The other day, I was wondering roughly how far some of the places I've been are from home. So I said why don't I use a bulls-eye style multi-layer buffer, and make circles every 25 miles from home out 500 miles. The farthest I've been away from home in the past decade is West Virginia and the Blue Ridge Parkway, which is almost 500 miles away as the crows eye sees.
The 1,200 shots I took along my autumn road trip. Rural Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, Blue Ridge Parkway.
The 1,200 shots I took along my autumn road trip. Rural Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, Blue Ridge Parkway.
Apparently NY 812, Indian River Road up between the Tug Hill, St. Lawerence Flat Lands and Adirondack Hilltowns is New York's most lonely road. I've driven it before -- years ago -- but never spent much time up in that area, because I wasn't aware of what kind of camping opporunties exist in the Frank Jadwin State Forest and other nearby state lands. I should really get back up there. And yes, US 219 north of Thomas WV is beautiful, but I'd hardly call it lonely. PA 36 out of Punxsy, often very straight but hilly and remote coal country, would classify on my list of very lonely roads, although certainly not as flat as Western Penna.
What can I say, life is full of smells, some good, some a little more offensive.
Mike Pence on his dairy farm channel often jokes about smell-o-vision, so one can enjoy the good and bad smells of life on a dairy farm from freshly chopped silage and hay to manure to sour silage. No smell-a-vision here either, only words.
Driving down along Interstate 88 you could smell the semi-trucks and diesel fuel and exhaust. Trucks certainly can smell although with the cleaner diesels not so much.
Silage has a very sweet smell when it’s freshly chopped. It’s a very farm-like smell but a nice smell.
Hard to go many places in Upstate New York or Pennsylvania in good farm country and not smell cows and the even more pungent smell of cow manure.
Paper plants have a distinctive sulfur smell. It’s really obnoxious if your not used to it, almost makes your eyes want to water and wonder when it.
Lots of folks in rural Pennsylvania burn their garbage. It’s a pungent, sharp smell, chemical but in some ways depending what folks are burning on a particular day, not that pungent.
Oil wells in the Allegheny National Forest have a distinctive oil-smell like you might smell during an oil change, only sweeter. Sweet crude has a very distinctive smell.
Oil refineries smell a lot like the oil wells, although maybe a lot stronger and sweeter. I wouldn’t say oil or oil refinery exactly smells bad but it sure is pungent.
Some of the chicken and turkey farms have a particularly earthy smell. Maybe not that pungent but what you might normally smell in a chicken barn.
Anthracite coal and especially bituminous coal has a very distinctive smell. It smells like coal, somewhat like burning garbage or kerosene but not as strong or acrid.
A lot of trailers and rural households use kerosene because it’s can be purchased and transported in a regular gas can, and works in both portable heaters and some small heaters in mobile homes. Kind of pungent sulfurly smell, but very different then coal.
Coal power plants have a coal smell, a bit of a sulfury, mechanical smell. A smell like old machinery and coal.
Moorefield and Keyser West Viriginia are home to many large chicken and turkey processing plants. Depending on the breeze, they can be pungent, reminding me a lot of smell of raw meat you might get at the store.
Landfills have a methane smell that is more chemical, more bleachy or toxic smelling from the landfill methane. Definately a lot more sour and less sweet then what you might smell on a farm or from sweet crude oil
A lot of households in rural Pennsylvania also heat with wood. Generally wood is a pretty pleasant smell although it depends on the concentration and what exactly folks are burning.
The rain got stronger in the forecast and the drought worse in West Viriginia 💦 — there is a fire ban in the Monongahela National Forest, making me think maybe I don’t want to camp in 40 degrees weather in October without a rip roaring fire 🔥 even with the heater and some cold beer and something good cooking in the camp oven 🍻. Then I was thinking about starting vacation in Allegheny National Forest and taking US 219 maybe on Tuesday to Canaan Heights (even if it means a night or two camping without a fire) but that’s a long trip out of the way, although both Maryland High Point and Mount Davis (Highest Point in PA) are on that way. Some of the neat old coal towns are along that way too, always fun to poke around after hoping off US 219. ⛏
But I want to get down to West Virignia by Monday at the latest, as I want to drive down to the New River Gorge on Tuesday. 🌉 So ain’t going to work necessarily well. So option 2 would be to first camp at County Bridge Campground in Pennsylvania, take Interstate 99 and US 220 and camp at Camp Run which is in the George Washington National Forest, which has had a little more rain and there is no campfire ban there.🔥🌧
But then it looks like Monday will be fairly wet, and I was a bit concerned about flooding on the road to Camp Run, as the campground is a ways above a Flood Control dam. Plus no radio or cellphone reception down there — so if I’m But now I don’t think it’s going to be quite as wet, so that’s the route I’ll take. Worse comes to worse, I might get stuck there a few extra days, but it’s unlikely. 🏕 It’s probably the shortest route, then on Monday or Tuesday, I’ll drive to New River Gorge, stay there one or probably two nights, then head back north. And heck, I might take US 219 and end my vacation in the Allegheny National Forest — and hit Mount Davis and Hoye Crest up that way.
I don’t know, I think I will choose the Allegheny National Forest option to start out the week.🌲🌲 I’ve been there a lot but not in the autumn for a number of years. Then I could decide either to go to West Virginia via the US 219 or head north to New York. There might be very good color in Allegany and Cattaragaus County this week, and beautiful weather to boot. Small game hunting opportunities too. I wouldn’t mind a nice autumn hike back to Zoar Valley, Allegany State Park, Little Rock City, Letchworth State Park, and maybe even the Finger Lakes.
Google Maps can tell you how to get from Point A to Point B, but it’s absolutely lousy at helping you select a route to take.