Road Trip!

Ah. Lovely Waynesboro, Virginia. And what better time to drive there from Chicago than late September?

Jeff and I have made this trip many times, and only once in the past have we stopped overnight either to or from. That was many years ago when Jeff came down with pneumonia and the drive back to Chicago was just too tiring for the both of us to attempt in one day. This time, though, we decided to take a couple days to drive down to Virginia and a couple days to drive back. Take our time. Slow down a bit and enjoy the scenery. So we did.

On the way down, we stopped for the night at Carter Caves State Resort Park in eastern Kentucky. There are two caves open to the public there (and many more on park land--most of them used to be open to cavers with permits, but the white-nose syndrome has become such a threat to local bats that such excursions have been halted for now): Cascade Cave and X Cave. We arrived in time to tour the latter. It was a small but interesting cave, formed when the bore holes of two streams met, forming an X, literally. One of the passages is highly decorated, and the other is very sparse and spartan. I wish I had photos to show, but alas! I discovered all too late that I had left my data card at home, and the gift shop did not carry them. Sigh.

At any rate, here's a set of photos I found on flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dandeeshots/sets/72157617560136344/

Many thanks to DanDee!

It was a rainy, rainy night, but the lodge was comfortable and boasted a decent restaurant.

The next morning dawned foggily, and I worried that the mist would interfere with my morning driving plans, but by the time we reached Charleston and left the interstate for U.S. 60, most of the fog had burned off. At first I didn't think much of the scenery of this "scenic drive." The road hugged a river, the opposite bank of which sported mills and shacks and, well, lots of the accouterments one associates with Appalachia... and not in a good way. But as the road veered away from the river and climbed higher into the hills, the scenery improved. And the frequency of hairpin turns increased. Finally, we got to Hawks Nest, a lofty perch overlooking the New River Gorge. Of course, no photos--still hadn't found a data card--but well worth the detour.

We had hoped to be able to check out the Mystery Hole, which is located along highway 60 near Hawks Nest, but alas! It was closed! But here's the beauty part: When I got to Waynesboro, my BFF Barb presented me with a lovely sweatshirt from there! Yea! At least I have the appropriate apparel should I ever be lucky enough to pass that way again and find the attraction up and running.

We rolled into Waynesboro in plenty of time to take Mom to dinner.

The highlight of the weekend was a gathering of Fools to eat pizza and attend the production of Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street featuring the incomparable Barbara Spilman Lawson as Mrs. Lovett. It was an accomplished production, with the leads (Brian Holsopple played Sweeney Todd) bringing performances that would have been welcome on any major stage in the world. It was great to spend a bit of time with old friends and see a wonderful, creepy play in the bargain.

We were a bit early for the full fall color display, but we did manage to catch a few glimpses of what was in store for the valley a few weeks on:



Jeff and I strolled around the old neighborhood and down to the park, where we discovered that the old boat ramp was returning to its natural state and hosting a few ducks to boot.



And of course we enjoyed Sunday brunch in Staunton with Mom and brother John. We went to the Clocktower, where they prepared our omelets to order. Tasty. We rolled out of there more than satisfied.



We headed back to Chicago on Tuesday, breaking for the night at Batesville, Indiana, where we ate at the historic Sherman House. Good German food to be had here!

We got home in the early afternoon on Wednesday, weary and ready to rest from the road. For a while. Only for a while.

Fall Foliage and More

A couple of weeks ago Jeff and I took a brief road trip down to Waynesboro, VA to visit my mom and our pals there and to take in the glorious local Fall Foliage Festival. If you've been following this blog for more than a year, you know this is an annual pilgrimage for me, but Jeff hadn't been down to Virginia for this weekend for eleven years. It just never worked out, vacation-wise, for him. But this year--yea!

We started the festival off at the pancake breakfast, served in the social hall of Main Street Methodist Church. What memories that room has, as it was the venue for many a Junior Girls Choir practice. That's where I met Barb and Susan (aka, Chibby), who were to become my fast friends through the vicissitudes of junior high school, and beyond. And this year the pancake breakfast proved to be a reunion of sorts, with Susan and Laura--a fellow former Young Fool, now a psychologist--providing some of the entertainment.


That's Laura on the left, Susan on the right. They sang folky duets, including an old Girl Scout camp fave, "Walk, Shepherdess, Walk." I'd forgotten the song completely until they began singing it, and every word came back.

Barb met us there, and Susan's mom joined our merry band as well--we were the fun table.

That's my mom, of course, mugging for the camera.

After the breakfast, we headed down Main Street hill to the legendary art show.

There, at the fabulous Ed Brownlee booth, we met up with Beth and Cortney to check out the ceramics.



And check them out, we did:


Barb found a couple of kindred spirits and spirited them home with her.


Jeff and I each bought our own ceramic jar. Mine has insane bunnies on it, as you can see:


And Jeff's has a sad ghost.


It didn't take long for us to walk off our pancakes and sausage among the many booths of photography, ceramics, pottery, watercolors, glassware... and I really should have taken a picture of the guitar-playin' dude in the purple suit. He had flowing curly blond locks that he threw back in ecstasy as he strummed, his long teeth bared in the rictus of what can only be called orgasmic pleasure. Or pride. Or pain? But anyway, before we knew it, we were lining up for some fried rice.


Alas, we did not partake of the sacred funnel cake at this festival, but it was available had we wanted to. As always, Barb, this snap's for you:


Notice the shorts on the dame in the picture above? Everyone was dressed for summer. It was well into the 70s--maybe even 80 degrees. As I noted last year, that seemed way too warm for early October in the Shenandoah Valley. In fact, I have a picture of myself about 20 years ago at the FFF, and I'm wearing a sweatshirt, jeans, and a thick corduroy jacket. And a hat! Times have changed, or at least, the climate has. Everyone was in shirtsleeves, including Beth, who also seems to have a spindle sticking out of her cranium.

In reality, it is the steeple of the aforementioned Main Street Methodist Church.

There were other, more troubling changes to the Big W... for example, I found this sign to be rather disconcerting for a returning ex-pat:


Yikes!

Well, the bulk of the fall foliage pictures (and there ARE more than the mere teaser at the top of this post) will have to wait for the next entry.

Time to get some shut-eye. I'll have more tomorrow or the next day...

More WV State Fair Shenanigans

Here is the "more" I promised yesterday evening.

As many state fairgoers can attest, there is more to a fair than the midway. There is the "buy stuff" hall (featured briefly in yesterday's installment). Then there is the craft hall. The craft hall had lots of quilts hanging from the ceiling, but the one that caught my eye was this, the quilt of presidents:



I hope you can see it in all its nephew-art splendor--some of the prezzies are hard to identify without their nametags. All snittiness aside, I do think it is a noble effort at quiltery. It did give me just a bit of pause that W's dates in office have been rendered as "2000-200 " with no end date given. I can only hope that indicates the quilter was hoping against hope that s/he could insert a pre-2009 date for the end of the nimrod-in-chief's term.

There was a seal show that we missed, but we were just in time for the photo-op.



They were charging folks ten smackeroos to have their pictures taken with the placid pinnipeds, but I snapped this photo gratis...

As I still had my braces on, I couldn't avail myself of this foodstand, much as I wanted to:



Note the helpful signage.

To divert my attention from golden ears of corn slathered in rich creamery butter, we headed to the livestock barns to see what was up. We watched the heiffer judging for a while:



This little guy and his heiffer were a class of one, as were several other entrants. No matter, each received a ribbon right from the hands of the dairy princess, who appeared to have had enough of the entire enterprise:



To be fair (at the fair--get it?), she'd probably been looking at heiffers of one sort or another all day long.

Next, we proceded to the horse barn, where Beth made an equine friend:



We went into the swine barn (which the porcines shared with the goats). The goats were stinky. Really stinky. The pigs were kind of stinky, but nowhere near as stinky as the goats. And who couldn't love this sweet face?



The rabbits were next. The first bunny to catch our eye was this guy, a Flemish Giant:



Since there is nothing in the photo to provide a size reference, you are going to have to trust me on this--this guy was BIG. He (or she, didn't note which gender) was every bit as big as Shelly, our 15-pound fluffy divacat. If not more so. As you can see, I uploaded a big version of the bun to try to approximate the rabbity splendor.

Then there was this guy, some kind of angora rabbit:



Or a tribble.

We wanted to see the poultry next--as I have seen chickens at both the Virginia and New York state fairs with amazing fountainesque crests and feathers that look like the tribble's--I mean, the bunny's--fur, but they had canceled the poultry exhibit this year due to concerns about avian flu. Well, better safe than sorry, I guess. But dag.

As night fell and soft lights began to play on the souvenir stands,



a cheezy oldies band took the stage. Their first number? "Oh What a Night." Indeed.



At least their dinner jackets are sparkly.

The bloke whose job it is to goad passersby until they pay to try to soak him took his place on his precarious platform.



He had the patter down, but the real source of annoyance was his nasal, Haskellesque laugh. Ugh. We did see him get soaked, though. Twice in a row. Heh.

There is something magical about a carnival midway at night. The peeling paint and rickety-looking nuts, bolts, and beams recede into the darkness, and the lights just take over:



The lights can't obscure the torture-chamber aspect of some of these thrill rides, though. Note the giant four-toed claw that not only swings patrons up and down as if they are affixed to a sideways pendulum, but whirls them around and back and forth and you name the direction, they are getting shunted in it, feet dangling and hands clutching their harnesses for dear life. Can you pick out the ride I'm describing?



Now look to the left, at that ride nestled within the archway of golden incandescence. That is the flying saucer ride, where they herd the willing victims into a centrifuge and spin the living crap out of them. Here's the warning sign posted in front of said attractive nuisance (I'm uploading a large version in the hope that you will be able to read it):



Please note the additional warning someone has written in: "Low Suger" (sic) in a faded circle with slash.

At least they offered the tame and pleasantly retro Tilt-a-Whirl



And, naturally, you cannot have a midway without a carousel.



Not nearly as imposing or utterly creepy as the one at House on the Rock, but sweet and kid-sized. And you can actually RIDE this one.

Footsore and weary, we reluctantly left the midway and headed back toward the BAV, our sojourn at the West Virginia State Fair over for this year.



Cheers!

The Lure of the Midway

About a week and half ago, Jeff and I managed to wrangle some time off from work, and we headed down to Virginia for an all too quick visit with my mom, my brother, and our very great pals Barb and Beth, and their sweeties Charlie and Cortney. The weekend happened to include Barb and Charlie's daughter Jenni's birthday (she's 14--damn, does that make me feel OLD!), and a portion of the festivities included a road trip to the West Virginia State Fair where Jenni and her pal Summer could ride the rides and scream their lungs out while ogling Corbin Bleu. Now, until that very weekend, I had no idea who this Corbin Bleu fellow was--hermit that I am. But I was put wise, pronto.

At any rate, on Friday, August 17, Jeff and I found ourselves tooling west on I-64 with Barb, Beth, Cortney, Jenni, Summer, and Stacy (who came along to wrangle the teens), bound for Lewisburg in Barb's BAV (Big-Ass Vehicle). Our destination:



Lights! Action! Souvenirs!

Now, I have only attended two other state fairs in my life (well, multiple times for each): the Virginia State Fair and the New York State Fair. The West Virginia State Fair is smaller than either of those--about double the size of a decent county fair. But that doesn't mean it didn't pack lots of amusment into a petite package (as state fairs go).

Of course, there were the rides--guaranteed to make everyone over the age of 16 sick as a dog:



There were the ubiquitous funnel cakes (this picture is for YOU, Barb!):



There was the hall of commerce, where you could buy all kinds of funky things, such as Bat Boy...



And the sparkly goodness of blown glass.



Just in case you're wondering, this is what a West Virginia State Fair glassblower looks like (he's the one on the left... I think...):



Beth and Barb succumbed to the high-tech siren song of the handwriting analysis computer:



And just in case you are wondering what the West Virginia State Fair handwriting analysis computer looks like, well, it looks an awful lot like the handwriting analysis computer that graced the Virginia State Fair in the '70s and the New York State Fair in the '80s, right down to its operator. Except now it is bilingual:



Soft-serve ice cream was touted on the midway...



As were games...



Cortney won Beth a nice prize at the pick up the duck game--a game that requires a steady hand and a steely resolve:



Then there was the dime-toss game. Check out these guys. We decided that they were headed to a wedding, forgot to get a gift, and decided to stop by the state fair to win some fine glassware before the ceremony:



There was one game with no carney barking for it... lonely and deserted. We couldn't figure out what the hell it was, except for its skeery name:



This was probably the worst juxtaposition of attractions on the midway proper--The Bible Story and Face Painting tent placed right in front of the Mardi Gras funhouse:



Just in case you can't see what's painted in technicolor splendor on the facade of said funhouse, here is a closer look:



Good lord! Think of the children!!

And speaking of children, here's a kiddie ride I could have been persuaded to try, had I only purchased any ride tickets:



Alas, the one thing this midway lacked was any kind of sideshow. I realize that freak shows are a thing of the distant past, but where the heck was Ooka, the woman who turned into a gorilla before your very eyes? Where was the world's littlest horse? Where were the hootchie-cootchie girls? Nowhere to be found at the West Virginia State Fair. So Beth did her best to make up for the lack of general weirdness:



Well, this is getting long, and I have more pictures with which to regale my readership: exhibitions, foodstuffs, LIVESTOCK! And the midway at night. Stay tuned for more!