Monday, 13 May 2019
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| today's route |
The Bluegrass Campground where I've been staying has signs directing people to the Eco Camp, which appears to be some odd-looking tents perched behind a screen of bushes. I know people were staying there this weekend because I saw the cars, though I never saw any people. I thought it must be some unusual ecologically-sound set-up so finally got around to looking it up. If it's ecologically sound, it doesn't seem to be trying real hard, and they're charging a lot of money for staying in tents. https://theecocamp.com/#great-rest
I needed to mail a card so took a tour of the post offices in the little towns between my campground and Toledo.
I passed by an entrance to Oak Opening Preserve, a 5,000 acre oak savanna ecosystem that includes sand dunes and swamps - not usually thought of in the same small area, but they're here. The name came from early white settlers who hacked their way through the swamps and forests and, apparently, came upon an oak opening in the wilderness.
I first went through the village of Whitehouse (it calls itself a village), a decent-sized town of 4,000 with nice-looking public facilities. Some of the prosperity may be explained by a facility I passed called the Ardagh Group. I looked it up and learned it's a company based in Luxembourg and is now (they say) one of the world's largest producers of metal and glass packaging. I'm guessing this plant does glass, because Ohio is yet another state where glass-making has been an important part of the economy since early settlement days.
I passed many farmlands, many of them water-logged from all the rain we've been getting and not able to drain well because it's really flat here.
Next came Monclova Township (that's what it calls itself), which I'd have thought would be bigger than a village, but this one sure isn't. And because it isn't even incorporated, its population is included into someplace else's total. On the other hand, it's had its own post office since 1852, so it's an official place to the US government.
It has an attractive church called St. George Coptic Orthodox Church, but all of the online photos had copyright problems so I can't include one. I know from looking it up that the Coptic branch of the orthodox church was founded in Egypt by St. Mark the Apostle, which makes it what you might call old.
I passed the trailhead for the Wabash Cannonball Trail. In elementary school we learned the song about the Wabash Cannonball, which if course I still remember the words to (no wonder I can't remember much any more, with my brain so stuffed with useless stuff like this), so I looked it up. The Wabash Cannonball Express was a train on the Great Rock Island train route, and the song about it is the oldest song on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's list of 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. I looked up Great Rock Island train route, trying to figure out where Rock Island or Great Rock Island is and still have no idea. But I learned a great deal about the railroad, which was still operating into the 1980s when it was killed by competitors. The Wikipedia article also includes side references to Abraham Lincoln, as well as "Petticoat Junction," "The Beverly Hillbillies" and "Green Acres," for all of which someone should be paying a very big karmic price.
Next I came to Maumee City, a 2006 All-American City of 14,000. It's on the Maumee River, which is pretty good-sized and dumps into Lake Erie right at Toledo. I saw a pine tree that was acting as a cell phone tower, with those receivers or reflectors (or whatever they are on cell phone towers) strapped to the top of it all the way around. It took a while for me to figure out it was really a tree, not a camouflaged cell tower.
As soon as I hit an elevated bridge on the interstate, I noticed some very strong wind gusts - so strong they actually blew me around. I slowed right down to less than 50 mph and didn't worry a bit about other drivers who could go around me in their lower-profile vehicles. I honestly don't know how truckers can keep their semis on the road in those winds.
I took one of the exits for Toledo and went through Sylvania, which calls itself the City of Trees, which of course is what sylvania means. They have a population of 19,000, have been around since 1833, and have been designated a Tree City USA since 1983. Of course I had to look that up too and learned it means they've met the 4 standards set by the National Arbor Day Foundation, and that these cities are assisted by foresters from the Texas A&M Forest Service.
I found a very nice laundromat (my standard is clean facilities, efficient machines for a reasonable price, and an attendant on duty), so I got clean clothes, the dogs got walked, and the critters all had lunch.
I hadn't been allowed to eat or drink anything at all since 6:00 AM, and it was getting to be a nuisance. I got up early and chugged a pot of coffee but hadn't eaten since last night.
We went down the road a mile or so to the Gastro doctor's office and found what I thought was as inconspicuous place to park as is possible in an open flat parking lot. I walked the dogs again and told everybody I'd be back in a little while.
The endoscopy went as usual, I guess - I wasn't awake for it of course. I don't know if they used a different anaesthetic than I've had before or if it's just that I'm getting older, but I felt groggier afterwards than I have in the past. But I didn't have far to go to get home - across the parking lot.
The doctor had remembered to write me a letter of permission to stay overnight in the parking lot, and I highlighted parts of it and taped it to my door, in case a security guard came around during the night. I walked the dogs a couple more times and fed everybody and went to bed. Weird day.
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