New Shoes, Air Pollution.

Carole and I drove up to Asheville on Sunday so that I could find a pair of new hiking shoes. My old reliable Merrell shoes finally gave up the ghost. The treads were worn down to the point where I had begun to feel the stab of rock edges as I hiked. They were a great pair of shoes, but they had to go.

I had done a bit of shopping online to find a new pair of boots and did a lot of reading for some good shoes that would give me what I need in that type of footwear. I ended up settling--at least in theory--on the Oboz Firebrand2. I could have ordered them online, but I opted to go shopping and find a place where I could try them on to see what the fit was like and get the feel of them before committing to a purchase. The only place I know of that carries that brand is the Mast General Store.

Since we generally enjoy trips to Asheville we decided on the Mast store there rather than going to one of the other branches. As usual, we arrived in Asheville to massive crowds. There is always one sort of festival or march or demonstration going on there, and Sunday was no exception. I think the heavy burst of population was due to some kind of gay rights push, but we weren't sure. It made parking a tad more difficult (but not by much) and didn't have any effect at all on our shopping, nor any kind of wait at our favorite pizza restaurant there.

After we made some purchases, got lunch, and returned to Carole's car, we decided to head over to the Black Mountain Campground (National Forest facility) by way of the Blue Ridge Parkway. The views from the Parkway and nearby peaks were hampered considerably by resurgent air pollution--courtesy of our current Mother Nature-raping administration. The weather was warm, but not nearly as hellish as in Huntersville. Still, the high country was a good 10-15 degrees above normal for this time of year.

My intention was to catch the South Toe River Road (Forest Service) down to the campground. But it is still closed due to flooding damage from well over a year ago. Our government can find money to piss down the Pentagon rathole, but not for repairing our parks and National Forests. Instead I went over to the intersection of the Blue Ridge Parkway and NC 80 and took that down to the campground. After checking it out we then headed over to Old Fort NC and to the Curtis Creek Campground which is also a National Forest facility, but which is not blocked by gates due to road damage. We want to plan camping trips to both of these places so we needed to look at them to decide roughly where we'd want to park our Casita travel trailer when we go.

After that we called it a day and went back to the Interstate to drive home. All in all, we accomplished most of what we wanted to do, but the diminishing air quality that we witnessed was yet another reminder that global warming and mass extinction loom over everything. If you like our wild places, my suggestion is to do as we do and see as much of it as possible before it's all dead.

At the hiking shoe department in the big Mast General Store in Asheville.

What I bought there. Not the most attractive hiking shoe, but functionally what I need.

 

The Mellow Mushroom. Our favorite pizza joint in Asheville.

The Blue Ridge Parkway at a point where I pulled off to get a few photos.

Colors starting to change for Autumn. I was able to mitigate the hazy air pollution via editing software.

A small tributary of Curtis Creek.

This little one was in the creek at my feet. Very tiny.

 

Salamander Eggs

While I was hanging out at Hunt Fish Falls I noticed some weird-looking stuff floating in a pothole out on the bare granite expanses below the main falls. These are places where small stones and grains of sand have worn out circular depressions and holes in the granite face. This particular pothole was about two feet across and about the same depth. It was full of water and floating in that water were a couple of clusters of what were obviously eggs of some type.

I figured that they were amphibian eggs, but I don't know much about such things and wasn't sure. And they could have been any type of amphibian for all I knew. So I took some video and photographs and when I got back I showed them to some of my online pals who are far more knowledgeable abut these things.

The consensus is that they're obviously salamander eggs. But as to the exact species--that's up in the air. It would be nice if they're Hellbenders, which are our largest species of salamander here in the NC mountains. I've never actually seen a Hellbender, and it would be nice to think that I got to see literally hundreds of Hellbender embryos floating in that little pool of water.

Here I am on the exposed rock below the falls. This rock is riddled with many potholes. It was in one such pothole that I saw the clusters of eggs.

Here is a macro shot I took of a single egg. The eggs looked to be absolutely perfect little spheres, and in the center of each sphere was a forming embryo soon to become a baby salamander.

The eggs.


A better view of both masses. Each cluster was about the size of a soccer ball.

The Salamander!

Carole loves to take train rides. We've been on a few one-day jaunts, mainly in the mountains of North Carolina and West Virginia. Since most passenger train service is gone from that area, the only places to enjoy such an experience are where some public/private concerns have taken over short bits of rail lines, paid out the money for the purchase and upkeep of the necessary engines and rail cars, and instituted a tourist ride.


We found one such outfit in Elkins, West Virginia and promptly booked a couple of tickets. The day we went the weather was quite nasty, so we knew we weren't going to get any hiking and picnicking done. The price of the tickets included a buffet lunch, so we didn't even have to pack that. All we had to bring were some spare jackets (for rain), the camera, and a tripod. And off we went!

We took the Salamander, so named because of the endangered Cheat Mountain salamander. So they tagged it onto the official name for the line. The city of Elkins has refurbished the old train station--it's quite pleasant to look at and inside there is a museum, ticket office, information kiosk, a shop, and rest rooms.

We arrived for our ride at 9:30 am, and boarded the train at 10:00 am. After that, we were on our way!

The station in downtown Elkins, WV.

The choo-choo train!

The "green" car, and my sweet wife already making friends with the couple behind us before we can even sit down.

This guy was our guide and entertainment for the ride. He had a lot of cool history and information about our route and the cool stuff along it.

A rough section of whitewater taken through the window along the ride. The water appears "dirty" but in fact this river is one of the ten cleanest in the USA. The color is from tannins produced by tens of thousands of years of the drop of hemlock and spruce needles into the soil.

An abandoned rail bridge and rail line we pass along the way.

The most scenic destination on the ride: The High Falls of the Cheat River. They are called "high" not because of the height of the falls (only about 15 feet), but because they are located so high on the river--about 3,000 feet elevation. Also, they're not technically on the Cheat River, but on the Shavers Fork of the Cheat, which runs into the Cheat River. Because of the heavy rain, the volume of water going over the falls was very impressive.

Below the Falls.

Self-portrait in the rain. The rocks were VERY slick! If you go, be careful! It was really starting to pour down so I had to hurry this shot and get the camera dry.

The falls from above.


Video from above High Falls of the Cheat River.

The dining car where we were served sandwiches buffet style. The sandwiches were very good! Lots to drink, too. Tea, water, lemonade, coffee, hot chocolate, etc. And fruit and cookies, also.

These were once for men working on the rail lines. The company would drop them off with a couple of cooks and food and they would work the lines. Later, a train would stop to pick them up. After the line was abandoned, these houses were bought by individuals and are now private. Access is pretty much either by arranging a ride on the Salamander, or hiking in, or getting the Forest Service to unlock a gate on a primitive road. Our guide told us that he sees the owners using these two houses only a few times per year. They are extremely isolated.

The end of the line where the engine detached and reversed the train. It's called The Cheat Bridge.

We all got out to stretch our legs while the engine made its changes.

This is what happens when kids live in an isolated village with a population of 20. This car was stolen by some local teens in Bemis. Really. Only about twenty people live there year-round. The few kids were bored. So they hiked out, found this car, boosted it, drove it around for awhile and then somehow aimed it straight down the mountain and maneuvered it through the forest down a 40-degree slope and crashed it here next to the train track. The final impact set off the airbags. No one has yet been able to figure out how to get it the hell out of its current location. Despite appearances, this is not a road, but just a patch of green out in the middle of nowhere. I assume the insurance folk will just consider it totaled and pay the owners off.

And here is Carole getting off the train as we arrive back in Elkins!