Our Trail of Two Cities

One way you can tell that you’ve been on the road for a while: the names of cities start repeating themselves. Our day started in Portland, Maine and we started this trip in Portland, Oregon. We sailed across Lake Champlain from Burlington, Vermont, but also have visited Burlington, North Carolina. And so it goes. Maybe there’s just a shortage of good city names, but we’ve already been through two Berlins, and the list expands daily. So a repetition of city names is as predictable as the recurring carpet of big-box and national-chain stores ringing every metropolis.

Portland was a refreshing stop along the way, but we ditched our plan to spend two days there. For one thing, we discovered the worst motel we’ve stayed in for years, the Howard Johnson. Trouble should have suggested itself right at check-in, where we learned that although we were in a non-smoking wing, smoking was indeed allowed in the lobby and in many of the rooms. That would not have surprised us had we noted the numerous semi tractors (the front part of trucks) that built up over the evening in the parking lot. Oh great. A truckers’ hotel! How bad was it? The mediocrity of this place can best be exemplified by the quality of the paper cups. Once you put something into one, you had about one minute to drink it; after this time your beverage began to slowly seep out through the seams! It was my fondest desire to fill a couple of these up and leave them on the check-in counter, but this potential prank remained merely a vengeful fantasy. Suffice it to say that HoJo hotels have a prominent place, right at the top, of the “No Stay” list.

We did have a lovely dining experience that evening in the old port. The city is a very industrial, working port with a lot of energy expended on the export of seafood. There also appear to be a smattering of hi-tech startup companies, and with the presence of a new and quite immense Whole Foods and a thoroughly modern Trader Joe’s, the condo boom surely is not far off. Vintage brick buildings and warehouses have been repurposed into attractive shops, breweries, restaurants and offices, and some of the wharfs have been reimagined as the bases for condos that jut into the harbor. J’s Oysters, located on a pier, delivered a great meal at a very reasonable price, starting with six oysters for $6.75. These, we learned, came from Chesapeake Bay, the reason being that Maine oysters are quite small, and are not what most people expect to see on their plate. They were incredibly fresh (apparently they go through over 1,000 of these a day.) I indulged in a steamed lobster dinner, which was described as “soft shell.” That meant something to me, having wrestled to separate the meat of Andrea’s lobster the previous night in Gloucester from the rock-hard shell. This must have something to do with the molting cycle; at any rate, rest assured that soft shell is the way to go. This also came with a passel of steamed clams that were outstanding and stole the show from the lobster. We dined outside under a canopy, and had an unbroken view of the harbor lights and a nearby floating restaurant. Portland ME seems like a city in development (Hampton Inns is putting up a substantial hotel right near the port, and I am sure more will follow.)

Andrea had dropped the Rochester, NY stay out of our trip and decided to substitute Lake Placid instead. This turned out to be a stroke of genius; after a rather jostling start on I-95 and a series of toll booths, we ended up on I-89 and streaked through the glorious emptiness and vastness of the New Hampshire and Vermont countryside, populated mostly by trees. The Green Mountains loomed up along the way, and the views migrated from merely lovely to spectacular as we sprinted towards Burlington. This town is dominated by the University of Vermont, as evidenced by a half dozen pizza places on the main drag, but we headed right to the Lake Champlain Ferry. After a wait of about 45 minutes (we sipped on a beer and a strange Bloody Mary with dehydrated garlic specks in it,) the  modest-sized, open-deck ferry pulled in and unloaded. We drove on and the boat departed, about half full. When we boarded the weather was muggy, sunny and hot, but storm clouds loomed over the lake; by the midpoint it started to rain lightly, and then gained intensity. We saw lightning strikes in the distance over the New York mountains, and had to retreat to our car for the latter half of the cruise. About an hour later our car was disgorged into the foothills of the Adirondacks.

What followed was a shockingly scenic drive that we had not anticipated. The route followed the Ausable River (originally known as the Au Sable.) It twists and flows across rocky terrain, resulting in spectacular formations (Ausable Gorge,) numerous falls and scenic vistas at every turn. It is apparently quite an angler’s paradise as well. I found myself pulling over every few miles for another photo, some of which are shown here. Keeseville is the home of the Adirondack Architectural Heritage group, and they are housed in a historic building surrounded by many others. The river runs right through the town and produces some spectacular rapids. The Hollywood Theater exemplifies the “frozen in time” look of the place. It’s right off the NY Thruway, so drop in if you are ever flying through. The pleasure of this drive only increased as we passed through Wilmington and beneath Whiteface Mountain, a substantial mountain with multiple ski runs. This town is full of resorts and quasi-rustic motels that seemed quite well maintained; if I return to this area I would likely avail myself of their attractions. The only strange thing about the route is the near-complete lack of any place to stop and look over the river and its environs. This speaks to a complete lack of imagination on the part of New York Lake Placid itself seems more like an Alpine village than a piece of Americana. We walked along the edge of Mirror Lake and then up and down most of the main drag, lined with restaurants and shops. We even bought a tchotchke (photo to follow.) Dinner was at Lake Placid Pub and Brewery, a funky establishment on a side street. The food and brew were both excellent, which can not always be said about pubs, especially when it comes to the dining fare.

What was not so nice were the screaming kids. This lead me to think about their behavior; I reached the conclusion that the youngsters were merely imitating their elders. Bring a kid into a restaurant with chaotic noise and music pounding away, and their inclination will be to do what most of us do, which is to raise our voices to be heard. I decided that it is a bit sadistic to bring a child into this setting and then expect them to ‘behave.’ Given that the service was languid, the experience was drawn out, and until the food arrived and little mouths were stuffed, the shrieks and screams were periodically emitted. Fortunately the feeding calmed them down; you’d think we’d hate the place, but the opposite is true. And this is the best beer I’ve had since leaving “the real” Portland!

Sun of a Beach

on the porch at the cottage

It's time to end our radio silence after several days of kicking back at "the Beach." We're now parked in Gloucester, Massachusetts at the summer cottage of Andrea's childhood-and-ever-since friend Ronni. She inherited it from her parents Joe and Ruth. Joe Solman was a painter and graphic artist of note (if you've been in our place in Portland you've seen a tiny portion of his work, including a portrait of Andrea's mother Marie.) This cottage, along with other locales in Gloucester and Rockport produced inspiration and subject matter for many of his later creations.  It is ever-so-cooler here, but hardly shiver-inducing, with highs in the eighties and lows in the 60's. This is a few degrees below what we experienced in Bethany Beach, Delaware. I can hear all you sun lovers saying, "Get over it, it is called SUMMER." And so it is, so I will stop complaining about the high humidity that blankets you with a microfilm of ooze at all times, and the sun, Mean Mister Sun, who top-broils your arms and neck in a flash. I think that living in Portland, OR has permanently lowered my heat tolerance, so nearly every place else feels too hot to be optimum. I hold out hope for Portland Maine.

cocktail sauce. So elusive!

One thing we did do in Bethany Beach and environs was to eat (I am sure this comes as a great surprise.) Two meals in a single day combined to provide us with one of the most unusual back-to-back eating experiences possible. Lunch was at a new place called Just Hooked, and both the menu and the setting were quite promising, with fresh seafood and salads, very moderate pricing and comfortable, well-spaced seating. Our server introduced herself as Amy, and promptly spilled a tray of rather large, icy water glasses all over the table. Other than a momentary threat to an iPhone, all was well, and we were reseated at a nicer, round table by the windows. Amy returned and this time successfully furnished the ensemble with ice cold waters. We by now had enough time to peruse the selections; several of us ordered the crab cake sandwich, which comes on a brioche roll baked in house as well as slaw and garlic chips (also all house made,) and "is served with tartar sauce, cocktail sauce and ketchup." I quote. Very attractive, fresh plates came out in a timely way, and all was well except for . . . the lack of cocktail sauce. We pointed this out to one of the several people who came up to ask if everything was OK, and she said she'd bring it right out. Nothing. No result. This went on and on; someone would walk up, and we'd say, where's the cocktail sauce? The story slowly evolved. They are making a new batch, would normally have been done in the morning but we were slammed last night. Ok, could you just bring us a little bit? Oh no, we have to make it for the whole house. This finally evolved into cold crab cakes sitting in front of four of us, and after yet another delay we received a promised visit from the manager. He was a nice enough man, but his management style consisted of a string of apologies, another story about why the cocktail sauce was not there, and an assurance that it would indeed soon appear. About 35 minutes after the food hit the table, the oft-requested and continually-promised cocktail sauce arrived. And oddly enough, it was, we all agreed, some of the best cocktail sauce ever. Maybe it was the long wait, or perhaps the culinary skill of the kitchen, which despite the sauce issue, had produced some delicious food. We gulped down our room-temp food, and when prompted for coffee or dessert, asked for the check instead. At this point the manager instructed the server to bring out a full tray of desserts, all six on the menu, all made in house except for some excellent ice cream from a local producer. A unique Key Lime Pie; a Lemon tart; chocolate fudge; two kinds of ice cream; warm blueberry cobbler. It was a delightful surprise and put a nice cap on an otherwise weird dining experience.

J.D.'s Sisters at the Grove. Note rain.

This is how it looked after power failure . . .

This turned out to be just the prologue for dinner. Our party of eight motored out to the near countryside to the Grove Market restaurant. I probably should not even mention this place because it is nearly impossible to ever get a reservation. It is tiny; it is well liked by locals; it has a somewhat arbitrary policy of accepting reservations a couple of weeks in advance if it fits in with their very limited seating. It also does not have a printed menu, nor will you find everything on a chalkboard. And even when the menu is recited to you in exquisite detail, course by course, one thing you will not hear mentioned is a price. Normally this is a cue to run as rapidly as you can to the nearest exit before your nest egg is permanently drained. But we had a general idea that the meal should end up at around $50 a person, and as each course was laid out the price seemed a non-issue. Every dish at this place was prepared in a tiny kitchen that divided the two seating areas, each with just a few tables; the variety of both appetizers and main courses was astounding (Grouper on skewers; smoked fish platter made in-house; salad with local beets; lobster bisque with actual lobster in it were the appetizers.) But this experience went beyond the food; just after the main courses hit the table, the intensity of the showers that had begun with our drive out to the restaurant stepped up to a new, violent level; lightning spewed, thunder rumbled, and after a few perfunctory flickers, the lights failed. "Happens all the time," said the staff, who rapidly lit the tables with tea lamps and proceeded as if this were the most normal thing in the world. The meal was completed with assistance from the Flashlight program on the iPhone and some shining of non-virtual flashlights by the staff at critical moments. We passed on dessert, which made the server happy, because she said she had no idea where anything was in the walk-in. Two bottles of wine, six exquisite main courses, and four appetizers later, we were out the door for $55 each. Thus ended the day of strange meals.

Click and check out his eyes!

Ocean City Boardwalk

Other activities included a longish walk on a soupy, sunny day on the boardwalk in Ocean City, MD, and several visits to the beach, my favorite of which was, of course, after sunset. The boardwalk gives one hope for the American economy; somehow the hordes continue to pump money into businesses that sell not one necessity, and there are surprisingly few vacancies along the way. The serene, nearly empty beach near South Bethany shows that Nature is still out there, patiently waiting for us to pause in our destructiveness so she can rebuild herself anew.

We still have a couple more days here in Gloucester before we head for Portland, ME and then begin the trek westward. More to come

Getting familiar

Hello Everyone

The compulsion to blog has dissipated a bit now that we have landed for a few days on the DelMarVa peninsula.  We don't feel quite as alone as we did when we were wandering the byways of this huge country.   Both of JD's sisters have places here at the beach.  Susan has a condo in Ocean City that has a fantastic view of the ocean where dolphins can often be seen frolicking in the waves.  Debra has a sweet little cottage on the bay side, in So. Bethany Beach,  where you can watch the waters lapping at the shore. It feels wonderful to not have pedal to the metal for a few days and get to relax in real housing instead of the endless motels. We get to do this for a stretch of days now.  We are here until Sunday and then we are going up the east coast to stay with my old friend Ronni and her husband John,  at their summer home in Gloucester, Mass, also for a few days.  

I love how where we are now is called the DelMarVa Peninsula. This stretch of the coast is comprised of the three states:  Delaware, Maryland and Virginia.  As you go up and down through the various towns, you go through the state lines. As a matter of fact, although only living a few miles apart, the sisters are in two different states.

We are partaking of the local fare, here. Crab cakes. corn, spiced shrimp. All good things. We will be visiting the tacky and colorful boardwalks of Ocean City and perhaps Rehobeth Beach. My brother and his wife have joined us so we are having a mini-reunion of all the siblings. We have never done this before and it is great fun.  We are now the older generation, we have to stick together. 

     Andrea

Coastal

Virginia Dare Memorial Bridge

Washington Baum Bridge

Finally we reached the coast. And not just any coast. A tiny fragment of land lying out, rather audaciously, in the Atlantic ocean. You gain access to the Outer Banks across a series of cement ribbons that stretch across river inlets and bays and connect you to this sand spit. The same audacious place where the Wright Brothers took their leap of faith. It feels so much better to be here. I can't really explain it… but being on the edges of the continent has this calming effet on me. Being all bunched up in the South was just not feeling right.

North Carolina Beach Dining . . .

. . .versus typical inland stuff

Motels: Sort of a crap shoot. There we were… months ago… booking places to stay. Using various methods, none of which are really reliable, to select a spot. Now here we are, in Kill Devil Hill, and we got a gem. A slightly run down, but not seedy, place on the ocean's rim. Kind of old fashioned fifties with a view of the water. The smell here is an amalgam. As soon as we started getting oceanward, I noticed this odd, burnt smell in the air. In my usual paranoid reaction, I thought it was our baby Versa burning up, but the odor was much more malodorous and organic then what a car might emit. When we checked in at our wonderful abode by the sea, I asked the desk person what was going on, and she said there has been an ongoing peat bog fire. It started, months ago, on the surface, and was a wild fire at first, but that was extinguished; yet the underlying peat continues to smolder. The smell is rather pervasive, but not totally unpleasant. Perhaps they will need a hurricane to put it out, it but a hurricane here would be not so good. The land does not rise much over the water.

So --- we are happily checked into our little bed for the night. We found a local seafood establishment with the unappealing name of "Awful Arthur's" down the road where we managed to snag some seats at the bar and got to eat very yummy seafood, including grilled locally caught tuna, spiced shrimp, oysters, steamed clams and a crab cake. And, oh yes, some hush puppies and a couple of fat martinis. We enjoyed the casual beach culture that consists of families with way too many children, callow youth, and romancing couples. The bar tender, Milo, was a real pro. Sitting at the bar can be quite fun as long as you can remain perched upon your stool.

Okay -- tomorrow we head to the bosom of our family. We will be staying with JD's sisters who each have a place on the DelMarVa Peninsula and my brother and his wife will come down form Brooklyn to stay as well. It will be s sibling reunion. We are all Jews with not that many relatives, so for the next few days we will rally our meager tribe in one place and eat vast quantities of traif. If we don't write again for a few days, don't worry, but now we are pretty much addicted to pouring our thoughts out and will probably continue to regale you with our ongoing antics.

Andrea

Closed

I suppose the first question to answer is why we failed to blog from Nashville. The answer is two-fold: first, not all that much of interest transpired between Hot Springs Arkansas and Nashville Tennessee (I am just seeing if I get all the double letters right, putting that elementary school education to use - - I am sure you all would be perfectly happy with two-letter state abbreviations.) The second reason is that we were simply trashed, bone-tired and exhausted from long-distance travel. And Nashville made it pretty easy for us to settle into a minimal activity pattern - - after hours of searching for an intelligent place to eat, we reached the conclusion that Nashville, while undoubtedly a fantastic place to discover up and coming talent in a club, is not a particularly evolved food city. So taking the easy way out and walking less than two blocks to the nearby brew pub made sense, especially after checking out the seedy brew pub just one block away, which allows smoking in most of its premises. For our Portland friends, let me just state immediately that our beer industry has nothing to fear from the burgeoning brewpub industry in the Southeast, other than the lack of taste by their clientele. I am not saying that the beer is bad; rather it simply lacks the intensity and subtlety of flavor developed by our brewmasters, perhaps because in the Northwest they have access to a panoply of unique hops and malts to work with. Or maybe we just like our beers with a bit more kick (this is the land, after all, where ‘beer selection’ often amounts to the following list: Bud, Bud Lite, Coors, Coors Lite.)

One of the Hot Springs Bath Houses

Our exhaustion in Nashville started with the trip between Oklahoma City and Hot Springs. Usually moving over to the two lane roads is an enhancement; almost anything is better than the numbness brought on by continuous hours of interstate driving. However, having come from the previously reported enrapturing scenery of Utah, New Mexico and, in part, Arizona, we have borne witness to a rapid decline in natural beauty and stop-worthy sites since leaving Santa Fe. We chose to follow Arkansas Scenic Byway Route  7, touted as one of the most scenic drives in America. Meh. Lots of rolling green hills, which, granted, were more interesting than the not so rolling terrain of Oklahoma. Maybe drive it in the Fall. Maybe it is the best Arkansas can do, but it was lacking by our now highly-refined standards for scenery.

Really Worthwhile BBQ in Memphis

Travel from Hot Springs to Memphis TN, on the way to Nashville, held promise. Little Rock has a very groovy sector called the River Market, which has situated interesting shops, a farmers’ market, restaurants and businesses in old buildings lining the riverfront. It sounded great and fully worthy of a stop. Alas, it was Sunday, and this was the first but not the last place we underestimated the hegemony of businesses in the South when it comes to being closed on the Lord’s Day. The entire market was empty and the lights were out. This did allow us an opportunity to drive by the front of the Clinton Presidential Library, an impressive modern building with a similar lack of activity. The final insult was that our GPS program on the iPhone (more on that in another blog) refused to understand the highway system of Little Rock, so badly that in the end we relied on our eyes and dead reckoning to get us back on the road to Memphis. There things became even more frustrating. First we decided to at least get a glimpse of Graceland. Big, big mistake, not so much because of the zoo scene just to get into it, but rather because it is way the hell out of Memphis on the southwest side, and was a huge time sink.  Our preselected Barbeque Joint turned out to be located equally far away, now in the southeast quadrant of outer Memphis, smack in the middle of an industrial and trucking neighborhood. It was Sunday. Need I say more? CLOSED, and another time sink! This then required triage using the smartphone, although it might have been smarter to just use the telephone and figure out if places were open to begin with; but Andrea cleverly came up with an alternative within minutes and accurately guided us through the deserted neighborhoods and avenues of Memphis (we did pass Sun Records which looked suitably vintage and neon-signed from outside, but did not feel the need for the tour.) The Barbeque Shop did not disappoint, with $4.95 sandwiches redolent with chopped pork or brisket, topped with superior cole slaw and served on Texas Toast or a bun (“Try the Texas Toast, honey, it’s really good” advised the waitress in her finest Tennessee drawl. And so we did. And all was right in the world.) Next we discovered that Beale Street might be interesting for entertainment late at night, but it was the middle of the day, so it mostly appeared to be a place where you could not park on the street, and men were gesticulating energetically trying to get you to park in their $10 lot for the privilege of strolling down a famed avenue where it was Sunday and . . . everything was closed. This rated a U-turn and a request to our GPS to find us the most direct route out of downtown Memphis and back onto the interstate. Alas, Mr. GPS was not up to the task, but by cleverly ignoring it at strategic points and using common sense, we were back on the way to Nashville.

So you could see why, hundreds of miles and many hours later, we were beat, and had little more than a randomly discovered sandwich to show for our day’s travail. Notice the close similarity between “travail” and “travel;” it proves that it can be hard work to vacation.

Sea of Shining White Faces: Cracker Barrel Site

This day began hopefully, with a visit to our second Cracker Barrel restaurant (and Old Country Store,) a huge chain that has a pervasive presence throughout the South and much of the Southwest, mostly at interstate highway interchanges. Since Andrea is officially dieting and I am working on providing positive support, we’ve found that we can spend exactly $6.99 plus tip and tax and feed both of us more than adequately. For this princely sum Cracker Barrel will supply you with two eggs, two pieces of sausage or bacon, a big serving of vanilla lo-fat yogurt loaded with fresh fruit, a tasty and sizeable blueberry muffin, and a little side of house-made granola to add to the yogurt. Andrea and I just divide it up - - eggs and meat for me, plus ½ the muffin; the rest for her. If “Cracker Barrel” sounds like a name that might not appeal to people of color, that might be true. I would have to say that the two we have visited had the most homogeneous white-skinned clientele I’ve ever encountered. This screen shot from their web site pretty well tells the story. But - - they do get credit for making their food in house at each location; using good ingredients; and doing it all with good service and low prices. Not bad for road food. Thanks, Elinor and Rex for that little tip.

Somewhat of a View

Army Corps of Engineers, Hard at Work

Torrential Rain on Blue Ridge

We decided to spice up the trip between Nashville and Asheville with some two-lane driving. The idea was to drop down off the interstate on some scenic roads and then end up on the Blue Ridge Parkway, easily one of the finest roads in the U.S. when it comes to car touring. Our path took us down Tennessee 129 and North Carolina 28, on advice from another friend (Donald.) Turns out these are two of the premier motorcycle roads in the country, and they live up to the hype. Lots of elevation gain; loads of switchbacks, and spectacular runs along, across and above rivers and lakes created by the Tennessee Valley Authority and their towering dams, visible at several points along the way. Traffic was not an issue, yet we were eating up quite a bit of time and it was turning into yet another too-long driving day (made worse by crossing into the Eastern time zone and losing another hour,) but I was determined to take in at least 50 miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway, and after quite a schlep we intersected it for the final run to Asheville. Andrea happened to be driving, and as we turned to go up the ramp to the Parkway, the skies, which had gone from partly cloudy to drizzle and periodic moments of rain, let loose with a torrential waterfall, that went on to the point that visibility was near zero with the wipers beating as frantically as possible. Andrea pulled over and we changed places, and sat for a couple of minutes. Conditions improved, so I took off on the Parkway. The road is quite well marked and, although full of curves, can generally be negotiated at around 45 MPH. In good conditions. We were not so lucky; the torrents returned periodically, followed by moments when it seemed the skies would clear. We’d go to an overlook, only to be thwarted by fog rising from the valleys, veiling the distant mountains and valleys. Finally, near Asheville, we were treated to somewhat clearer vistas, but over all the feeling was one of disappointment, and much energy spent to little avail. 

Contrasting Architectural Styles in Asheville's Downtown

I’ve rambled far too long and at too great a length about these days, but let me quickly finish with a visit to downtown Asheville. This is a town with many brewpubs and ambitious and creative restaurants, plus brunch spots and loads of cute shops. We found a great sounding place called Posana Café. The meal was excellent (especially Andrea’s seared scallops with grits and unique saucing and spicing.) Afterwards we took a stroll and noticed a crowd gathering at a viewing point for fireworks. Andrea had researched this subject, and learned that the city had moved their event to Sunday the 3^rd because the venue was not available today, on the 4^th. But nobody had shared that with the crowd. We were told that the fireworks should start at 9:30PM, so we hung out with the audience for about 20 minutes. By 9:45 we realized that she was right; there was no event, so we walked away. I am not sure at what point the crowd dispersed, or whether by some miracle fireworks happened, because we were beating our way back to our refuge for the night (as we glanced over our shoulder on the way out of town . . .  nada.) Yet another example of things being closed, or the two of us being hopelessly out of sync with the rhythm of life in these parts. Tomorrow, on to the beach.

Sweltering in Arkansas

English Classes for Vietnamese, Fort Chaffee, 1975

Pho and Salad Roll, Pho 21

We are in the midst of a major heat wave here in middle America -- maybe other places as well. It is in the upper 90's and relentlessly sunny. As you all know, that is NOT our kind of weather. Today was a shorter driving day and we arrived in Hot Springs, Arkansas a bit earlier then usual. Hot Springs was chosen for it's convenience on the map, and not much more. Before we got there we had the always important matter of lunch to deal with. We determined that Fort Smith was the halfway point and our research told us about something very unexpected --- a Vietnamese Pho place in a repurposed gas station, listed as P.H.O. on Google, but actually named Pho 21.  Fort Smith is just east of the Oklahoma border, and is also the former site of Fort Chaffee, one of the relocation centers where evacuees from S. Vietnam were held until they could find sponsors and be "integrated" into this country.  This process took much less time then anticipated by officials, due to the enlistment of some of the  educated bilingual refugees, many of whom were higher ups in their government and business. Most of the refugees moved on to other states, but a vestige of that immigration is evident in Fort Smith today.You can read more at: http://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=5562.  What a wonderful ethnic twist to find in the middle of whitebread America. Excellent pho, salad roll, and grilled pork bánh mì sandwich. The best sandwich ever, in fact! Tonight's important factoid: "Bánh mì" was added to the Oxford English Dictionary on March 24, 2011.

Park Hotel Entrance

Running Ice Water. Nice Idea! Too bad it's disconnected!

   Upon our arrival in Hot Springs, neither of us felt like going for a two-hour hot soak in mineral water (ha ha. Maybe in the winter or spring.) We are staying in an old pile of a historical building -- The Park Hotel, built in 1930 -- right in town. It reminds me of my grandmother's apartment in the Bronx. But it does have A/C which she certainly didn't have. We are working up the energy to go out and explore in the town but it is hard to move off the bed and into the outer world. Later we will be going to a place called Stubby's for BBQ. Today we listened to "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me" as we drove along -- supposedly on some of Arkansas' most scenic roads, but I don't think they hold a candle (or even a match) to anything we have out West. Internet not working in the room so this will have to post tomorrow.

________________________________________

Stubby's. We were the thinnest patrons, for sure.

Okay -- feeling much better. Internet working and Stubby's was terrific. Our first, but certainly not our last BBQ, of the trip. Lots and lots of very well done and lean ribs. I've learned to request the burnt ends, which is what I like, and they were very accommodating. The place had a good vibe to it, too. Racially integrated, which is maybe more the way the South is? At least some of the time. This town exudes a past era ----- the main street is lined with stately, huge bath houses that were once tres chic (in the 1930's) and are still well maintained despite usage having peaked in the 1950's. They stand opposite an unfortunate collection of totally cheesy, awful souvenir shops filled with icky tourist crap. Thank god for Stubby's or this stopover might have been a near-total loss.


- - Andrea

Zone Change

For Sale in Santa Fe

Sunset over Motel Parking Lot, Santa Fe NM

Note Bread Choices for French Toast! Tecolote Cafe

Our travels today brought us across two state lines and one more time zone. We now find ourselves in Oklahoma City and have set our various devices (those, that is, that don’t set themselves) to Central time. This morning started in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and if that seems a world apart from OKC, it is, both figuratively and literally. The nicest thing about revisiting old haunts in Santa Fe was to find them fundamentally unchanged. So the green chile bowl at Sophia’s was as tangy and aromatic as ever, with lean chunks of pork and a couple of perfectly cooked chunks of potatoes. La Choza did not fail with its fiery red chile, and even the rooftop Canteen at the Coyote Café delivered flavorful, zesty, original preparations (although we did have to send the salad back, which then returned with very fresh greens instead of the ones slightly tinged with brown.)  This morning started with breakfast at Tecolote Café, and again, there has been no deterioration in their cooking and quality; Andrea had a single Blue Corn Pinion Pancake, which takes up an entire plate, and I managed a combo of two eggs with Pork Adovado, which cranked up the heat of the red chile to the highest we experienced in Santa Fe. It could be easy to dismiss old Santa Fe as a tourist trap, but that would overlook its remaining charms. Sure, there are too many places selling crappy artifacts and ugly tee-shirts, but the core values remain. There are gems to be found, both literally at the venerable jewelry outlets, and in the many galleries sprinkled around the city. And of course much of the food is simply superlative, at least if  you share our values, which consist of shunning the fancy and going for the earthy and simple. The attraction of this food (New Mexican) could wear off if it was all you ate day after day, but we could easily have put up with a couple more rounds of it, no problem.

Cadillac Ranch, Then . . .

. . . and now

But we’re told all good things must come to an end; at any rate it was time to push on. Oklahoma City was selected as a destination simply because it represented the maximum number of miles we were likely to be able to tolerate in one day, in our relentless eastward push. So the drive consisted of many hours of not all that fascinating terrain, although I did learn about the Llano Estacado (a.k.a. the Staked Plain,) visible from I-40, which (along with other features it blends into) covers about 37,000 square miles, spread over parts of New Mexico and Texas. It is enormous and rises as much as 450 feet above the surrounding land. It is one of the flattest places in the U.S. So much for that. We decided to break up the I-40 roll with a couple of diversions. First was a stop at the Cadillac Ranch, where a number of Cadillacs have been buried nose down in the ground. This art installation has gone through several iterations, and right now is a do-it-yourself project; bring your spray paint and add whatever you’d like to the layer upon layer of paint. I only counted one swastika, so I thought that was pretty good; mostly young people were adding their name, thereby wiping out the handiwork of those who may have come only minutes before. After that we dined at the Country Barn, noted for their use of naturally-raised Bonsmara beef, a breed developed in South Aftrica that somehow produces tender steaks without the high levels of fat typical of American cattle. We shared a small New York Strip, and the flavor was delicious; the accompanying onion rings may have been the best ever. However the highlight of the afternoon was the bathroom; where else can you find an all-black décor with sink bowls shaped like the state of Texas? The rest of the interior was similarly inspired, with walls of movie posters featuring Texas and no end of stuffed heads and corny Texas-themed paraphernalia.

Texas gave way to Oklahoma. In search of further diversions I at one point turned onto old Route 66, and fortuitously stumbled upon the Conoco Tower, an old-fashioned gas station and garage that remains from the old days. But the rest of the old strip was ugly and not particularly timeless or preserved. At another point I decided that I could not pass through western Oklahoma without visiting at least one town to get the flavor of the state. I chose Sayre, since I-40 Business made a quick loop through the ‘city.’ This place mostly consists of boarded up stores, abandoned gas stations and sagging houses, and appears to have no vitality whatever, not to mention a complete lack of charm. It was actually a relief to return to the Interstate.

The long distances were made shorter by the podcasts and music that Andrea loaded her iPhone with. Several hours of listening to oldies and Moth storytelling, followed by NPR news on Oklahoma Public Radio, made the miles melt away. We’ll have to reload in the morning.

Cocina Guatelinda

The Reflecting Pool and Sunset, OKC

Memorial Graveyard

After checking in we headed out to our dinner destination, Cocina Guatelina. There is an active and seemingly large Latino community here, and this Guatemalan restaurant is one reflection of this. While the food was not over-the-top great, it was an unexpected pleasure to find honest home cooking in this corner of the world, and the place resonated with the slapping sound of hand-formed, fresh tortillas being grilled to order on the flat top. After that we decided to take in the National Memorial to those who died in the Oklahoma City bombing incident that destroyed the Federal Building. Normally I would avoid such places like the plague, but someone (of course we can’t remember who it was) told us that it is a particularly moving presentation. And so it is. Two massive end structures enclose a reflecting pool that mirrors the changing Oklahoma sky as well as surrounding buildings. A stylized ‘graveyard’ has 168 identical markers, one for each person who died in the bombings. The overall effect was solemn yet elegiac and transporting. We walked the entire perimeter of the reflecting pool, and then returned to our hotel first through blocks of brand new reconstruction and reimagining of the downtown core, followed by miles of dingy industrial streets. There’s a new vitality and elan to the center of town, but much of the city seems bogged down in poverty and tired, aging housing and infrastructure.

Tomorrow we move on to Arkansas and Hot Springs, and the ride will be quite a bit shorter than today’s. It’s time to put the hood down on the computer and get some rest.