TIDBITS: ELKHORN CITY, KENTUCKY

From Wikipedia, about Elkhorn City, Kentucky, hometown of country singer, Patty Loveless: "On October 16, 1882, the post office was renamed Praise for 'Camp Praise-the-Lord', a tent colony that was established by evangelist George O. Barnes for a revival there in August 1881."

I find that fascinating, and for some time, I've been considering a periodic Tidbit post like this, apropos of nothing. It could be one way to offset any excess of attention to poetry. But is it interesting to anyone else?

I've driven around several times in those mountains traversed by Interstate 81, so I must have been close to Elkhorn City.

In Wytheville, Virginia, I just crossed I-81 on I-77 while driving to and from Florida. I find it easy to romanticize the Blue Ridge in spring, summer, and fall,, including bluegrass music and rural living. Winter is another matter. In southbound snow flurries and, a month later, a northbound threat of icing, I just wanted the damned mountains to end.



It was a comment by some female country singer, possibly Loretta Lynn, that first made me re-think my idealization of that area. She, or her song, said the days were shortened a lot in the hollers--you're that deep down; it's that skinny in there. If there's any sun, it's on a mountaintop, and who can live there? Maybe the owner of a coal mine, with his a private, heated road upward?

One time in south-central Kentucky, a little west of I-75, I asked a gas station guy about a two-lane route I'd planned to take into the mountains and on to the coal country of Hazard and Harlan in eastern Kentucky, Loretta Lynn country.

"Is that road just too full of curves? I don't want to spend a whole day going 50 miles."

"Oh," he said of my road marked narrow and grey on the map, "I wouldn't go that way. If you break down, you don't who's gonna stop. Or why."

It was the kind of advice I was used to hearing about pockets of danger in urban blight. So, as I processed the unexpected info over days and weeks, I decided to call it justice: there are vicious people everywhere and the inevitable fear of the Other. And how about the way we all groove on fear, the dirty little secret that makes local TV news stations happy.

Yes, yes, I already knew all that, but the gas station guy gave it new life, made it palpable. In one of the areas I'd nominated to myself for the title of Paradise, or at least a Praise tent camp of my own making, not everybody was Doc Watson or Earl Scruggs. A native of the place had said so. For all I know, Doc and Earl are mean too, and that guy would be the first to tell me so.

But I'll go back. In southwest Virginia, even in winter, there are sloped pastures among the mountains, and they're dotted with cattle, including a lot of Black Angus. A few years ago on that stretch, I hit a pothole and lost a hubcap. I need to go fetch it, and that could take a awhile.
















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Road Trip, Northern Ohio, NW Pennsylvania

We’ve recently returned from a road trip—some fine, mostly two-lane roads through NE Ohio and NW Pennsylvania. Left, right, and straight ahead were fields, woods, and hillsides of one lit up shade of green after another, plus a few flowering trees. May and October are the times to travel.

Ohio Rt. 87, Newbury through Middlefield was very nice. Yoder’s Amish restaurant was too crowded—a happy accident because Linda’s, downtown, seemed to be a local lunch hangout where “English” and Amish farmers gathered in apparent harmony, while Yoder’s came across as a more touristy haven for middle-class retirees. The food at Linda’s is just okay, but the atmosphere made me want to stay a few days and try to get more sense of life in the area.

Rt. 6 into PA was pleasant, though a bit busier than I’d hoped. I saw it lying between two east-west interstates (I-80 and the new I-86 across southern New York state) and thought it might be a once-important two-lane that was now a lazier, more liesurely and local road. My guess was only somewhat right. Give it a B for effort and good intentions.

PA Rt. 77 north from Meadville to Corry and then Rt. 6 again, east toward Warren, were also good. 77 was better than 6, because it was less crowded and had the feel of a back road in hills and mountains, without the work of a lot of hairpin curves.

On Rt. 62, southwest from Warren, PA to Oil City and Franklin, PA, along the Allegheny River, was the best stretch of the trip. One might complain about too many pockets of modest houses, along with fishing and hunting cabins, but the scenery was still first-rate, there was very little traffic, and the bends in the road were gentle. The Allegheny is a beautiful river up there. Do I want to know about what's upstream, the purity of the water?

Little Rt. 666 west to east could have been even better than 62--certainly more remote; but the pavement was in such poor repair that the drive became somewhat of a labor. Still, with most of the road following the Tionesta River, the route was quietly gorgeous, and the potholes forced us to take our time and appreciate it.

The villages of Tidioute and Tionesta, on Rt. 62, are worth a stop. We had lunch in Tionesta, at the pleasant little T-K Dinor (note the creative spelling), where pierogies were the typical side dish, if not an entrée.

Two or three lunch spots in Tidioute looked inviting, but we were there too early.

About lodging in northern Ohio and Pennsylvania, here are three places to consider: back in the Toledo area, Maumee Bay State Park has renovated its lodge, which was much more agreeable than the last time I visited a couple of years ago. Also, I like its restaurant better than any of the others in Ohio State Parks. The grounds include some Lake Erie shoreline (new jokes only, please) and some nice walking on a boardwalk through a marsh. If you want still more birding, the terrific Magee Marsh is about 15 miles east.

East of Cleveland, the tudor-style Punderson State Park lodge, near Newbury, Ohio, has a green, tree-lined approach and an impressive Tudor-style exterior. However, we found the rooms and interior common areas claustrophobic, and the restaurant menu was limited and pricey. Also, these state park lodges, run by Xanterra, need to drop the $10 per day charge for in-room internet service (which operated at elderly turtle speed, after the ten-dollar insult).

The Warren, Pennsylvania the full service Holiday Inn was one of the nicest I’ve ever stayed in—and I’ve been in more than a few, lured by supper on the premises, never mind how mediocre or overpriced it usually was. After a day of driving the issue is comfort more than fine cuisine. In Warren, the food and service were good, there was a selection, and the prices were more in line with comparable restaurants.

We had a pleasant after-dinner walk to the city park about a quarter-mile south of the hotel. Two fast-pitch softball games were going on, with four more teams waiting in the wings, and the high quality of play impressed me--a lot of 20 - 40 year-old talent for a town of about 9,000 people.

So there you have it—American travel in Corndog world at Corndog speed.