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Posts Tagged ‘Tim Cahill’

Adopted for Two Days

Posted in Adventures With Pepper, Favorite Places, Travel, Writing, tagged , , , , , , on October 17, 2012| 6 Comments »

            “A journey is best measured in friends, rather than miles.”—Tim Cahill

One of two ponds at the entrance to Carthage Gap RV Park. — Photo by Pat Bean

Adventures with Pepper: Day 26

            What I didn’t tell you about my drive yesterday were my concerns about where I would spend the night.

Brandy, sort of my granddaughter for a weekend, in the costume her mom made for her. The outfit included a hook and specially braided hair. — Photo by Kim

I hadn’t seen an RV park all day, and my campground directory listed only one near the end of my day’s drive.  It was the Carthage Gap RV Park outside of Coolville, Ohio.

I was worriedly hoping it would be a nice, safe, clean place because I didn’t fancy driving another 100 miles. I’m happy to tell you my hopes were met — and then some.

The park was located in a beautiful setting, and the staff was enthusiastically friendly when I checked in for two nights. The manager explained that I had come just in time to experience the park’s early Halloween celebration. She offered me the option of being in the middle of the large park, or of hooking up in an isolated section.

I guess I was sort of people hungry at this point in the trip because I chose the small site in the middle of it all.

After the park manager led me to it, and guided me as I backed into the squeezed space, she introduced me to my next door neighbor, Kim.

“She’s one of our seasonals,” the manager said, then hurried off to help other RVers get settled for the busy weekend.

Kim became my guardian angel for the next two days, taking me under her warm wing and adopting me into her brood, which included parents, a sister, a niece, a husband and a daughter. They lived not too far away and their travel trailer was almost permanently parked at the scenic campground, I learned.

The brood had all gathered this weekend for the spook celebration, which is an annual event at the park.

I was the family’s guest at the Halloween potluck dinner that preceded the trick or treating the next night. And I got to sit around their campfire as candy was handed out to the many young treat-or-treaters. The most unusual costume of the night, I thought, was the young boy dressed as a railroad crossing. As a mom, I was never that inventive. My kids were usually witches, hobos or ghosts, things that didn’t require any sewing on their mom’s part.

The second pond at the park. — Photo by Pat Bean

Kim’s daughter, Brandy, was one of the trick or treaters.            “Just wait until you see my niece’s costume,” Tracy had said at dinner. “My sister’s an excellent seamstress and can sew up anything.”

I waited. Tracy was right. Brandy was the most lavishly dressed pirate I think I’ve ever seen.

Since Kim had officially adopted me into the family for the weekend, Brandy felt like a granddaughter, of which I have eight.

I left Carthage Gap with great memories tucked away in the brain’s rolodex. And a bit homesick for my own family, too.

Book Report: Travels with Maggie is still stuck. Too much traveling – I’m currently on the Blue Ridge Parkway in my journey and driving 100 miles takes five hours. I need to settle for a day soon and catch up.

Bean’s Pat: Couch surfing in India http://mymeanderingtrail.com/ This travel blogger, who writes about hiking the Appalachian Trail, is a good model for Tim Cahill’s quote about the journey being more about the people you meet than the miles. And about the kind of concerns all travelers who get off the beaten path endure — and overcome.

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Favorites: Travel Books

Posted in Books, Travel, Wildflowers, Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on August 1, 2012| 7 Comments »

 “The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.” – St. Augustine

Ten of Hundreds

 

Lake Powell, which destroyed Glen Canyon and which wouldn’t ever have existed if Edward Abbey’s “Monkey Wrench Gang” characters had anything to say about it. — Photo by Pat Bean

I won’t say these are my 10 favorite travel books, because I could name 10 more just as easily. But these are books that influenced my decision to become rootless and make the road my home for the past eight years.

I Married Adventure, 1940, by Osa Johnson. I picked this book up at the library when I was about 10 years old. I was always sneaking into the adult section. I think I already knew I had wanderlust, and this book simply confirmed it. I, too, wanted adventure.

Blue Highways by William Least Heat Moon. My 22-foot RV, Gypsy Lee, is my version of Moon’s green van, Ghost Dancing. I loved this book so much that I’ve given dozens of copies away as gifts. The green-dotted scenic byways marked on today’s maps are my blue highways.

Road Fever, by Tim Cahill, I have loved everything this Wyoming author has written, especially this book that details a 15,000-mile trip from Tierra del Fuego to the top of Alaska. I’ve read everything this author has written that I could come across, including his many Outside magazine stories.

A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson. This book fueled my desire to walk the Appalachian Trail, but except for a few miles on various sections it’s a to-do list item that I’ve waited too long to get around to doing. But I still have time to hike at least a few more miles on this trail whenever I come across one of its many trailheads.

One of Charles Kuralt’s more popular “On the Road” episodes wat the time he hooked up with a botanist to put names to all the wildflowers he was seeing, like this fireweed. — Photo by Pat Bean

Travels With Charley by John Steinbeck. I read this book many years ago, but reread it when I took to the road in 2004. My wordsmith friend, Charlie Trentelman, mentioned that I was the female version of Steinbeck, thus the title of my travel book, “Travels With Maggie.” Thank you Steinbeck.

On the Road with Charles Kuralt. Charles Kuralt was also influenced by Steinbeck. Kuralt, meanwhile, is actually the traveler most like me. We were both journalists, and we both prefer looking at life’s brighter side. I cried when Kuralt died, and one of my favorite travel photos is of his “On the Road” RV that’s on exhibit at the Henry Ford Museum.

The Snow Leopard, by Peter Matthieson. A fantastic writer who makes one think. This book brought the Himalayas to life for me. I was privileged to have once heard this author speak.

Out of Africa by Isek Dinesen. Like Osa Johnson, this book made me want to travel to Africa. Not only did I do that in 2007, I visited Dinesen’s former coffee plantation in Nairobi.

Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey. While I loved this book, Abbey’s “The Monkey Wrench Gang” is my favorite of all that he has written. It, too, could be considered a travel book in that it includes awesome descriptions of Utah and Arizona’s red-rock landscape.

The Great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux. No travel book collection would be complete without Theroux. This is my favorite of his many.

Book Report: Busy morning, then a four-hour lunch with a group of mostly crazy old broads, whose Bay of Pigs nickname rivals my former group of crazy old broad friends called the Murder of Crows, that I wouldn’t have missed for the world. It comes under my umbrella mantra of smelling all the flowers and grabbing all the gusto this life has to offer. While I will do some editing as part of the rewrite of my travel book late this afternoon, I doubt I will add any significant word count. It’s the story of my writing life, conflicting goals. The good thing is that I no longer flagellate myself for such lapses.

Bean’s Pat: Photos and Facets; http://tinyurl.com/ckpfxer No! It’s not the London Bridge you’ve been seeing on television.

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Jack Kerouac: His Writing Perplexes Me

Posted in Birds, Nature, Travel, tagged , , , , , , , , on June 10, 2011| 2 Comments »

A yellow-headed blackbird seen on my morning walk with Maggie makes me go "Awww!" -- Photo by Pat Bean

 “The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the muddle you see the blue center light pop and everybody goes ‘Awww!’” – Jack Kerouac

Travels With Maggie

Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road,” is listed in almost every version of the 100 Best Travel Books. And on all of the various lists I’ve come across in recent years, I’ve read well over 50 percent of the selections.

But I haven’t read “On the Road.” That is I’ve never finished it. I’ve started the book several times but have never gotten beyond a few pages before laying it down and forgetting about it.

While there are quite a few of Kerouac’s quotes in my journal, such as the one above that I absolutely love, I can’t connect with this author like I do with say Tim Cahill, who has me rolling on the floor with laughter, or Charles Kuralt, whom I consider my travel soul mate, or John Steinbeck, whose down to earth writing draws me into his circle, especially since he writes about traveling with his poodle, Charley, and I write about traveling with my cocker spaniel, Maggie.

But I don’t, except for an occasional quote, get Jack. I keep thinking I will if I just read more than a few pages of “On the Road.”

Perhaps one day I will. Perhaps I’ll even find that copy of his book I bought a few years back to give it a fifth or sixth try. It was at least the third copy of “On the Road” that I’ve bought over the years, and I honestly have no idea where it is now.

And a patch of colorful pansies lights up my eyes as well as a fireworks display. -- Photo by Pat Bean

I recently read a book in which needful books kept turning up magically for one of the characters. I wonder what it means when books disappear. Or how come I can’t get into a book that so many other people think is a great classic.

Perplexing questions to which I have no answer. But I do love Kerouac’s above quote. It’s a whole book in itself.

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