We've been clocking up a lot of miles traveling all around the coast of Florida recently – about 1,400 so far! After we left Miami, we headed south to the Florida Keys, where we stayed in Grassy Key RV Park and Resort, the amazing campground pictured above near Marathon Key, which is located about half way between Key Largo and Key West. We had two days of torrential rain while we were here and I got bitten all over by an unidentified insect and looked like I had the measles, but whatever. It was pretty amazing to wake up to this view every day and incredible 80F weather and jump in the pool, even when we had clouds – and insect bites. It was on the marina wall at our campground that we saw the iguana in the gallery below, which was over three foot long from his head to his tail. Crazy. Apparently they are not native to Florida and have become a pest that are a hassle to locals, who do not want their gardens dug up by critters with no natural predators. We also saw our first manatee in the Keys, green sea turtles, sharks, grouper and jelly fish (the last four, all while we were in a glass-bottomed boat in John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park) and of course 50-odd polydactyl cats (cats with extra toes) at Hemingway's former house in Key West. Another highlight for this new driver was driving over the Seven Mile Bridge to get to Key West – Shane has a video of this that we will upload. Shane went fishing, we had drinks in the campground with our new friend Buzz, who is spending several months down here, Sonny developed a liking for climbing palm trees and we all developed a taste for the amazing shrimp, crab and other seafood in this area, not to mention fantastic Key Lime Pie. We thought the best we had was at Brutus Seafood and Eatery in Marathon. We must also give a shout out to Sparky's Landing in Key Colony Beach, home of the $0.30 fresh ready-to-peel shrimp and $0.30 chicken wings during happy hour, where you can sit outside by the marina and watch the pelicans swoop by. Then we left the aquamarine waters of the beautiful Keys and drove to the Everglades, subtropical wetlands which cover over 1.5 million acres of South Florida, which as well as containing a national park, are a World Heritage Site and International Biosphere Reserve. There are an estimated 1.3 million alligators in Florida and we've decided most of them live here. They were everywhere – basking in the sun all along The Tamiami Trail (Highway 41), along Highway 84, also known as Alligator Alley, and all along the walkways we explored in Shark Valley, part of Everglades National Park. There were also alligators in the lake in our campground, so we couldn't let out Sonny for a couple of days. We did an airboat ride into the Everglades with Tigertail Airboat Tours, which operates on the Miccosukee Reservation on the Tamiami Trail. Our guide told us that gators grow all their lives, and as they can live to be 100 years old, they can grow up to 15 feet. However, the biggest around there were 12 feet long and around 60 to 70 years old. The Everglades, and the adjacent Big Cypress National Preserve, which is another 729,000 acres, are also habitats for the Florida Panther. Sadly, these endangered big cats are often struck by speeding cars in this area, which is why panther crossing zones, complete with tunnels underneath roadways, have been set up around here. The population is beginning to grow again, but there are only an estimated 100 to 180 panthers in this area, so it's no surprise that we didn't see one. We had to make do with own trailer panther instead. AuthorKathryn
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Earlier this month we stopped for a few days outside of Cocoa Beach, Florida, and visited the Kennedy Space Center. After spending around seven hours there, we could have spent another day. If you are planning a visit, we'd recommend either knowing what you won’t mind missing or spending two days – there is too much to see in one. The huge spacecraft on exhibit and the bus tour of the buildings and launchpads made big impressions, but most memorable was the presentation of the inspiring and emotional historical content. One moment we'll never forget was the presentation of the prep and launch of the Apollo 8 mission, which sent the first humans out of earth’s orbit, into moon orbit, and back safely. The video above captures some of it. Even today, it sounds like a Hollywood script, more science fiction than history. What made the experience incredible was the presentation of this real-life drama. We were seated in bleachers overlooking the actual Apollo control center equipment in the configuration from launch day. A video presentation on the monitors showed footage and information from Russia’s post-Sputnik period of space superiority, bringing the audience into the anxiety of that moment. We then re-lived actual footage of the series of explosions and failures that made President Kennedy’s dream of a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s seem impossible. Information was provided about the preposterously large Saturn rockets, so much bigger and more complex than the previous vehicles that only had to reach low orbit, but with so many additional points of failure and fewer test opportunities. We were shown the preparations made by the hundreds of thousands of people who worked on millions of parts and plans, under time pressure, cost and safety constraints, knowing each piece could decide success or failure. The presentation culminated in a description of what was expected to happen at each stage of the launch, followed by a countdown in the control room in front of us, and footage from the launch countdown. Forty-eight years later, it still evoked a spine-tingling tension. A roaring sound system amplified the excitement. The reactions of relief and celebration caught on the control room footage were enough to make anyone proud not just of NASA and the USA, but of humanity. Proud that whatever else we have done, or will do, as a species or a people, we have also done this. There are innumerable other highlights which make Kennedy Center worth visiting. The space shuttle Atlantis is hanging from the ceiling in a building dedicated in tribute to the shuttle program. Visitors can get hands-on time in a cockpit, experience a launch, and offer respect to those who lost their lives aboard Challenger and Columbia. A gigantic Saturn rocket is hanging from the ceiling in another vast museum dedicated to the Apollo program, where visitors can see real suits and gear that were used on the moon, and even touch a moon rock. We were also lucky enough to visit soon after the opening of the new Heroes and Legends exhibit, which commemorates all of the astronauts in the center’s history, including John Glenn, the first American to orbit earth, who died this month at the age of 95. It was a very fine museum, but in the context of the whole experience, it left us thinking of all of the other, less visible heroes, scientists and civilians, who have made the space program successful. There are also exhibits about Mars. The focus of funds and research at Kennedy Space Center now is clearly to ignite the public’s interest in the next phase of human space exploration and Mars in particular. Maybe it was some of the inspiration from the Apollo exhibits spilling over, but I really want to believe that we are still capable as a species of caring about pushing beyond our limits in space and buckling down to make it happen. The new vehicle under development, the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (Orion MPCV,) is scheduled to be launched from one of the pads that we got to visit. It is a modular design, and like the Apollo program, the general plan is to build and test components in a series of missions, which ultimately produce an interplanetary vehicle. The current mission schedule includes extraordinary plans – including this gem: "Send an Orion capsule in 2026 with four crew members to an asteroid that had been robotically captured and placed in lunar orbit in late 2025.” Of course in today’s world these plans will require working public/private partnerships, international collaboration and reliable funding. In my opinion, the audacity and grandiosity of our plans for the stars is a measure of humanity. Big goals are not cheap, although NASA has done incredible things on budget. Something like $1 billion - $1.5 billion per year has been spent on Orion so far; roughly $14 billion in the last decade. At the center, you see the engineering that goes into producing zero-fail systems with many redundant parts, which have to fit into absurd spaces, and weigh as little as possible. It is a marvel that these custom jobs can be done and work together at any price. Often on the first try. In space. The Kennedy Space Center is a place that is well worth a visit, to see what hundreds of thousands of dreamers have been able to achieve, and to be inspired about the future. The facilities, rockets and treasures there are the property of all Americans. The achievements realized and honored there belong to all of humanity. It is impossible to visit without feeling very humbled, and very proud. AuthorShane I don't know this for sure, but I seriously doubt that any of the 77,000 people who flocked to Art Basel Miami Beach or the many more that attended the hundreds of satellite events in Miami last week spent the whole time camping in a trailer in a former avocado orchard. At first, it seemed like a great idea. I'm working all year on the road after all, so why not rock up at a gathering of the art world's one percenters that I need to cover for work in our travel trailer? What fun! One friend even suggested that we could pass off our rather dowdy and extremely beige Keystone Bullet as a public art installation and give people tours. This didn't take into account that the closest campground we could find in Miami was an hour's drive away from South Beach, even without the Art Basel traffic. Once we actually made it into the city, we had to sit in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the causeway over to South Beach, navigate gridlocked streets once we got there and then find a parking spot that was large enough for The Beast in all the mayhem. Thank goodness Shane offered to drive. Still, repeating that process at the end of each day meant a total of three or more hours of driving on top of eight or nine hours of running around various art fairs reporting, which meant the whole thing was pretty full on for both of us. It was also weird to be staying in a campground surrounded by fruit farms in the same city, but in a different world to South Beach, with its VIP receptions, rope lines, slinky dresses and celebrity parties. The Beast looked pretty conspicuous and in dire need of a wash in the valet parking pick up line outside the main fair, wedged in among the gleaming BMWs and Ferarris. Again, thank goodness Shane was driving. We also found that trying to appear like people who are not actually permanently living in a field and emptying a trailer's sewer tank every few days is a bit of a challenge when that's actually what you are doing. At one point, we had to conduct an emergency change into evening clothes out of the back of The Beast in the underground parking deck at our friends Vic and Tom's place. Thankfully, we both got to see some fantastic art last week (see photos and captions for some of the most talked about pieces) and have a lovely dinner with Vic and Tom one evening. Artists Tomas Vu and Rirkrit Tiravanija also had an installation at Untitled fair, held in a massive tent on the actual beach, which encouraged visitors to take surfboards with Pussy Riot-inspired designs out into the waves, so I made it onto the sand too, albeit very briefly. (Incidentally, although everyone who had a go a surfing deserves a high five (unlike me), the only person who actually managed to get up on a board was a lifeguard, who walked over to have a go and blew the competition out of the water, so to speak. I immediately thought that our surfing friend Riva should have been there!) Thanksgiving, preparations for Miami and a lot of moves over the last few weeks mean that we have some gaps to fill in on this blog. Shane has posted about Charleston, South Carolina, but we were there just before our stay at Fort McCallister State Park in Georgia. Since then we've been to Savannah and Jekyll Island, Georgia, and Jacksonville, Florida, where we spent Thanksgiving with our amazing hosts Michele and Spencer and family. Before we arrived in Miami, we made a day trip to St Augustine and then stayed near Cape Canaveral, Florida. There we visited the Kennedy Space Center and had an equally inspirational time with our friend Sally's trailblaizing mother, who from her first job heading up the crew systems lab during the Apollo missions, spent an amazing career at NASA. So we are playing catch up. Watch this space for more! AuthorKathryn While touring the charming and expectations-exceeding city of Charleston, South Carolina in November, we saw old stand oak trees, the greatest concentration of antebellum houses in the country, and dolphins feeding and playing a few feet from the seawall. |
I was very impressed and hopeful to see that the event was packed. Everywhere, young people were pushing around with bags full of newly purchased hardcovers, rushing to stand in line to hear authors and participate in signings. The age of the the attendees ranged from 12 to 17, and one immediately obvious demographic was that, by my statistically irrelevant count of about 20 people, about 80% of the attendees were young women. |
I didn’t have a good theory for why this was, so I took a look at the list of participating authors on the website, and over two-thirds of them were also female. I expected to find some illuminating genre trend, but no, there were a wide range of genres and the most universal theme was genre fiction featuring a strong young hero or heroine. There was less coming of age stuff than I remember from my generation’s young adult section, but I guess that the commercial success of Harry Potter, Twilight and the rest are one obvious market-driven reason for the trend.
It was gratifying to see that there was a voracious appetite for a diverse set of work, by a very established cast of authors that I had never heard of (there were about 65 at the fair). Also, seeing the excitement and energy of these young people reminded me of a Wired magazine article that I read years ago. The article discussed an interesting analysis and discussion paper from of a series of experiments in over 200 urban schools to study the effectiveness of various incentive programs on student performance. These studies asked the question – what if we spend money directly on incentivizing students? The studies were scientific in that they included control groups, were normalized for a number of socio-economic factors, and there were two general types of student incentives studied. (Teacher incentives were also studied in a limited way – read the report if interested!)
Some students were given performance-based cash incentives, such as money for grades on their report card or for higher standardized test scores. Others were given behavior-based incentives for attending class or reading books. The reason that I remembered this study in Charlotte was that to the surprise of many, by many metrics, the test scores for the students who were paid to read books improved the most. Even more surprisingly, it wasn’t just their verbal scores that increased – some improvement appeared to be seen in math as well.
That said, I actually did my own reading of the source paper/data for a subset of the studies, and I don’t think that enough attention was paid to several skew/weighting factors in the study, specifically that certain incentives were tested only on certain age groups and that the data suggest that bilingual students may have accounted for an oversized amount of the “book reader” numbers from the portion of the study conducted in Dallas. Also, the authors of the studies and the analysts who have looked at these since made it quite clear that more investigation is required to confirm any statistically significant results.
Still, whenever I see kids reading on the subway, I feel hopeful. And YALLFEST makes me believe that just maybe we can improve US skill levels by giving children the love and confidence for reading that opens the doors to learning everything else in the universe.
Finally, I need to give a shout out to our friends who hosted us for a wonderful evening in Charleston and provided critical tips for our South Carolina and Georgia experience.
And also to an epic food idea perfectly executed. Excellent cookies, plus ice cream plus pie. Please open these across the country – I need to try all of the flavors.
Finally, I need to give a shout out to our friends who hosted us for a wonderful evening in Charleston and provided critical tips for our South Carolina and Georgia experience.
And also to an epic food idea perfectly executed. Excellent cookies, plus ice cream plus pie. Please open these across the country – I need to try all of the flavors.
Since our bear quest ended in the Smoky Mountains, we've been working our way south to warmer climes. First came Lake Oconee in central Georgia and then a campground just outside Charleston, South Carolina. Now we're working our way down the coast, so we've crossed the border back into Georgia again to hang out 40 minutes south of Savannah. We're staying on Savage Island in Fort McAllister State Historic Park. We toured the fort, which was a confederate stronghold during the Civil War until it fell to Union general William T. Sherman and his army, but the park also contains 1,725 acres of salt marsh, the Ogeechee River and a forest full of beautiful giant live oaks covered in Spanish moss.
Our campground in Savage Island is connected to the mainland by a long causeway across the salt march. This area lost a lot of trees and suffered extensive damage during Hurricane Matthew. In fact, the park only opened a week ago, after a month of clean up with the help of a teams of volunteers, and there are still fallen trees and mounds of tree debris everywhere you drive around here. When we tried to visit Hunting Island State Park in South Carolina earlier this week on the recommendation of friends, it was still shut because of hurricane damage and the campground there is not expected to reopen until next May. Instead, we visited Coligny Beach Park that day on Hilton Head, South Carolina, where the picture of both of us on the beach at sunset was taken and where we saw a pod of dolphins close to the shore.
Although our campground has definitely lost a lot of trees and undergrowth, our spot on the island is still amazingly beautiful. This and our federal campground in the Smoky Mountains have been so much nicer than any of the private camp sites we've stayed in so far. There have been forest fires burning for a couple of weeks in the northern part of Georgia, but we have been completely unaffected in the south. There are hardly any other campers around, we are surrounded by mature trees draped in Spanish moss and all we can hear are the sounds of woodpeckers above.
Sonny loves it here as it is a super quiet place for him to explore outside and watch squirrels–a first for him– scampering about everywhere. A short walk away is Redbird Creek, where you can go sea kayaking (as long as you don't mind the alligators), begin a number of hiking trails and take in panoramic views of the salt marshes, which are also home to four different species of egrets and six different species of herons, pelicans and cranes, among hundreds of other birds. This was also where we saw the super moon, but let's come clean here, our photos were crap, so we won't post any of those.
We'll write about our stops in Charleston and Savannah in another post soon, but in the meantime, if you'd like to see more photos from our trip, we're posting some every few days to our @nycnomads Instagram account. Hope to see you over there too!
Our campground in Savage Island is connected to the mainland by a long causeway across the salt march. This area lost a lot of trees and suffered extensive damage during Hurricane Matthew. In fact, the park only opened a week ago, after a month of clean up with the help of a teams of volunteers, and there are still fallen trees and mounds of tree debris everywhere you drive around here. When we tried to visit Hunting Island State Park in South Carolina earlier this week on the recommendation of friends, it was still shut because of hurricane damage and the campground there is not expected to reopen until next May. Instead, we visited Coligny Beach Park that day on Hilton Head, South Carolina, where the picture of both of us on the beach at sunset was taken and where we saw a pod of dolphins close to the shore.
Although our campground has definitely lost a lot of trees and undergrowth, our spot on the island is still amazingly beautiful. This and our federal campground in the Smoky Mountains have been so much nicer than any of the private camp sites we've stayed in so far. There have been forest fires burning for a couple of weeks in the northern part of Georgia, but we have been completely unaffected in the south. There are hardly any other campers around, we are surrounded by mature trees draped in Spanish moss and all we can hear are the sounds of woodpeckers above.
Sonny loves it here as it is a super quiet place for him to explore outside and watch squirrels–a first for him– scampering about everywhere. A short walk away is Redbird Creek, where you can go sea kayaking (as long as you don't mind the alligators), begin a number of hiking trails and take in panoramic views of the salt marshes, which are also home to four different species of egrets and six different species of herons, pelicans and cranes, among hundreds of other birds. This was also where we saw the super moon, but let's come clean here, our photos were crap, so we won't post any of those.
We'll write about our stops in Charleston and Savannah in another post soon, but in the meantime, if you'd like to see more photos from our trip, we're posting some every few days to our @nycnomads Instagram account. Hope to see you over there too!
Author
Kathryn
As it turns out, cooking in our Keystone Bullet trailer kitchen is not all that difficult and many of the same limitations and tricks that we learned in small New York apartments apply. Full Disclosure: Shane lived in a studio in Chelsea in Manhattan that had a smaller kitchen, and unlike our camper, no oven and no freezer for six years. So when we have successes, we'll post some meals that work in the camper.
This one is not really a recipe – we just made instant pancakes and added chopped fruit to the batter. Seems like a good way to use whatever fresh items we impulse buy from the produce stands on the sides of the roads of America. In this case, we bought a sack of local apples from Waynseboro, North Carolina (this type are supposedly Arkansas Blacks) and were running out of ways to eat them.
- Skin and chop one whole apple. Eat the skin while cooking because that’s the healthy part.
- Mix the batter according to the instructions. We used a batter that doesn't require an extra egg, but that may be because we're living in a trailer. The box says it makes 12- 18 pancakes, but it really only makes about six human-sized ones. Depending on the extra ingredient, you will want to tweak the mix just a bit to account for how much moisture you are adding. You should use less water, for example, if you are adding peaches or plums. Change nothing if you are adding bananas or chocolate chips. Usually we just add a tiny bit more powder if we are using wet fruit.
- Today we also changed out one-third of the water with apple cider which we bought in South Carolina but comes from our home state of New York. You just have to try apple cider to know if it is a good one, but our guidelines are: no preservatives, no additives of any kind. A lot of them have malic acid listed as a second ingredient after apples – this comes from apples, but suggests a need to add tartness back to make it taste good, like lemonade and juices that have citric acid as an ingredient. There is nothing wrong with malic acid, and it may even have health benefits, but the straight stuff usually costs the same in the fall and cider should taste good enough to stand on its own.
- Grease the pan with peanut oil, because it is the best for pancake flavor and less of a burn risk than butter. Butter can be added as topper later for flavor. Smear the oil around with a paper towel and save the greasy towel for re-priming between pancakes.
- Heat to medium high. The right temperature varies stove to stove, burner to burner, and based on pan, batter, barometric pressure, humidity, and tidal fluctuations so unless you use the same mix, pan, and burner at home every time, the first pancake is often a test round and the second is fired for effect.
- Pour the mix around in the pan and keep it thin. With fruit in the batter it won’t run quite as naturally, if you have to pour it over some spots twice or tilt the pan to get a good even spread, no problem just do it quickly.
The conventional wisdom regarding when to flip a pancake is when complete bubbles begin to burst on the surface, but with our mix loaded with apples there were bubbles immediately. Again, the first pancake should be sacrificed to science. If you can get the spatula under it, then even if it’s not cooked enough you can always flip it back to that side at the end. With practice (or by the third or fourth cake in each batch) you will figure out the timing to get that golden brown that is the platonic ideal.
Slather with butter to taste and add 100% pure maple syrup and enjoy!
Author
Shane
We took a side trip from Knoxville to visit Oak Ridge, TN and the American Museum of Science and Energy. Oak Ridge is known as the ‘Atomic City’ or the ‘Secret City’ because it was founded as a site for work on the Manhattan project. Much of the uranium researching the ‘upstream’ work that was ultimately used to create ‘Fat Man’ and ‘Little Boy’ at Los Alamos was done at Oak Ridge. The site is now home to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), the largest ($1.6B) Department of Energy laboratory, and also hosts US ITER, the hub of the US’s seat in ITER, the international collaboration on fusion power research and development.
Note: ITER is one of the most important things that our species is doing at this time, see their website http://www.iter.org/. It is also an inspiration in that at least someone in our world is interested in working across national boundaries and toward common or at least shared interest. Politically speaking, this may be because scientists are awesome.
The museum itself was very interesting and surprisingly (admittedly my bases for comparison are the AMNH and Liberty Science Center) almost empty on a weekday afternoon. Items of interest included actual relics from the first fission reactors, once-secret photos, interviews, film of the Manhattan Project sites, and displays and learning activities related to the current work being done at ORNL.
The AMSE's exhibits were inspirational but also sobering, balancing a portrayal of the heroic sacrifices made by the scientists and their families with unflinching descriptions of the human cost of the horrific result and the serious risks of nuclear proliferation.
One theme that kept resurfacing in the historical exhibits was the degree of public/private partnership in the project. It was an all-hands-on-deck proposition where failure (losing the atomic race to Nazi Germany) was not an option. I guess that it is for this reason that politicians and private sector visionaries still characterize important R&D programs as ‘the Manhattan project for Cancer’ or ‘the Manhattan Project for Anti-Virus’ when they want to convey the idea that an all-out effort beyond the normal limits of bureaucracy and economics is required. The examples of US corporations, private citizens, and the military really putting their time and their money on the table in the 1940s made me think of other revolutions that happened in the same way - Alan Turing’s work popularized in the film 'The Imitation Game', for example, which led to the Universal Turing Machine and the modern computer.
To my mind, these examples pose an interesting lesson regarding pure science. If we were to assign a dollar value to the invention of nuclear technology or the computer, what would it be? How can we estimate the value to gross cumulative human productivity of having developed those technologies, say, conservatively, 5 to 10 years earlier than they otherwise would have been?
There are current technologies (genetic, energy, computing, AI, and many less obvious ones) with even greater potential return on investment for the species, which we don't invest in in quite the same way, financially or culturally, perhaps because of our short sightedness. One imagines that if aliens were to attack us with a genetic weapon, we would learn to understand and rewrite our genome more rapidly than we are, just because the stakes would be clearer. If the Chinese developed a bio weapon capable of consuming or contaminating oil reserves, articles and books exist on the potential of these technologies and the urgency with which we should be pursuing them.
The point made clear for me by the Manhattan Project exhibit was this: it is easy culturally and politically for humans to spend money on the needs of today, either through state or philanthropic projects and programs or free market allocation of resources and innovation. It is more difficult to focus on pure science efforts that will bear in some cases infinitely more valuable fruit tomorrow and it is a shame if it takes fear of annihilation by Hitler to get us to act more wisely.
To my mind, these examples pose an interesting lesson regarding pure science. If we were to assign a dollar value to the invention of nuclear technology or the computer, what would it be? How can we estimate the value to gross cumulative human productivity of having developed those technologies, say, conservatively, 5 to 10 years earlier than they otherwise would have been?
There are current technologies (genetic, energy, computing, AI, and many less obvious ones) with even greater potential return on investment for the species, which we don't invest in in quite the same way, financially or culturally, perhaps because of our short sightedness. One imagines that if aliens were to attack us with a genetic weapon, we would learn to understand and rewrite our genome more rapidly than we are, just because the stakes would be clearer. If the Chinese developed a bio weapon capable of consuming or contaminating oil reserves, articles and books exist on the potential of these technologies and the urgency with which we should be pursuing them.
The point made clear for me by the Manhattan Project exhibit was this: it is easy culturally and politically for humans to spend money on the needs of today, either through state or philanthropic projects and programs or free market allocation of resources and innovation. It is more difficult to focus on pure science efforts that will bear in some cases infinitely more valuable fruit tomorrow and it is a shame if it takes fear of annihilation by Hitler to get us to act more wisely.
Another takeaway from the museum was the contribution of Enrico Fermi to the atomic program and also ultimately to the development of nuclear power, which provides about 8.5% of US energy and 5% worldwide. Names like Oppenheimer and Einstein are part of the public lexicon, but Fermi’s immigration to the US (his wife was Jewish and they fled Mussolini’s Italy) was perhaps tactically more critical. Fermilab in Chicago and fermions (half of the types of matter in the universe) are named after him, but he should probably be the most famous Italian whose name isn’t a Ninja Turtle or Caesar. Someone please make a movie about him so that he can become hip like Turing and Tesla.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enrico_Fermi
Author
Shane
“Caution: increased bear activity at this time. Food regulations strictly enforced.”
This was the message posted on the website for Smokemount Campground, the federal campground where we stayed in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which straddles the boundary between North Carolina and Tennessee. We already knew this campground was a bear habitat because around 1,500 black bears live in the park - all food has to be locked in the trunk of your car or in your camper at all times - but this news suggested there were bears romping around all over the place. We had completely failed to spot a bear in Shenandoah National Park, but surely we would see one now.
This was the message posted on the website for Smokemount Campground, the federal campground where we stayed in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which straddles the boundary between North Carolina and Tennessee. We already knew this campground was a bear habitat because around 1,500 black bears live in the park - all food has to be locked in the trunk of your car or in your camper at all times - but this news suggested there were bears romping around all over the place. We had completely failed to spot a bear in Shenandoah National Park, but surely we would see one now.
Just off the Blue Ridge Parkway on the North Carolina side of the park, Smokemount was our first experience of camping off the grid. We couldn’t use any AC appliances and we had no cell phone or internet service, but the batteries on our camper and our propane tanks provided all the power and heat we needed and we wished we’d done it before. Why camp close to a national park when you can camp in a national park? With no sounds apart from the creek running nearby, the wind rustling the leaves and the incredible fall foliage, Smokemount is by far the most beautiful and tranquil campground we have stayed in to date. On our first evening, we built a campfire and watched the stars.
It was then that Kathryn realized she was still wearing the jeans that she had liberally sprayed with a cat-calming potion to help Sonny the cat, who had been sitting on her lap, relax during the drive there. The spray is supposed to give off the same comforting pheromones as mother cats. There we were sitting by our camp fire wondering if we would see any bears, when it was much more likely that every bobcat in the neighborhood would turn up looking for its mother.
It was then that Kathryn realized she was still wearing the jeans that she had liberally sprayed with a cat-calming potion to help Sonny the cat, who had been sitting on her lap, relax during the drive there. The spray is supposed to give off the same comforting pheromones as mother cats. There we were sitting by our camp fire wondering if we would see any bears, when it was much more likely that every bobcat in the neighborhood would turn up looking for its mother.
On our second day in The Smokies, we drove up to Clingman’s Dome, the highest point in the National Park, and walked up to the observation tower that offers 360 degree views. Check out Shane's video from the top. We stopped off at overlooks along the way to take in more pretty amazing vistas. At the Webb Overlook, we got out of The Beast and were immediately blown away by the incredible colors and the lake of 'smoke' nestling between the mountains in the distance. The Smoky Mountains are said to have more species of trees than Northern Europe, one reason it is a World Heritage Site and an International Biosphere Reserve, which creates a spectacular show for 'leaf peepers' at this time of year.
Our campground was only six miles from Cherokee, which is home to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation and the urban center of their reservation, the Qualla Boundary, which encompasses 56,000 acres. Located here are The Museum of the Cherokee Indian and Qualla Arts and Crafts Mutual, a very impressive gallery and shop, which exhibits and sells authentic Cherokee arts and crafts, including beautiful baskets, pottery, wood and stone carvings. There’s also a large outdoor theater, which stages nightly performances of ‘Unto These Hills’, a drama that tells the story of the Cherokee people, but sadly those only go on between May and August, so we missed out.
We also visited the Oconaluftee Visitor’s Center, which is in the area of the National Park where elk, reintroduced by the National Park Service in 2001, can often be spotted. We didn’t see one around the visitor’s center, and still bereft of bears, we were a bit disheartened, but just as we were driving away from there, one male ambled across the road right in front of us. Completely unfazed by the number of people who quickly pulled over by the side of the road to snap his photo, he strolled through the field next to us, enjoying the afternoon sun. He was magnificent.
Maybe our bear-viewing chances will improve on the west coast.
Our campground was only six miles from Cherokee, which is home to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation and the urban center of their reservation, the Qualla Boundary, which encompasses 56,000 acres. Located here are The Museum of the Cherokee Indian and Qualla Arts and Crafts Mutual, a very impressive gallery and shop, which exhibits and sells authentic Cherokee arts and crafts, including beautiful baskets, pottery, wood and stone carvings. There’s also a large outdoor theater, which stages nightly performances of ‘Unto These Hills’, a drama that tells the story of the Cherokee people, but sadly those only go on between May and August, so we missed out.
We also visited the Oconaluftee Visitor’s Center, which is in the area of the National Park where elk, reintroduced by the National Park Service in 2001, can often be spotted. We didn’t see one around the visitor’s center, and still bereft of bears, we were a bit disheartened, but just as we were driving away from there, one male ambled across the road right in front of us. Completely unfazed by the number of people who quickly pulled over by the side of the road to snap his photo, he strolled through the field next to us, enjoying the afternoon sun. He was magnificent.
Maybe our bear-viewing chances will improve on the west coast.
Author
Kathryn
Categories
Yogi Bear's Jellystone Park. The name of the only campsite in Luray, Virginia, which had space for us last weekend suggested that it was pretty kid-centric. Still, we were totally unprepared for what we faced when we got there and were given an activity list for the Halloween Witches Brew weekend, which kicked off with a vampire scavenger hunt and candy bar bingo on Friday and culminated with trick or treat and site and cabin judging on Saturday night.
Site judging? Sure enough, the guy camping in a large fifth wheel right across from our site in the campground was setting out a row of inflatable tombstones when we got there. We had nothing. At first, we thought that having a real, live grey-but-could-pass-as-black-in-the-dark cat might improve our Halloween credentials, but by nightfall, our neighbor's site boasted a light show, a scary outdoor soundtrack, dry ice effects, the works. We panicked and rushed out to buy a couple of pumpkins and five big sacks of candy for the trick or treaters.
It wasn't enough. Ten minutes after the trick or treating started, Shane had been approached by about 100 little people, including three-year-old twin ninjas, Buzz Lightyear, some unicorns and an array of dinosaurs, and our stash of chocolate bars disappeared. It's worth watching the video below to the end to check out an excellent dog costume.
The next morning, we discovered that our neighbor with the inflatable tombstones had won second prize in the site-judging contest. We've no idea what the winner had to do to beat a light show and dry ice extravaganza because they'd left by the time we went to investigate. Our neighbor was Kevin Cubbage, and although he lived near Luray, he said it was a remote spot. As a result, he'd been coming to Yogi Bear's Jellystone Park the same weekend every year for four years to "have an opportunity to decorate for Halloween, hand out candy and do the whole thing". He also said it was a great place for children who also lived in remote areas to go trick or treating in a secure environment with no traffic.
Such is the popularity of this that the campground has hosted Halloween events for the last three weekends. Who knew that Halloween lasted for most of October? We do now, and at least we left with two pumpkins, which we can whip out again tomorrow.
Site judging? Sure enough, the guy camping in a large fifth wheel right across from our site in the campground was setting out a row of inflatable tombstones when we got there. We had nothing. At first, we thought that having a real, live grey-but-could-pass-as-black-in-the-dark cat might improve our Halloween credentials, but by nightfall, our neighbor's site boasted a light show, a scary outdoor soundtrack, dry ice effects, the works. We panicked and rushed out to buy a couple of pumpkins and five big sacks of candy for the trick or treaters.
It wasn't enough. Ten minutes after the trick or treating started, Shane had been approached by about 100 little people, including three-year-old twin ninjas, Buzz Lightyear, some unicorns and an array of dinosaurs, and our stash of chocolate bars disappeared. It's worth watching the video below to the end to check out an excellent dog costume.
The next morning, we discovered that our neighbor with the inflatable tombstones had won second prize in the site-judging contest. We've no idea what the winner had to do to beat a light show and dry ice extravaganza because they'd left by the time we went to investigate. Our neighbor was Kevin Cubbage, and although he lived near Luray, he said it was a remote spot. As a result, he'd been coming to Yogi Bear's Jellystone Park the same weekend every year for four years to "have an opportunity to decorate for Halloween, hand out candy and do the whole thing". He also said it was a great place for children who also lived in remote areas to go trick or treating in a secure environment with no traffic.
Such is the popularity of this that the campground has hosted Halloween events for the last three weekends. Who knew that Halloween lasted for most of October? We do now, and at least we left with two pumpkins, which we can whip out again tomorrow.
Author
Kathryn
Categories
This weekend, we stayed at a campground in Luray, Virginia, a short drive from the Thornton Gap entrance to Shenandoah National Park. From here, we drove Skyline Drive down to the southern most tip of the park. Shenandoah National park was established in 1935 and it's easy to see how the Skyline Drive capitalized on the new popularity of the motor car. The drive follows the crest of the Blue Ridge mountains for a total of 105 miles, with lots of places to stop off and picnic, and offers incredible views to the west and to the east over the mountains and the Shenandoah Valley, from 75 overlooks. The photo of Shane above was taken at Stony Man Overlook at an elevation of 3,100 feet. We arrived just after the peak for fall foliage, but the luminous colors of the trees bathed in sunlight set against those still in shadow and the beautiful fall light refracting through the foliage took our breath away anyway. It took us about two hours to drive the southern-most two thirds of the Skyline Drive, but you need about three hours to drive the whole way.
Quite by chance, Shane's friends Russ and Steph and their two kids Josh and Emma were also staying in Shenandoah for the weekend. It was fantastic to see them and we all hiked together up Whiteoak Canyon, which allowed us to see six waterfalls in total and more amazing views in glorious fall weather. We didn't use any filters on any of these photos, by the way. The light and the colors were perfect. We just hiked from the bottom of the canyon to Upper Whiteoak Falls, which was about a six miles round trip, but you can also reach the Upper Whiteoak Falls in about an hour's hike off Skyline Drive. It's definitely worth the effort.
We also purchased our annual pass, which will give us free entrance to all the national parks and federal recreational lands across the US from the rest of our trip. The best thing $80 can buy, if you ask us, quite apart from the fact that it has a polar bear on the front, which made Shane happy. This is only our first national park and we've already used it three times in Shenandoah!
Author
Kathryn
Categories
Authors
Kathryn Tully and Shane Sesta are a married couple, one American and one Brit, who are spending a year traveling across America and writing about their discoveries. Sonny is their rescue cat and fried chicken aficionado.
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