Travel Archives

February 2, 2013August 24, 2015

Old Man’s Cave

I don’t care how much you like your job, there are days when you get hit with the “I gotta get outta town blues.” The great thing about being a newspaper photographer was that you had a ready-made excuse to cruise. When I got that “gotta get out of Athens” feeling, I’d either call Ruthie, our Logan bureau reporter, and say “Need anything shot in Hocking County?” or I’d tell Messenger Photographers Chuck or Bob, “I’m headed up to Logan today.” Nobody much cared where you went so long as you brought back a picture for the next day’s paper.

Hocking County was the home of Old Man’s Cave, one of the most peaceful places I’ve ever been. Even if other people were around, the gorge twisted and turned so much that it gave you the feeling of being alone. It was a place of beauty in any season, but it became magical when the dripping water and waterfalls turned to ice in the winter.

Lila had a winner

There was some kind of photojournalism conference in Ohio where spouses could enter a photo contest. Wife Lila selected this one shot at Old Man’s Cave on April 20, 1970. I’ve always liked the image of a child running across the bridge at the bottom of the gorge. Unfortunately, we arrived too late to get the photo entered. You don’t need some judge to give it a ribbon, it’s a winner in my book. I’d be happy to have MY name under it.

A younger Ken at Devil’s Bathtub

She also caught a much younger me photographing the Devil’s Bathtub.

The Bathtub looks the same

The Devil’s Bathtub looks much the same in 2013. I, alas, do not.

Fun to share with friends

No telling how many people I hauled up to the area during my stay in Athens. Even though it took us quite a few miles off our path from Ohio to Cape, I couldn’t resist giving Friend Jan a look at the place.

Coincidences

I had another case of those get outta town blues in the early 1970s in Florida. I took off with no destination in mind. Lila either couldn’t come with me or she saw the crazy look in my eyes and decided this might be a trip better taken solo. I picked roads at random until I finally ended up on Cedar Key, a tiny spit of land sticking out into the Gulf of Mexico more than half-way up the state.

Walking down the main (probably only) drag, I thought I spotted a familiar face. It turned out to be former Central High School debate partner John Mueller. He had the same desire to escape from his job reporting for the Associated Press in Tallahassee as I had to get away from The Palm Beach Post for a weekend.

There is no telling where Cape Girardeans will turn up.

Grandma Gatewood

This is also the place I shot Grandma Gatewood when part of the trail was dedicated to her.

Photo gallery of Old Man’s Cave

Black and white photos were taken in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The color shots were from our recent visit January 24, 2013. Click on any photo to make it larger, then click on the left or right side of the image to move through the gallery.

January 31, 2013

Gateway Arch and Goodbye

Friend Jan and I had planned to visit St. Louis’ Gateway Arch Tuesday, but the torrential rains kept us from our goal. We got to the site too close to her departure time for her to see the movie on the building of the structure, one of my favorites, but she did get to walk around it taking photos.

You have to lick the arch

I tried to convince her that it was tradition that newcomers to the arch had to lick it. Daughter-in-Law Sarah must have warned her about that gambit, because she got close enough to tease the arch, but not close enough to give it a healthy lick.

Turned down tram ride

I think she was ready to take the 4-minute tram ride to the top of the arch despite all the horror stories about claustrophobia and getting stuck. Ready, that is, until she got into a mock-up and realized that she’d be sharing that small space with four other riders.

I got the feeling her togetherness quota had already been exceeded on this trip.

Time to wave goodbye

Eleven days, 2,422 miles and nine states after we started our trek, it was time to put her on a plane back to sunny Florida. She made her escape just in time. Shortly before I dropped her off, I noticed some white pellets on my blue jacket that weren’t dandruff. The wind picked up and the white stuff kept coming down harder. It wasn’t sticking yet, but there was enough of it to blow around in the roadway.

I met with some folks about a possible St. Louis photo exhibit, then went to dinner with Friend Shari. When we got out of the restaurant, the stuff was still coming down and I had ice on the windshield. That’s when I decided to stay at Brother Mark’s house one more night rather than chance finding a slick spot on the way back to Cape.

Is this going to work out?

To be honest, before we left Florida, I wasn’t sure how this pairing was going to work out. Sure, we had worked and biked with each other for years, but being trapped in a car with someone for days is another thing. That’s why Wife Lila flies back home and I drive.

After it was all over, Jan and I are still speaking each other. She and Mother bonded. (I’d wake up in the morning hearing they chattering away in the kitchen like magpies.) I even noticed a few times when Jan said, “The next time I come back….”

Photo Gallery of the Last Day

Here are some pictures of Jan’s last day in Missouri and the Gateway Arch. Click on any photo to make it larger, then click on the left or right side of the image to move through the gallery.

January 30, 2013January 25, 2016

Storm Is Jan’s Fault

My road trip partner, Jan, a native Floridian, wanted to experience all the things she’s never seen in the Sunshine State. She got to shiver through sub-zero wind chills, freezing rain, snow and ice. Somebody joked that maybe she’d get to hear tornado sirens before she flew out of St. Louis on Wednesday.

They didn’t know how right they were. She and Mother went on a pecan search, then we dropped by Annie Laurie’s, planned to eat at the Pie Safe in Pocahontas (but they were closed), stopped in at the Altenburg museum where Carla and Gerard convinced us to go to the Mississippi Mud for the best cheeseburger around. It was.

On the way north, Brother Mark encouraged us to stop at the St. Mary’s Antique Mall. After about 30 minutes, I told Jan I’d take a nap in the car and she could take as long as she wanted. She said a group of women came back into the mall to report “there’s a man sleeping in a car with Florida tags with the lights on.”

They were right on all counts. My car battery was tested and passed.

Rain as bad as as a hurricane

Twenty-five miles south of St. Louis, the sky turned dead black, the winds booted us all around and we hit a wall of water. I’ve covered 13 hurricanes and had four pass over our house, so I’m a pretty good judge of rain. This was as bad as any hurricane I ever drove through. On top of that, when I was covering tropical storms, I was the only dumb fool on the road. Today’s rain caught us at evening rush hour.

When I called Cape to tell Mother we had arrived safely, she said she was hunkered down in the basement after telling our neighbors who don’t have a basement that she was going to leave the front door unlocked. “I’ve never heard the wind roar like that,” she said.

When I checked with her later, she said the wind had passed, but there was still thunder and lightning in the area. She heard a loud thump on the roof, but she won’t know what broke off the maple trees on the side of the house until morning.

Please, Jan, don’t ask to experience an earthquake before you get on the plane.

[Note: that’s a file photo of lightning. I was trying too hard to keep us alive to think about shooting pictures.]

January 27, 2013January 25, 2016

Drive In and Drive On

After we left Athens, Ohio, I wanted to pass through some of my old haunts, so we headed north toward Nelsonville, Logan and Old Man’s Cave. Just past the 595 exit on Rt. 33, I looked to the right and spotted the remains of the Hocking Theater. I was going too fast to stop, so I blew right past it. Knowing that there are a couple of readers who are drive-in nuts, I drove five miles to the next exit to turn around and head back to it.

I probably should have gotten off at the 595 exit and gone exploring like this guy did in 2003, but we had miles to go, so I made do with a shot from the main road. (You can click on it to make it larger.)

It’s in both better AND worse shape than the drive-in at Bloymeyer.

Bad vibes at No-Tell Motel

I’ll write about some of our other Ohio stops, but I’ll jump ahead to our search for a motel in Louisville, Ky.

Friend and passenger Jan Norris told me before we left on our grand journey that she likes to plan where she’s going to stay. I said that my plans change on a whim, so I drive until I get tired, then start looking for the best place at the lowest price. We agreed to be flexible.

When it became obvious that we weren’t going to make it into Cape before midnight, and because the weather forecasts all called for ugly stuff to start falling out of the sky around midnight and to continue on through the night, I told her to set her sights on Louisville. She pulled out her computer and, with much pecking and pausing, announced that she had found us two inexpensive, highly-reviewed, non-smoking rooms in a chain hotel that had been recently remodeled.

Jan’s going to check it out

When we pulled into the parking lot, I noticed several things: the parking lot was almost empty; the curtains had that “old” look, and the metal-clad doors had an awful lot of dents and dings in them. Jan said she’d ask to look at a room before we committed.

My bad vibes multiplied when a sign on the lobby directed us to another door where we had to talk to the clerk through a slit in what looked like bulletproof glass. She wouldn’t give us a key to inspect a room unless I left my driver’s license as security. I don’t know if she thought we were a couple of AARP members in search of a free spot to unleash our passions or if she was afraid we were going to steal the towels. Given our wrung-out, road-worn looks, I’m going to put my money on the latter.

The room was about half a block away, give or take, and on the third floor reachable by an elevator that had graffiti scratches on the walls. The rooms all opened to the outside, so it was a cold, windy walk. The room itself was clean, but so small you couldn’t have swung a bob-tailed cat in it.

We both reached the same conclusion: it was time to move on. I told Jan I’d get the car and warm it up while she got my license back. I only regret that she didn’t return the key to the desk clerk smoking a cigarette and sporting a glow and a big smile. Maybe then she wouldn’t have been strip-searched for hidden towels.