Ohio (part 1)

Last night I uploaded all the photos from my recent Ohio excursion. Now I just have to link to them here and possibly weave some sort of interesting (or even boring) details and/or narrative among them. Due to the number of pictures involved I'm not going to post them all at once—instead I will provide logical installments as I get to them. But first an intro piece...

Despite current gas prices I drove from New Jersey to Ohio. I am not a flyer—just am not comfortable with the concept—and anyway by the time you factor in the cost of a last minute round-trip airline ticket and have someone on the other end go an hour or more out of their way to some airport to pick you up (and then back, plus the same dropoff trip for departure) I figure it was worth it to simply drive. That way I have a vehicle to use while I'm there and besides which, I actually enjoy driving and seeing the sites along the way at a leisurely pace (if you can call 75 mph "leisurely").

It's about 600 miles one way and just a little under half of that distance is spent on the semi-famous Pennsylvania Turnpike (♪♫ "I know this superhighway..." ♪♫). Heading west I take the NJ turnpike (very briefly) to the Delaware River Bridge and enter the PA turnpike, staying on it until exit 75 at New Stanton (class 1 vehicle toll $16.75 and a distance of 283.5 miles according to the PA Turnpike toll & mileage calculator).

Along the way there is some beautiful mountainous scenery, especially as you get farther west, but unfortunately I was unable to take any pictures since I was preoccupied with, you know, driving. There are rest stops every 30 miles or so, but none seemed to be at any particularly scenic overlook that would yield some good pics.

Before reaching the New Stanton exit I pass through three tunnels: Blue Mountain, Kittatinny, and Tuscarora. (Here's a good history of the PA Turnpike with some focus on its tunnels.) Even though tunnels aren't the least bit scenic, there's just something about travelling through them that is fascinating. I guess it's because where I live is flat and there just aren't any. Also, it might be the realization of all the planning and labor that went into such a feat of modern engineering.

So after leaving the PA Turnpike (no toll roads from here on out) it's on to I-70 which leaves PA, passes very briefly through the northern-most tip of West Virginia, and then completely traverses Ohio, though I exit after passing through Columbus. Or should have, anyway, but that's where I made my one wrong turn. I was supposed to stay on I-70 to I-270 to Route 33. Instead I saw an I-70 exit sign for Route 33 and took it. Only after leaving I-70, did I discover that my mistake put me on Route 33 east when I obviously wanted west. I tried to get turned around to Route 33 west, but the roads didn't seem designed to easily allow that. Apparently Columbus is a well-known interchange trouble spot for out-of-towners traveling through.

Rather than continuing and getting even more lost, I did the un-male thing and stopped and asked a Value City distribution center security guard for directions to get me to Route 33 west. He was very helpful and got me going with confidence again. (Although he started out telling me some convoluted directions—admitting up-front that there'd be some tricky turns—before switching tacks and telling me I could just simply head back up the road I came in on which would get me to Route 33 west in just a mile or two. I recall thinking to myself "Yeah, let's just try that" once he got to explaining the simpler method.) So I ended up traveling directly through downtown Columbus with all its slow speeds and traffic lights, but at least I knew I was headed in the right direction. Once I left Columbus the speed picked up again, but I'd added about an hour to my overall travel time. Oh well. I don't worry about such minor detours as I know in the end I'll figure it out and get where I need to be. Eventually I reached I-75 for the last very brief leg of my journey.

I arrived at my cousin Dave's "farm" (as they call it) just around sunset. Dave and his family actually live in Cincinnati, but my cousin-in-law Dan, who has been staying at the farm while doing numerous renovations and odd jobs, met me at the exit from I-75 and escorted me the last mile or so. In fact, Dan's work was the reason for me going out there—to be some company and assistance. Not that I'm that handy with tools or have any great experience, but I do my best and try to be more help than hindrance (though often I wonder). And some tasks just simply require at least two people. If nothing else, I figured I'd be able to call 911 if Dan fell off a roof or something.

The farm is just south of Lima, which itself is positioned toward the western border of the state about halfway between the northern- and southern-most borders. The town is very rural, but only a stone's throw from bustling Lima. Lima is known from way back in the day for the Lima Locomotive Works (see also Wikipedia) where many of the great and powerful locomotives of rail's glory years were produced. Sadly (though inevitably), those days are of course long past and the LLW itself is no longer a presence.

OK, enough trivia—on to the pics (and subsequent trip-related posts should be mostly pics with minimal commentary, I promise)...


First up are shots of the farm. The house out front is where Dave's tenants live. Dan and I stayed in the apartment over the garage in the back. The other building behind the house and to the right is the tractor barn. There's one view of the "back yard" and a couple shots of the back side of the buildings...

     

     

     


Lima, and Ohio in general, is still prime railroad area. There are lots of tracks and frequent freight traffic, though it seems to move more at night than in the daytime. I would think that must be by design to minimize delays and hazards to folks going to/from work or school and to generally try to minimize the annoyance to drivers. The negative side of it, though, is that I don't know how folks who live closer to the railroad tracks—some homes are right next to RR crossings—can stand the noise, especially of the multiple train horn warnings at all hours of the night! They must either be deaf or have extremely well insulated and sealed homes.

If you include the length of the driveway the farm is half a mile from the RR crossing. I'm a light sleeper so at first the train horns woke me up, but after a little while I did get somewhat used to it. It helped that the new windows Dan had put in the place are very well sealed to keep the warning blasts to a manageable decibel level. Another half mile beyond the RR crossing is a bridge over the RR tracks and I walked to it a few times in hopes of getting some train shots from above, but I never hit upon the right timing.

I should mention that while I enjoy the sight of a train now and then, my brother is the big train enthusiast of the family. I was mostly trying to get some good shots for him, but didn't really succeed. The one time I caught a train coming through the crossing I happened to be on the opposite side from where the sun was positioned so the shots came out too dark. Here's what I got, plus a shot of the tracks from on the bridge...

     




Dave is a Methodist minister and a collector of John Deere tractors (as well as other assorted JD equipment/accessories). Those two points aren't really related, but I just wanted to mention that the last shot here is of one of Dave's congregation who came up with him from Cincinnati so he could run one of the tractors to mow the field out back. Apparently Al grew up around John Deere tractors, but hadn't ridden one in a long time and he wanted to experience the feeling once again. He seemed quite pleased with the pic I took...

     

     




Well, that's more than enough for one post. Stay tuned for more installments (with visuals) in the coming week detailing my Ohio experience.