Stuck In Harriman, Tennessee

10/26/12:  We started home a week ago.  The boat is wrapped for the winter, it was getting cold in mid-coast Maine, and a local bank was advertising, "Loans for winter heating oil."  We drive over some of our favorite Maine country roads through low rolling hills covered in trees clothed in gold and orange leaves, and through the quaint old river towns of Wiscasset and Bath, dotted with New England church steeples.

At Brunswick we get onto the interstate and then onto toll roads, crossing the bridge with Kittery, Maine at one end and Portsmouth, New Hmapshire at the other.  It is windy and raining, but we are heading for California sunshine!  We pass Lawrence, Massachusttes, an old mill town where my daughter Katherine's Harvard roommate and friend, Nicole, grew up and is now a teacher.  The smoke stacks and red brick mill buildings still stand, largely deserted now.  We bypass Boston.  As dusk descends we are on the Massachusetts Turnpike and the fall folige is brilliant in the waning light of the day - full of the reds we did not see in Maine, along with oranges and golds.

The next morning when we get on the road, the sky is clear and the ground hugs pockets of evaporating fog in its hollows.  Along both sides of the highway trees crowd together, garbed in fiery fall foliage.  We are in Connecticut, passing red brick towns: Waterbury, Middlebury, Southbury.  Soon we are in New York State, paralleling the Hudson River.  There is a big barge being towed by a tug boat on the river - right where we will be sailing next spring.

The New York roads are as poorly maintained as the ones in California - we feel at home, dodging the potholes!  Our route edges us by New York City with signs: "Welcome to the Bronx," "Henry Hudson Parkway," "Welcome to Manhattan," and we are happy that it is not a work day when the roads would be jammed.  We drive on an ancient highway under the George Washington Bridge, and around and around, until we are up on the old suspension bridge, across the Hudson River and into New Jersey.  We pass through some of the more unattractive parts of New Jersey, highlighted by belching smoke, and a dreary wasteland of the detritus of industry before we move into the beautiful forested hills of rural New Jersey - the land where Washington crossed the Delaware.

Into Pennsylvania and across the Delaware River, through long, low hills covered in golden and green-leaved forests and valleys of farmland with domed grain silos.  We are in Pennsylvania Dutch country with pristine farms but also many fields of drought-stunted corn.  Now it is across the   Mason-Dixon Line and into Maryland where we spend the night in Hagerstown.

Searching for my caffeine fix the next morning, we see a bit of Hagerstown, which seems to be an old coal town, a classic northeastern industrial town.  There are so many different churches all over Hagerstown, one after the other.  It is hard to believe they were once filled with different ethnic religious sects of worshippers who came from all over Europe to seek their fortunes in America.  Brick is everywhere and in all architectural styles.  We pass many brick rowhouses: some are Victorian with decorative bay windows and plaster gingerbread, some are severe brick facades but with welcoming wooden front porches to soften them, some are more modern townhouses.
Back on the freeway, we pass a turnoff to the Civil War battle site of Antietam, and another to the "C&O Canal" (the Chesapeake and Ohio).  On through West Virginia and into Virginia.  There are signs to the "Shenandoah Battlefields," to "Stonewall Jackson's Office," to "George Washington's Office."  We drive through the wide Shenandoah Valley on our way to the Blue Ridge Mountains.  The valley has huge systems of underground caverns, and giant holes in the ground that people base jump into; the hills are covered with millions of trees. 


Hills covered in fall foliage

We enter the 450-mile Blue Ridge Parkway through Shenandoah National Park.  It is a sunny day with puffs of white clouds.  We open the roof of the Tracker and cruise along the two-lane road: through fall-leaved forests, and by low stone walls built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930's, with stops at scenic overlooks of the Shenandoah Valley and of endless hills covered by millions and millions of trees in all shades of the fall colors. 



An overlook along the Blue Ridge Parkway

We exit the national park, and the next day continue on the Blue Ridge Parkway through autumn-hued hardwood forests and views across the valleys of millions upon millions of deciduous trees of many shades marching over hills that stretch to the horizon. 



Lower tier of Crabtree Falls

We detour on a windy mountain road for a short walk to the five-tiers of Crabtree Falls.  Back again on the parkway, we start to see some evergreens, and move into lower altitudes with open farmland and homes amid the forestland.


That night we decide it is time to leave the parkway and head west for home.  We will pick up the Blue Ridge Parkway from the other end when we return next spring.  OMG, we are 123 miles from Nashville on an upgrade on Interstate 40 when the Tracker's engine blows.  This is serious engine failure; the new water pump has disintegrated, the radiator is melted, and the engine is toast.  We are stuck in Harriman, Tennessee for at least a week while we wait for the arrival of a low-mileage, used Tracker engine that Conrad orders, and it's installation.  Fortunately we are both OK and the garage that will fix the Tracker appears to have excellent mechanics.  Harriman is small but it is in pretty country.

Harriman, Tennessee

Our laptop crashed before we left Maine, so I can't download photographs to the blog; the car is out of commission, so we can't go home.  Yikes!  At least the people here at the Days Inn are giving us a deal on the room and letting me use the computer in the lobby, although the ability to send emails does not appear to be with in its capacity....



Back in the Land of the Living

10/12/12: At last we have some answers about Conrad's health.  After a summer of feeling punk, he was finally feeling so awful that he contacted his doctor in Stockton who sent him off to the local Emergency Room.  With the small population here and the nearby upscale communities of Camden and Rockport, the local hospital is quite small, but excellent.  Conrad only waited for a matter of minutes before he saw a doctor and was put through a battery of tests that ruled out leukemia, an undetected heart attack, or any damage to his kidneys, liver, heart and lungs.  After dodging all of that, almost anything sounds like good news!

But no wonder he has been feeling lousy - he's extremely anemic.  His red blood cells were way low and very small.  He stayed in the hospital overnight, and had a transfusion of three units of blood.  The doctor suspected internal bleeding in his stomach; put him out and ran a camera down his throat and into his stomach.  No bleeding in his stomach so they let him out of the hospital, and told him to have a colonoscopy when he is back in California.  His red blood cell count is still below normal, and he is now on high dosages of iron and vitamin C to take care of that.  Finally we know why he has been so tired, frequently dizzy, out of breath after the slightest exertion, and generally feeling like crap for many months.  Since the transfusions, Conrad is full of energy, and is hard at work trying to make up lost time on the boat.  He is focused on completing the AC wiring and finishing new compartments for the boat batteries in the lazerette (the space beneath the cockpit floor) before we call an end to work for this year.  Our rent at 7 Mountains Motel is paid through October18th, and then we'll head for home.

A house in historic Rockport

With fall here, it is raining frequently, day and night, and we are having the first nighttime temperatures below freezing.  Sadly, the rain knocked most of the leaves off of the trees before the cold snap set them afire.  No spectacular fall colors in Maine for us, alas.  Still, it is gorgeous, and on the days it is clear, I walk miles through the quiet streets and low hills of this historic town of Rockport, established in 1769.  My walks take me by lovely old homes (like the one above), many dating from the mid-1800's.  I especially like all of the dry rock walls everywhere (like the one below).

Dry rock wall in a Rockport garden

There are only about 3,000 residents in Rockport, and what a pretty place to live.  Much less touristy than its next-door-neighbor, Camden, the "village"of Rockport has only a few retail establishments, including an occasionally open gift shop "Uncommon Luxuries" (the items are limited and pricey), a photograph gallery, a wine shop, a coffee bar located in someone's home, a seafood store, an excellent restaurant, plus the post office, the library, and the old Rockport Opera House.

Rockport Harbor

Andree, the seal

Rockport Harbor lies below the town, and is filled with moored, as well as moving, sailboats, lobster boats and two, many-masted schooners that take passengers out for long weekends.  There is a stone statute of Andree, the seal, who became a local fisherman's pet; returning to Rockport Harbor every spring where he was doted upon by locals and tourists alike, until he died of old age.

Old lime kilns at Rockport Harbor

Old kilns at the harbor are preserved to show the history of the limestone transported by train from local quarries and dumped into the top of kilns where coal fires below super-heated the stone.  After the lime was leached out, it was put into barrels, loaded on ships in the harbor, and sent to Boston and New York to be used in plaster and mortar.  This continued into the early 1900's.

Rockport Opera House stage and decorative screen

A hike up the hillside from the harbor takes me past the old Rockport Opera House where in early October the free Bay Chamber Music Fall Foliage Concert gave me a chance to see the handsome, historic interior of the opera house with its elaborately painted, period screen on the stage, and the curved second-floor balcony.

Balcony of the Rockport Opera House.

Just up the street from the opera house I discover the Rockport Public Library with free WiFi, free computer use, a paperback book lending library, and the usual hardbacks, and DVD's, along with comfy wing chairs to curl up in while reading.  Of course, now that we've been here since August 23rd, it takes me until October to find that a Mah Jongg group meets at the library Wednesday nights and Saturday mornings.  I have the opportunity to play with them four times before heading back to my much missed Stockton Mah Jongg group.



My newest discovery is Three Dogs Cafe, a great place to hang out that is only blocks away from our motel..  I still cannot get used to how things are done here in terms of locations for public and private enterprises.  The local DMV is out in the country where you'd least expect it, so is the large local furniture store, and Three Dogs Cafe is along a busy two-lane highway with no other retail places near it.

Matthew shows off a few of the pastries at Three Dogs Cafe

Fireplace at Three Dogs Cafe

 The Three Dogs Cafe parking lot is hidden behind the building where the parked cars aren't visible from the street.  Only from curiosity and boredom was I drawn, after many weeks at the motel, to walk up the driveway.  What a surprise - inside is a large, airy, high-beamed room with a double-sided stone fireplace that heats the entire place in winter; tables and chairs for dining on one side of the fireplace, and sofas and armchairs on the other.  There are three life-sized, stuffed animals - "three dogs" - inside the cafe, and in the yard next door are the real ones: a black labrador, a chocolate lab, and a golden.  The pastry counter that is at least twenty feet long is filled with cakes, pies, cookies - a dangerous place to visit!  They offer free WiFi and wonderful salads, sandwiches, and soups like lobster and crab chowder, and coffee drinks to satisfy my caffeine soul.  The wing chairs covered with fabric picturing labradors are a perfect place to spend a few hours with a book, computer or postcards to write, and a cup of coffee.

Mary Forristall making OFA calls from her Camden home

I also have a new circle of women pals who meet three nights a week at a local home to make calls for OFA, President Obama's re-election campaign.  Maine has four electoral votes that are handled entirely differently from California's - two of the votes here go to the candidate who wins the most votes in the state; each of the others is allotted to the two Congressional districts.  Whichever Presidential candidate wins the most votes in a district gets the electoral vote of that district.  Although Maine generally is blue in Presidential elections, there are Republican vote-getters on the ground this time in rural Maine's Second Congressional District.  Usually we would be making calls into New Hampshire, but this year we are making calls into Maine's Second District.  Thursday night Mary and the gang are throwing a potluck good-by party for me, and it will be my last night of making calls until I'm back in Stockton   See everyone at home soon!