Hello Everyone! I hope you’ve all had a great week since last I wrote. I can’t believe we’re already halfway through August, but it’s sure been a beautiful week here in Wisconsin. For me, it’s been a week of catching up – catching up on work and catching up with my family in the Greater Milwaukee area. Since my dad is from Milwaukee and I spent a lot of time here as a kid, there is a lot of familiarity to it even though it’s been many years since I last spent time in the area. It’s been great though, and I’m really enjoying it.
When I finished this post last week, I headed over to the Neville Public Museum in Green Bay. Right as I parked and got out of my van, the tornado sirens started going off downtown. The museum was clearly a better option than my van in a tornado, so I headed inside. The staff was great and moved us all into the theater to wait it out. Thankfully the tornados passed us by and I could go ahead and get a look at the museum. There were some interesting artifacts there, but I really wanted to learn more about the history of Green Bay and it didn’t quite deliver on that for me. I did enjoy the museum but I would have loved a better organized permanent collection. The top highlight was a very cool model of Lambeau Field built entirely out of Legos which was definitely worth seeing. When I left the museum, I went to a delicious little spot called PhoComa downtown. Green Bay (and Southern Wisconsin) has a huge Hmong population who settled there after escaping from Southeast Asia at the end of the Vietnam War. I have definitely been craving some good Southeast Asian food for a while, and this place was amazing. After dinner I went to see the Green Bay Booyah baseball team play. They play in the Northwoods League with the Traverse City Pitspitters, and that night they were playing against Racine. The storms had cleared out and it turned into a beautiful night for baseball, but the Booyah couldn’t pull one out for the home town crowd.
Thursday I headed out of Green Bay and drove through downtown Appleton to see where Harry Houdini spent much of his adult life. It seemed like a nice enough place but there was nothing to keep me there. I moved on to Fond Du Lac at the bottom of Lake Winnebago and visited the Lighthouse Park for great views out over the lake. Lake Winnebago is a massive lake but can’t really compare to the nearby Great Lakes. The Fox River passes through Lake Winnebago and connects the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River. It’s also one of the few northern flowing rivers in the country and was a major route for early traders. I really enjoyed learning about the area at the local Visitors Center but had to keep moving so I headed on towards Milwaukee where I met my cousin Emma at her office for an evening event. I got there a little early so we could catch up as it’s been 8 years since I saw her last. We had a great chat and then moved into the music venue at her office which does a monthly livestream of a local band. That night we got to see the wonderful duo of Andreas Transo and Charlene Adzima on guitar and fiddle, playing Irish tinged folk music with some definite Wisconsin flare. They were amazing and I really enjoyed the show and especially seeing it with my cousin.
The next day was State Fair Day for me and I was so excited to go. When I was growing up, the Wisconsin State Fair was a definite highlight of the summer for me every year I went. I’ve often said that one of these days I would make it back and on Friday “one of these days” became “today”.
Hello Everyone! It’s hard to believe another week has passed here in the Great Lakes State. They really seem to be flying by and while I am seeing and doing a lot, the time is really moving. I’ve finally crossed the 45th Parallel (midway between the equator and the North Pole) for the final time here in Michigan and am only heading north from here. I spent a little more time than I would have liked to have in Traverse City this week, but it was a nice town and I was able to catch up on some work. I finished another episode of my podcast (out now – listen to it here or by searching “American Anthology” wherever you get your podcasts), which is always a bit of a chore even if it’s something I really enjoy doing. I also spent a night out on far-flung Beaver Island, Lake Michigan’s largest island and an interesting place to visit. The weather has been holding up pretty well, but we’ve had some hazy days here which hasn’t made for the best photography conditions. All in all, it’s been a pretty good week on the road.
When last I wrote, I had just arrived in Traverse City. Traverse City is a very pleasant town with a good variety of services which allowed me to get some work done. In addition to the library which had good internet access, they also had a gym to shower at and plenty of shops to restock my supplies. On Thursday night, after I finished up last week’s This Week, I headed out to the Traverse City Pit-Spitters baseball game. The Pit-Spitters are a part of the Northwoods League which is a summer league for college players. The game was a lot of fun and it was $2 beer and hotdog night which you really can’t go wrong with. I also have to applaud whatever genius came up with the name “Pit-Spitters” because I absolutely had to buy a t-shirt at the game. And the Pit-Spitters won, so that made it even better.
On Friday morning I toured the old Michigan State Asylum in Traverse City. At $30 for a ticket, it was a bit pricey for a walking tour, but it was really good and I would say definitely worth it. Our guide grew up in the area and had several connections to the hospital when it was still active (which it was until the 1980s). He intertwined his personal stories in with the history of the building and what they accomplished there. The central idea by which they operated was “beauty is therapy”, which meant that the campus was full of ponds and flowers and walking trails and the buildings had big windows to let in plenty of sun and it was well appointed with nice furniture and plenty of art. Patients were expected to work, and the hospital was self-sustaining for much of its early existence, producing enough food that there was a surplus which was sold to the local community. When the hospital officially closed, the community banded together to save it from being demolished. Today the campus is getting a second life as a mixed-use complex with condos, restaurants, studios and low-income housing. The whole place was really cool and definitely worth seeing. After my tour, I enjoyed a nice lunch in one of the restaurants there. When I finished at the hospital, I embarked on an afternoon drive up the Old Mission Peninsula which took me to the Old Mission Lighthouse and past some wonderful farm stands and wineries. They’re coming to the very end of the cherry season here in Michigan, and it’s been great to eat so many cherries and taste different varieties. I’m probably about cherried out though. Heading back in Traverse City, I went to a nice winery just outside of town for some live music and a few glasses of wine and to finish writing the last bits of my podcast.
It’s been busy, busy, busy out here on the road this week. This week has taken me from Selma to Demopolis in Western Alabama, back through Tuscaloosa to Birmingham and then north and west through Bankhead National Forest and on to Muscle Shoals where I am writing to you from today. I celebrated Orthodox Easter, hiked to some waterfalls, shouted “Roll Tide”, ate quail, and of course took lots of photos along the way. I’m into the home stretch of this leg of the journey as I need to be home in a week and a half, so I’ve been hustling out here. I have made plenty of time to stop and smell the beautiful wildflowers though, and enjoy some hills after 4 months of flatness in every direction. HERE is the link to this week’s map if you like to follow along.
After publishing last week’s This Week, I headed directly for Old Cahawba, the first capital city of the state of Alabama. It served as the capital from 1820-1825, but regular flooding caused the legislature to move out to higher ground. The city declined over the next century and by the time of its centennial, Cahawba was all but abandoned. Today there is nothing left but a few brick columns, an old cemetery and a few foundations. There really wasn’t much to see, but I enjoyed wandering around and imagining myself back to its heyday when its citizens probably thought it was a pretty cool place. Cahawba is managed today as a State Archaeological Site. It’s only about 20 minutes from Selma and for me it was worth seeing, but I wouldn’t necessarily go too far out of my way to visit…
This week has been a good one and a busy one and my last one in Louisiana. I traveled a bit across the North Shore area, north of Lake Ponchartrain and then ducked back to Baton Rouge for the wonderful 3rd Street Songwriters Festival. After a great weekend of music and new friends, I headed back to my former home city of New Orleans to get some work done and prepare to move on to Alabama, which I plan to do the minute this post is published. It’s been a great two months here in The Pelican State, but it’s long past time for me to be moving on, and I’m looking forward to it.
After I finished writing last week, I did indeed go for a couple of beers at the Abita Brewpub in Abita Springs. I had forgotten how cute a town Abita Springs is, and I enjoyed a little walk around before ducking into the brewpub. The bartender was Rita. Rita at Abita! She was very friendly and I enjoyed talking with her as I tried some of the Abita beers I haven’t had the chance to taste yet. When I was done there, I headed down the road and stopped by Ruby’s Roadhouse for a nightcap. This is a great old dive bar and music venue in Mandeville, and if only they’d make people go outside to smoke it would be even better. It’s a cool place though, and I’ll have to get back some day when they have live music on.
I woke up Thursday to torrential downpours and thunder so I made the command decision to stay in bed a little longer. I made a cup of coffee and watched some TV from the cozy confines of the back of my van. It wasn’t what I had planned, but that kind of weather isn’t great for taking photos or really much of anything, so I took advantage of it in the best way I could think of. I may have to do that more often…
It’s been another great week out here on the road, despite Mother Nature trying her best to put a damper on things. The weather has been getting significantly colder, and we’ve gotten quite a bit of rain. Winter weather advisories are starting to kick in which is definitely my sign that it’s time to turn my headlights south for the winter. It was great to be around friends and family for much of the last week, as it was a much needed recharge on my spirit batteries. My last week in Kentucky will be my last week in Kentucky for the moment. I spent most of it in the lovely Kentucky State Parks, and then wound down through Appalachia and Coal Country to the Cumberland Gap where I find it fitting that I will leave Kentucky the way early explorers first entered the area.. Despite the weather closing in, it really has been a wonderful week.
My week started where my last week ended, in Charleston, West Virginia at my dad’s place. It was nice to be off the road for a few days, clean up and fix a few things, get some work done and just spend some time with my family. The weather wasn’t great, but we did get out for dinner one night at a place called Bricks and Barrels. It was amazing and nice to go for a great meal with my dad.
Hello everyone! It's been a busy week out here on the road as usual. During this week I realized that in my pursuit of journalistic stories to publish and photograph, a lot of this journey gets left on the cutting room floor. So I thought when I can I would try and give a quick travelogue of my week - where I've been and what I've been up to. A "behind the scenes" look at my life on the road. This way you can get to know me better and see what this trip really entails.
