TurtleTooBlog: Oct 16 2011 TurtleToo is now a motorhome

It has been a couple of years away from this blog deal - I quit after I read J Steinbeck's Travels With Charley and realized this writing about traveling stuff had all been done before, there is nothing original on this earth, and what was I doing wasting my time? Just go read the book! And it felt a little funny being in two places at once - where I was, and here, writing about it. You can't be in two places at once. And...who the heck cares? We all have our lives and they're plenty interesting and entirely unique, so what was I doing pretending to have something to say? Just spinning my wheels.

But at least the blog was real, unlike watching TV shows where actors are playing parts created by writers - this blog is kinda the other way around...writing about what we did...so, dear readers, as long as the prose holds up, a few minutes reading this is looking into a virtual window to another world...a real one. And...I found out that some of Steinbeck's book was also made up. This ain't. Not much editing either, obviously!

I was also getting a little paranoid with us on the road, location disclosed, and our house back in Wilmington open for theft, wreckage, etc.

We fixed that part...we sold the house about a month ago, sold/gave away lots of stuff - I mean OUR STUFF!...but Tempus Fugit and there is no way to go but forward. I think it was Jesus who sail that if you get your foot caught in a bear trap, you need to chew off your leg. It wasn't easy - took 2 months from when we put the place up on the block until the deal closed, and in those 2 months we divested ourselves of lots of material shackles - bye bye, right? We sold stuff cheap but fair enough that everybody was happy.

bye bye, house...

I watch the sun set with regret that the day is over and will never be back, but I greet the sunrise with curiosity for the future - always a surprise, always an unwrapping gift. Sleeping at night is never easy.

A couple of years ago we got a little motorhome, a 2006 21' Roadtrek RS Adventurous, featuring a Mercedes Sprinter body with a 5 cylinder diesel that purrs the 4 tons along at about 25-30 mpg as we hypermile the thing - slow but sure, TurtleToo-style. It is like an oversized VW bus but with all the comforts, as long as you don't ask for much. After a couple of years driving it around the USA for a few months at a time we were home though Hell - let's just up and go and not come back! Sell the shack! Actually, it was V's idea, but after a couple of weeks it became obvious that we had to do it if we were going to move forward. The tough part is parting with the past - immigrants had done it when they emigrated, for instance...and what happens to your stuff when you're dead? Might as well not hang on to it while you're alive - living is the precious thing.

TurtleToo...
So in the last month we have been trying to wash the taste of the past out of our mouth...you ever heard the joke where the kid asks his Pop what their dog is doing licking his butt, and Pop answers the dog just ate the supper table scrap leftovers and is trying to get the taste out of his mouth? It isn't like that, but the joke is too good to not share, however irrelevant.

We spent a few weeks wandering the NC/TN/VA mountains and rivers, then we made it up near DC for my dear Mama's 91st birthday - she's not that old, really... We've been here a couple of weeks visiting my deal old Mama and Aunt up near DC...and visiting with brothers and soon with sister and all their significant others, legal or otherwise.

Dear Mama wanted me to delete this picture...

The Potomac River runs from Cumberland MD to DC, and George Washington envisioned a canal along the river and it got built between 1828-1850, 185 miles long, running along the river and through the woods. The canal has like 80 locks and a half dozen aquaducts where the canal was on a bridge over creeks, and it goes through a tunnel maybe 1/4 mile long. The canal turned a profit for a few years with more than 500 canal boats per year loaded with coal and other raw materials going one way and finished products the other way, pulled by pairs of mules walking along a towpath. If you have been to DC and were awed by the grand structures and monuments and edifices...I suggest you check out the canal - from my perspective, it outdoes all the rest of them. The Civil War was fought along it, so it appeals to nature lovers, engineers and war freaks. I identify with the first two - the 3rd is too ghastly to talk about...and was fought over slavery, pure and simple.

My brother talked about the canal and I thought I'd check it out - there was a weather window of opportunity of about 6 days, so I borrowed his space blanket and Thermarest ground pad, and I took a mexican blanket and a few clothes and took off on my folding bike with little 20" wheels and long seat and handlebar posts - kind of like a clown bike in a circus. I only wore flip flops and figured I'd spend a few nights under the stars, get some exercise, see what this canal was about. V didn't want to go - she sensed trouble with the whole half-baked slow motion impulsive what-the-heck air of it all, and she wanted to spend some time with my Mama. We had talked about this sort of thing- there would be times when I'd take off and she wouldn't want to go.

Men are stupid, but they are often strong enough to overcome their weak minds. Women are physically weaker but they are smarter, and they have the sense to know when to say when.

The canal and towpath are now a National Park with campgrounds and water pumps and porta-potties every 5-10 miles, little informative signs, etc., so it was a legitimate idea to see it.

I took off outa DC (Georgetown) Thursday afternoon and fumbled along with a flopping knapsack hanging off the handlebars and the rest piled on the back. All went well for a few miles before I took a wrong turn and lost the towpath in favor of an uphill asphalt bike trail with wizzing-by spandex helmeted urbanites who ignored me, so obviously out of place in this social lexicon...so I went back down to the canal towpath, made of dirt, gravel and mud, with bigger rocks, tree roots, etc.

Soft towpath upslope with canal to the right...

The little-wheeled clown bike doesn't deal well with those obstacles, and bouncing and swerving and bogging down into quagmires...all the while pedaling on a slight upgrade made the ride rather arduous. The bike has an 8 speed internal-geared rear wheel, and I never got it over 3rd gear, dropping into 2nd or 1st for the ugly spots and up the steeper short hills at the locks, rarely faster than 7-8 mph, never coasting…and after maybe 4 hours and 25 miles I was getting pretty disgusted with the whole situation...and tired! - I wasn't in decent shape, wasn't dressed right, the bike was slow, not much to eat or drink except lousy shallow well pump water and with no good idea of where to get more provisions. Other bike riders sailed past me in both directions, happily greeting and waving. Delirium was starting to set in and I became a little more reckless...the towpath was sometimes built 10-15' or more above dropoffs on either side, and while attempting to pedal around the edge of an especially daunting morass the front wheel buried in the mud and I was pitched over the side and headlong down the cliff, avoiding big rocks by chance. I lay there and took physical, mental and spiritual inventory...found everything lacking, and then got up and pedaled on to Mile 38 to one of those campgrounds as the sun set. I got a little fire going, ate a sardine w/mustard sandwich, etc, and dreamed weird things until dawn. It got down to the low 40s, and the thin Mexican blanket helped, along with raincoat w/hood and rainpants to hold in the heat. With no tent the sky was right there and the owls were busy making a racket.

Morning of Day 2...

Day 2, Friday morning I dumped Quick Oats into a cup, mixed in some pump water and swallered it down cold - tasted wonderful. Getting sore muscles going, I resumed the uphill slog through the woods, etc with the canal on one side and deep woods and cliffs and sometimes the Potomac in view, but mostly the early autumn foliage blocked the view. I came to the town of Brunswick and went to the grocery store, pushing the bike a mile or 2 up a steep hill to buy more sardines and bread and a half gallon of chocolate milk, which flowed into my sore, trembling body like an elixir - I thought of baby cows being nourished. Continuing on to around Mile 60, I came to Harper's Ferry, where the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers meet, the P from the East, the S from the West. It turns out the S is muddy while the P is fairly clear, so downstream the P-S mix is muddy, but the P alone is more beautiful to me...and the towpath was in better shape!

Harper's Ferry, Shenandoah River (L) meets Potomac under bridge

Not so deep in the woods, it was drier. Things were looking up...and the scenery was more spectacular. I stopped cussing my brother and blaming the world for my sorrows and started appreciating things. Maybe 10 miles up from there I came upon a couple of elderly gents in proper pedaling togs chatting by a lock. I stopped and inquired as to public transportation from Cumberland back to DC and they told me about a bus station and an Amtrak station and assured me I could catch a train with my bike - so I could pedal the whole canal in another 115 miles or so and see the whole thing!

My brother had suggested I turn around at about mile 85, where construction on the towpath to rebuild a collapsed cliff required a detour on roads, but I continued on the detour and back to the trail, to mile 102 before the sun set. There were a couple of campgrounds along the final 10 mile stretch, but they were occupied and I'm not one to share in such close proximity with no tent, so as night fell I found an old fallen-in house with nearly level ground back in the woods and hid out there. Similar supper and breakfast.

Packed and ready to go..

Day 3, Saturday dawned with my legs on fire and barely able to stand, my flip-flop feet bruised, my tail blistered, my hands locked, my shoulders and neck stiff and sore, with a headache... but my idiot mind celebrating being alive and feeling all the confusion of civilized, normal behavior falling away, so I got going again and pedaled all day, digging out every pedal up the slope, never coasting, bouncing and bogging. Bikes with normal-size wheels aren't as affected by every nuance on the trail - the bigger diameter wheels don't meet the road at such a sharp angle and float more easily over obstacles, while my clown bike skittered and shook and shocked like a fawn.

Lock and lockmaster's ($600/year pay) house (rent free)...

I pedaled the 83 miles to Cumberland, arriving at dusk, bought a 24oz can of Milwaukee's Best Ice beer at a gas station and inquired as to the Amtrak station. At the station I was informed that Cumberland was not a baggage stop, that they didn't accept bikes. With my body more than exhausted - it was hurt...I asked where I could put the bike on the train...Pittsburgh! How about the bus? No bus in Cumberland! Get away from here!

I found a bridge to hide under along the river and tried to sleep on sharp, fist-size railroad rocks with my legs screaming whenever they touched anything as police cars patrolled every hour and thick fog felt cold and wet, but safe. What to do? Hitchhike back to DC with the bike, maybe call V to rescue me? All the while I pedaled uphill to Cumberland I longed to pedal downhill, and it seemed that if I could ignore myself I could pedal back easier and see the sights from the other direction and get a better sense of it all.

So I did...87 miles Sunday, 67 miles Monday, 30 miles Tuesday at noon to DC… Each day my body hurt more than the last, but my spirits were high.

One of a half dozen dams on Potomac to feed water into canal...

The point I'm trying to make is that a body is just a vehicle to take the spirit around - the spirit is in charge. The spirit comes first. This trip was great for the spirit. Beyond the pale, above the fray, out of the human aquarium, if only through sheer effort.

Canal and towpath headed into Georgetown, National Cathedral spires...

One night as I set up camp along the river an eagle flew into a tree above to spend the night. One morning it dawned with a beaver chewing on grasses 20’ away. Geese and ducks…wood ducks, mallards…groups of deer, a bear disappeared into the woods just ahead. Big fish jumping out of the river...a sore body pales in the face of all that.