I subsequently discovered, this would turn out to be the first of many experiences with the attractions of Eastern Canada being closed for the season since October 15. The frustration I felt would ramp up over time, but that evening it was particularly high (ruefully remembering ~2 hours wasted at the border).

My consolation prize: a very quick bout of astrophotography across the New Brunswick horizon, before the cold rain and heavy clouds got the last laugh:

A bit of behind-the-scenes view of setting up the camera atop the tent platform and focused on the depths of interstellar emptiness (with a single star my cellular camera was gutsy enough to manage to capture, too!):

I had, at the handful of stops along my way, tried my very best to find a free camping area in New Brunswick near the bridge to Prince Edward Island (PEI). I failed. I tried to find paid camping in that area and it was either non-existent or closed for the season. Drat.

I decided to cross the famous Confederation Bridge to PEI at night in the fog, and I never like crossing bridges – this was no exception. But I made it across and rolled up to the Jellystone Campground, which per their website seemed to be open. That was false – I was exhausted and out of options. I settled in at their neighbor, the Carleton Motel of PEI. Sleep was quick, as I had a ~14.5 hour day of travel behind me.

Although this sticker’ing picture was taken the next morning, I felt I earned portraying it on the day I reached PEI:

Day 97 – Wooden Sailing Ships + Visiting Friends in ME

Tuesday November 6, 2018 (full photo album here)

My land ship, the Titan, had served me incredibly well thus far. I had enjoyed learning about and visiting steel ships and submarines in Hawaii. I was excited to go a step back and learn about wooden ships at the last place there were built in the United States, in Maine. Among a slew of other fascinating facts – there were wooden ships used extensively during World War I and even in the very earliest part of World War II due to tonnage deficits amongst shipping companies.

What else did I see there, at the Maine Maritime Museum? A slew of things, including:

• models and drawings of the Wyoming, which was the largest wooden schooner ever built (done on site):

• a chance to marvel at the artistic sculptural scale model of the Wyoming, on site in the exact spot where it was laid and built:

• a model of the shipyards as they looked when they were shut down for the final time:

• a replica lighthouse interior with everything in place besides the mercury “bearings” to allow the light to spin freely (and is likely related to why a few generations of lighthouse keepers were stereotyped as being reclusive and overly peculiar, akin to “mad hatters”):

• an extensive exhibit on how Maine developed alongside oceanic trade and survival, and eventually was integral to the triangular trade which saw the colonies grow (richer and also more divided over slavery from early on):

• a series of iconic newspaper cartoons relating to the USS Maine and US expansionism…

• … and well as artifacts including some salvaged from the wreck itself, in Havana Bay:

• a detailed and flat-tired VW Bug and/or lobster mascot, outside of a piercing look into the realities of the ever-more carefully regulated lobstering business alongside changing (worsening for this industry) environmental conditions:

• the on-site (and sponsored) Bath Iron Works exhibit, for one of the major American shipyards operating for the production of destroyers and similarly-sized ships (which was located within eyesight, down the river):

… OK, there was a lot more, besides. The photo album has details. I had a grand old time learning A LOT of interesting facts. One more – the Soviet Union used to park “factory ships” off the coast of Maine to purchase much-needed fish for their all-too-often starving peoples. The Maine-fishery/Soviet connection was a new one to me. I highly recommend checking out the museum if ever you are in that part of Maine.

Next stop: visiting with an old friend, Mark. At his suggestion, we met up at Moody’s Diner in Waldoboro Maine, to have dinner. I know Mark because of the forums for my old VW diesel (like his, except his were amazingly well-kept – he had over 440,000 miles on one of them!) – and during a winter camping trip to Maine, he gave me a HUGE amount of help with that VW. This time around, I was glad to buy him some dinner and show him my current diesel truck, to his delight. A great time catching up.

And then, just like the last time I came through the area, Mark and his wife Terri were so gracious that they offered me a chance to stay with them for a night, to use the shower, the laundry, and not be in the tent in the cold rain. I gladly accepted and followed him back to their home in the woods. We enjoyed chatting for a good long while, and eventually their jobs required them to get some sleep (as did my knowledge of the border crossing ahead of me for the next day).

The truck has been photographed in many ways, but not often with a building as a monument to the graciousness and hospitality of good and decent people in the background. While the floodlight on the house is a more likely candidate for the source of those beams of light… it is possible that I managed a photographic record of the beams of radiant wellness created by good and decent people:

Maybe both, in this case.

Day 96 – Resting in Portland Maine

Monday November 5, 2018 (full photo album here)

Albeit a day off for the Christian way of figuring things (2 days late for Jewish calculations, and 3 days for Islamic calculus), I had myself a nice little sabbath on a Monday. The plan was to go and see things, visit places, and enjoy myself – then I realized I was slightly feverish and not interested in getting sick. Bedrest, my internal unqualified doctor ordered – and the hotel staff wasn’t going to argue with another night of pay.

The top priority was not my healing, but that of the tent – I had to hope and pray really strenuously that 1) the ambient air temperature would get and stay above freezing; and 2) that the rains would hold off. The sodden tent had sat, covered and zipped up, for over 48 hours. While there are drains on the tent platform, and the black cover gathers extra solar warmth to perhaps (in my mind, at least) cook off the water in the canvas more quickly… I wasn’t excited to see how wet the tent still was.

One can imagine my surprise, then, to pop the cover off and find the tent partially frozen shut:

Not too frozen, though – I was able to muscle it open (with the permission of the hotel staff, as much as they were skeptical of what I described) to get it to dry a bit. Maine’s oceanic winds were obliging enough, picking up a bit with a breeze. I had a chance to add Maine, the second last of these United States, to my sticker map:

Then I had a hotel staff call asking me to move the truck to the back lot. They would not give me a straight answer – but whether it was fears of looking like a person sleeping in the parking lot or bringing unwanted attention of some other sort, I went ahead and moved to the back lot. I got the tent back up and eyed the weather forecast – rain was coming. I took a last look at the blue rain fly which had served me well for months of travel:

After some guesswork, some reaching far over the edges of the truck, and maybe a bit of creative swearing, I managed to get the extreme weather cover onto the tent, thus removing the ~~bright orange eye-popping~~ nature of the tent in favor of a vaguely military grey type of space blanket material:

At the time, I knew I would get into some mighty cold weather as I got further north. [Editor’s note: only as the trip continued did I learn that eastern Canada just closes for business in October, when it comes to camping… so this ended up being superfluous.]

The rest of the day? Reading and lounging, and then a couple of films at day’s close.

This was the last smidgen of rest on a driving day that the trip would see. Of 14 days ahead, only a portion of 1 of them would have moments to rest and breathe.

Bring it on.

Day 95 – VT to NH to ME. Ben and Jerry’s + Kancamagus Highway + Antique Automobiles

Sunday November 4, 2018 (full photo album here)

As suggested in the preceding post: ice cream for breakfast.

Ice cream.

I packed up, used the warmth of my breath to get the tailgate cartographic tableau for the newest entry, and then followed up with the warmth of yeti hands (warmer than the average bear’s) to ensure good sticker’ism [Editor’s note – yes, I am going to see how many compound pidgin English words I can get away with in this blog] and so Vermont was official:

I quickly packed up and vaulted myself over to Ben & Jerry’s, and this time secured a spot on a tour. After seeing a poster for their newest flavor…

… I went through the tour, ending up in the taste test room to enjoy a limited batch of S’mores ice cream from the preceding summer. While also eying a leftover poster from an April Fool’s long past when they had cooked up a genuine batch of broccoli and cheddar-flavored ice cream for that day only – but actually gave it out as the day’s tour samples to anyone brave enough. More interesting still was a vague reference to still more esoteric and questionable flavors which had been tested in the kitchen by staff only and then thrown away forever. The conspiracies involved in ice cream flavor development never fail to intrigue.

Filled with ice cream and satisfaction, I set my course through New Hampshire towards Maine.

I was saddened to learn that the extreme weather on Mount Washington was extreme enough to warrant early closure for the season. Between being legally closed and the tires on the truck being FAIRLY worn down after so many miles preventing me from even considering a trial run… I let that destination float gently onto the heap of “places encountered on the trek but saved for a future visit.”

Instead, I opted for the famous scenic byway known as the Kancamagus Highway. First step: cross over the border into New Hampshire itself:

This is the Bath Bridge, at the start of the Kancamagus Highway, a historical metal bridge and another small boost to my inner engineer scrabbling to take over and reorient my life:

Artifice on display was followed by a slew of increasingly intense curves in the road, until I had reached the umpteenth national forest encountered on my trek. The White Mountain National Forest:

I am no scientist, but if I had a picture of my grin next to each of the progressively more full “rear sticker map” photos – I am thinking that my grin would proportionally grow with the size of each sticker added.

Along this beautiful and treacherously squiggly scenic byway, I happened upon the town of Woodstock NH and saw a collectibles shop with some VERY odd cars in the lot, and it was enough to make me take a second look and see that it was a combination collectible shop/antique auto museum. Huh. Peculiar enough to stop? Yep.

The cars in the lot were approximately the right size to fit into each of my pockets (and one of them had only 3 wheels):

Of the varied interesting and unique cars inside, I think the 1927 fire truck with accompanying sign was the most compelling story-in-a-car, especially “not for sale” as a tagline:

They do not have a website, but it is the collectibles + auto museum in Woodstock NH. I do not think you’ll find a different and incorrect place like there (but if you do, it would be worth a stop, as well). Check out other cars and gadgets in today’s photo gallery. Glorious.

Next stop was for lunch at the Gypsy Cafe of Lincoln NH. There, I thoroughly enjoyed a hot cider toddy alongside a starter of grilled cheese with apricot jam fondue; and then a “Moroccan bus lunch” of lamb meatballs in a tomato sauce. My goodness gracious it was delicious. It was the late lunch/early dinner food equivalent to the golden views as I departed Lincoln into the grip of fall:

The sun began to retreat towards a horizon increasingly jagged – those White Mountains and their foothills showing off from afar. And yet – the further the sun retreated, to more I was treated to the purple mountain majesty of yore.

Even more importantly, my yeti soul was refreshed by encountering my favorite form of precipitation, albeit in stored on the ground format:

Down the other side of the mountains, I found purple mountains giving way to ************purple******* water, which I did my best to capture in this fast-flowing stream format along the side of the byway:

Nature, thou art beautiful and frightful in equal measure.

In another uncharacteristic-for-me choice, in lieu of driving all the long way to Acadia National Park (which would necessitate too many driving hours in the dark in moose-infested Maine after an already-long day)… I settled on a shorter drive to the greater Portland ME area and a hotel in the very cold weather. I was exhausted, on Day 95 of what would be 109 days of trip. Coughing was starting in small fits, and I knew it would only get colder (especially as Iqaluit, a few weeks hence, would be only slightly sub-Arctic!). Gladness, then, was my mood as I chose to pull into that south Portland Super 8. I knew I needed to aim for some relaxing.

Day 94 – NY to MA to VT. Dr Seuss Museum + Fossils + Ice Cream (almost)

Saturday November 3, 2018 (full photo album here)

I didn’t have the heart for the morning’s rainy photo to be posted here, because it was inundated with water and so was I. And the tent, outside and inside. Finally, for the first time all trip, the force of the rainy inundation for an entire evening with high winds was enough to soak the tent so thoroughly that a few segments of the interior got wet. For 93 days of intense travel and camping across multiple time zones and seasons and countries, well, I am willing to be OK with that.

I did one of my least favorite things (packed up a wet tent) and then one of my favorite things (cold Modern Apizza for breakfast). It balanced out as an even entry in the old ledger.

Another bit of retracing my tracks was ahead – back along I90 to Springfield Massachusetts. This time, though, I had a cloud’s worth of fog to make it a more spicy drive:

Challenge accepted.

After some time, I rolled off of the Mass Pike (which features pilgrim hats on their interstate signs, almost as delightful as Washington state featuring a side profile of George Washington’s head on their signs!) and into Springfield. I was there to see not one, but the whole set of the Springfield Museums:

Not enough time to stop everywhere with that expensive all-in-one-ticket in my pocket, but I did enjoy a few aspects of the Natural History museum, like:

• the alien-looking minerals on display:

• a cast of the only fossils every discovered (locally) of a particular species:

• a surprisingly intact fossilized crab:

The other and arguably more important of my visits on site, though, was the Dr Seuss Museum. Among many other moments of satisfaction for me and my childhood self, I saw:

• A slew of Geisel’s (Dr. Seuss’) hand-drawn cards, envelopes, and other illustrations:

• Geisel’s easel, chair, phone, and other drawing room items as preserved:

• “Oh the places you’ll go” in color lived format:

• “Unless” in the bronzed Lorax format:

• The bronze memorial garden and book-ified version of “all the places you’ll go” also seemed fitting for me on this particular trip:

A lot of lovely exhibits and dazzling facts and artifacts from Geisel’s life (and a lot of them very thoughtful and balanced on more touchy subjects). I wish I could have had more time. So it goes.

I positively ran out to the parking lot, added Massachusetts onto the truck…

… and started to fly up Interstate 91 into Vermont. My mission, in this instance, was to try and make it to Ben & Jerry’s on time for a tour. Mind you, I have done in twice in my life (once as a kid with family, and then a second time while camping in Vermont during my time at Yale). I also *adore* ice cream, and so I think this was a very reasonable (important!) aspect of my grand trek. Once again immersing myself in the vagaries of producing super premium ice cream (a category I only learned about earlier in 2018, as part of a case study in a business course at Harvard). Learning is not important.

Ice cream.

Along the way I got a glimpse of the fall in lower Vermont:

Unfortunately, my zippy pursuit of the ice cream tour was unsuccessful. I got half of the formula correct – reaching it on time (unlike all my attempted Rhode Island experiences). The other half, reaching them with unsold tickets, I did not manage to do. So tomorrow morning would be an ice cream bonanza and that is just fine. But just in case – I got a sample ice cream as my dinner of champions. It passed quality control, Mike-style.

Surprisingly, I went against my typical strategy of “DAMN THE TORPEDOES” in favor of a more wise approach. With my tent still utterly soaked compliments of Schodack the night before, and eying the external temperature gauge in the truck showing a balmy 36 degrees F, I decided to go out on a limb. I was going to stay at the Best Western Plus of Waterbury VT, down the street from Ben & Jerry’s. A quick morning drive, a proper shower, and NOT getting bronchitis from sleeping in a wet-then-frozen tent.

Money well-spent, I can confirm in retrospect. Even at the time, though, I was immediately aware that my choice was the right one.

A warm, showered, cozy sleep followed soon thereafter.

Day 93 – CT to RI to CT to MA to NY. Rain + Disappointment + Apizza + Rain

Friday November 2, 2018 (full photo album here)

Packing up, showering, and then laundry – the other victuals.

A phrase of positivity in my life for years running, the morning began with a refreshing sigh of “now, I get to leave Connecticut.” What can I say? Rainy cold weather in a tent plus a bunch of negative memories of New Haven and certain Ivy League schools therein = a Mike eager to depart for the land of perhaps the strongest of New England accent – Rhode Island.

At least I started off in a lovely forest, the ideal vantage point from which to enjoy JUST how sodden my beloved tent could be after a rainy night. Yeeeeeeeeesh:

A visible badge of Connecticut added to the tailgate (to match the indelible ones on my spirit from years past, mind you)…

… and I was ready to start heading towards the sanctum sanctorum of the yahd accent.

Southern New England is tiny compared to other states; when combined with the fact that this trip had seen me drive to the Arctic Ocean and back… I was across the border and almost all the way across Rhode Island in a flash. A fuel stop allowed for the sticker’ing…

… which required a detail shot to prove that tiny Rhode Island has a suitably tiny Rhode Island sticker (which it does). This also affords a chance to see the clear map vinyl sticker with the outlines, which makes the sticker’ing easier:

Rhode Island Experience, Attempt 1: My mission was to visit the altar to the opposite of my freeze-dried meal tendencies – the Culinary Arts Museum in Providence RI. At the time, I made use of my guide book to find this place and a very quick Google search to confirm the hours. All seemed to be well, so I drove over and snapped a picture of the sign:

… then I got held up by a couple of university police officers, who looked askance at my vehicle as being (only slightly) more overloaded than the typical undergraduate student. They asked if I had a pass for that parking lot as it was not a dormitory lot, but then I explained my hope to check out the museum. They both looked even more confused, as if my Ohio plates and ponderous overlanding rig denoted me as “obviously Mike knows that the Culinary Arts Museum is no longer open to the public.” Unfortunately, the big welcoming sign and open parking lot had implied otherwise – so I was told I could not visit and that I would have to find a different yahd to park my truck. Fair enough.

They pointed me towards Newport News as a neat place worth seeing, even in the rain. Off I went, across a surprisingly expensive (but only on the way in) toll bridge. A tax to keep poorer people out, as it was explained to me, of that very affluent city. Lovely.

Rhode Island Experience, Attempt 2: Trying to enjoy the Touro Synagogue of Newport RI, then, was the next historical site of interest to me. It was very early in the afternoon, and between the traffic on the highway and the affluence of the city proper, I was not willing or able to speed on my way. So I crawled, at times, through the traffic and tiny narrow corridors they called streets. I missed it the first time and the traffic behind me was in no way going to allow panic stopping, much less reversing (note to self – in addition to glorious auxiliary reverse lights, next time install a back-up external beeping mechanism like a bus). I looped around again and managed to swerve accurately enough to pull up right outside the impressive front gate, with its non-Julian calendar and all…

… just in time to see posted visitation hours closing at 3:00pm, about 10 minutes after I arrived. Awesome. Through barred gates I glimpsed an explanatory sign, which among other facts describes how this is the oldest synagogue in North America. Pretty neat, only too bad that I did not get to see it in person:

All I can do is try, and this was another failed trial at a Rhode Island experience.

Rhode Island Experience, Attempt 3: By chance, on my way back towards Connecticut, I saw a brown “museum or other point of interest” sign before an exit. It called out the existence of the SeaBee Museum and Memorial Park in Davisville RI, and being a history nutter with an every-growing interest in practical skills and engineering prowess, I got really excited at the prospect of learning about this incredible crew of military engineers who did the impossible as their daily job, for the US Navy in particular, across the globe during World War II. They built harbors and airstrips in places which were deemed impossible to build ever – and they often did it faster than required, with fewer real resources.

So: of course they were closed on Fridays. OF COURSE I didn’t get to see it.

Message received, loud and clear, Rhode Island. You were closed for business to Mikes on Fridays in November.

My Rhode Island activity, then, ended up being a combination of high hopes, low outcomes, and a driving tour of a good part of the state. Fair enough. The next step ahead of me was to go back through Connecticut (bad) but also to stop and get my absolute favorite flavor of pizza on the planet from there, for lunch (VERY GOOD). Namely, Modern Apizza in New Haven served up a box which by itself made me happy with memories and muted smells…

… which only made the contents, my lunch (and breakfast, the next day) all the better. SO scrumptious:

Full of satisfaction and also a little pizza, I reboxed the leftovers and got onto the long road indeed, from New Haven through Springfield MA all the way to Albany NY.

The usual rules applied, as I may have traveled through MA but I was not going to add the sticker until I stopped to at least try and visit something in the state. So I rolled all the way on to meet a friend (also Michael) in Albany NY, for dinner at the Parish Public House. Yes, a few weeks after not just visiting Louisiana but camping and hiking solo in the depths of the bayou… I went for Cajun food in New York state. Life is strange.

Dinner was good and relatively brief – a live musical performance was assembling and seemed likely to be LOUD, so we called it a night. I had found the Schodack Island State Park, outside of Albany. As the sticker would indicate, the next day, this leaves the gap of Pennsylvania to be hit on the way home from Canada, as my last state/province to visit on the trip. Crazy:

Another picture from the day after but seemingly reasonable to put in today, I reached the campsite in the dark and had my site options restricted to the half of the campground NOT flooded by the river (though as you will see, “not flooded” is sort of a matter of opinion):

The campsite started off and ended as a soupy mess of sandy mud, which made me a tad nervous about “will the Titan sink into the mud and never come out again”… but I was also tired enough to not really care. The truck was parked, the tent was set up, the Mike was bundled up – the variables were all ripe for a coma of immense proportions.

It was good.

Day 92 – DE to NJ to NY to CT. Nemours Estate + New Haven

Thursday November 1, 2018 (full photo album here)

The morning was a pair of moments less than ideal – the old “friendly Delaware ranger chat” because of arriving after check in and paying in the drop box but not having filled out the campsite number; and then the “important phone call in a state forest where approximately 7″ x 4” space had decent cellular signal – no pacing allowed!

Those tasks completed/survived, and a tasty meal of freeze-dried chicken noodle casserole in my belly, it was time to depart for a different corner of Delaware. Being a small state, there was a dearth of corners to choose from – the Reader’s Digest travel book came to my rescue yet again with a very solid choice and none of the Google searching in vain.

Taking the suggestion, I headed over to explore the Nemours Mansion, of the late Alfred I DuPont. I highly suggest reading a bit about this historical figure – but from turning the DuPont gunpowder business into a lot more, to a series of rocky love affairs/marriages and rockier familial strife, this man still fought for the laborers who worked for him and left a gigantic trust to fund a hospital and a lot more besides. Namely, this mansion complex:

A look at Mr. Alfred I. DuPont himself, and how he stole my intended fashion look for the trek (which is why I got shorts and high-SPF shirts, as to avoid being a copycat):

Of course, he also stole my car idea for the trip, with his mint condition 1960 Rolls Royce Phantom V Town Car (and this is why I settled on my second choice, the Nissan Titan XD!):

DuPont levels of place setting etiquette…

… with accompanying explanatory text for those uncultured (like me!):

The Mansion featured a slew of amazing and thoughtful design choices, and some downright cool things. From the basement bowling alley which may as well have inspired the end scene in There Will Be Blood…

… to a rich man’s hedging his bets when Edison and Tesla were fighting out electrical power delivery on utility poles, DuPont installed his own basement generators…

… with both a direct current (DC) generator…

… AND an integrated alternating current (AC) generator, on the same system, so he could be prepared for whichever system won (and therefore whichever gadgets would follow, regardless of the voltage they required):

There are a slew of other interesting tidbits, to be found in the photo album for the day. I was there in the off season, because Nemours is mostly known for their amazing Christmas extravaganza. It is worth going, if ever you find yourself in that corner of Delaware.

A Chipotle late lunch + postcard interlude followed, which was good indeed – certainly better than overpriced diesel fuel down the road (but cheaper than NJ and the New England abyss to the north would be). Refueling, as a percent of the time on the trip, is in intriguing question in retrospect. On a trip of 109 days, I have 102 fuel-ups – I have to wonder how many hours ticked away (especially on those emergency roadside fill-ups; or the lengthy time created by slow pumps and/or the times I refilled 24 spare gallons + 26 stock fuel tank gallons). A few weeks prior, on the way to meet my brother in KY, I had a 45 minute fuel-up because the only diesel pump within dozens of miles was known to have a bad seal so it was *slow*. In any event, and SPEAKING of fueling up and slow roads…

I exited Delaware across a bridge and found myself in a state of the Union with which I have never had great experiences. Traversing the NJ parkway was, surprisingly, visually appealing this time – after a set of states in varying stages of “actually autumn but not really” I had finally hit New Jersey for peak fall – not a state known for it, but there you have it. One of the better mid-drive photos I got:

When I say that NJ was out to get me – a few years back I got diesel fuel for a different (more Volkswagen-shaped vehicle, mind you) at a particular NJ turnpike rest stop. 2 minutes after I left, I had $375 of fraudulent fuel charges from that station getting me multiple calls and texts from my bank. This time, I had a slightly better experience at that same rest stop. While I avoided refueling (old fears die hard, I s’pose)… I did try to redeem the rest stop, using it at a place to add my New Jersey sticker onto the truck’s tailgate (though I cannot help but note how benighted the photo is!):

I was on a driving crusade – so I went up through New York City and did not stop in the state (so no sticker, yet). Instead, I rocketed up into Connecticut, another old stomping ground from my past. For some reason, I thought it might be interested to go into New Haven (a town I REALLY disliked) with a truck full of expensive things at night (in spite of huge issues with crime in the city). It was slightly foggy, but I did a nighttime driving tour by memory of the various places I inhabited and made use of during 3 years at Yale – from the Law School and Divinity School, to the downtown mess of One Way streets, all the way to my old rented home on Memory Lane Winchester Avenue:

There was a surreal quality to revisiting those places at night, but in some ways I am glad this got squeezed into this grand trek. The reasons (many, varied, complex, simple) for my disliking it there can be left aside – my grand trek was meant above all to be a period of extensive self-reflection, introspection, and growth. Growth, in my experience, doesn’t happen in a vacuum – and it certainly doesn’t happen without intentionally grappling with the unpleasant, the nasty, and even the Connecticut. I cannot make the claim that visiting Yale in the fog solved any questions or concerns, but nevertheless I think it gave me some food for thought about the dreary facts at hand.

SPEAKING of dreary – I encountered the east coast reality of VERY few free camping areas/national forests, and instead was stuck sleeping at the KOA of Mystic CT in the cold, driving rain. A myriad of unmarked campground roads, darkness, rain, fog, and blowing leaves all conspired to make it a challenge to find my actual spot – and then I got to do some precision backing up across root-infested rocky soil (the magic of Connecticut!) between a very narrow corridor of trees. What can I say: dreary as can be, just how life can go at times. Luckily, my truck’s rear bumper had a total of 4 stupidly-bright auxiliary reverse lights and so I was able to inch safely into a viable camping spot.

The trick, and perhaps the lesson, is to figure out how to plan for and install those “auxiliary reverse lights” into one’s own life. Maybe that means friends, maybe it means family; it might be a hobby or a sport or a couple of neighbors who also really enjoy screening Nicolas Cage films. I think I am in the process of rediscovering my own “lights.”

One of them is adventuring, as best I can, and therefore this grand trek was one hell of a light.