Washington With a Difference.

“It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end”

We were driving to a camp site West of Bethel, and as we passed through Bethel we decided to stop at a restaurant for lunch.

There we met Jeff, an Englishman married to an American, who just happened to run a campsite. Of course we ended up there - the only vehicle.

The view from our window.

We were all invited up to the house for dinner and spent a delightful evening chatting to Jeff and Patty, his wife. During the evening we learned of Mount Washington and the road trip to the top.

It even beats a Home Depot car park!

Our next day was thus sorted. After a farewell morning coffee at the house we set off for the mountains.

The top is where the towers are.

Now I give you all this detail because it's a very good example of how travel without agenda can unfold. One chance encounter can set the course for the next week.

Can you spot the road?

Mount Washington isn't a towering peak, standing at only 6288 feet above sea level, but it does have two things going for it. It stands proud of the mountains for miles around, which with the prevailing Norwesterly wind means it's a peak with exciting weather.

The furthest mountains are over 100 miles away.

It held the record for many years of the highest recorded wind speed on the planet. We were told that there were two men in the hut on the mountain that night, and they watched in horrific fascination as the walls flexed in and out by six inches. If you imagine putting a shed onto a lorry trailer and driving at over two hundred miles an hour, you'll have an idea of the forces involved. It must have been tied down pretty well…

The chains hold the hut to the mountain.

The second thing the mountain has going for it is the construction of a road and a railway right to the top. This happened over a hundred years ago, which is just as well as it would be impossible to get permission for the same enterprises nowadays.

The trains are especially built by the company that runs the railroad. It's been here over a hundred years.

The family business a while back.

The road has been privately owned by the same family for over a hundred years, which doesn't surprise me as it's a nice little earner. Even late in the season the buses were solidly booked until the end of the day.

Ice from the clouds. More people die here from the cold in Summer than in Winter - the weather's so changeable.

The vertical distance from the start is around a mile, and took half an hour with stops to look out of the windows down the various precipices. The road snaked round hairpins with no safety barriers - an active imagination is not an asset on this journey. We had half an hour's stop at the top, which was not enough to fully enjoy the views, as the day was unusually clear. Distant peaks over a hundred miles away were visible. It was exhilarating.

This is a rare sight. Most days the clouds get in the way.

On the way down the driver told us of the various races up the mountain. The oldest runner to make it from bottom to top was ninety four. The fastest cyclist arrived at the summit in just over forty nine minutes and the fastest car took six minutes eleven seconds - averaging over seventy miles an hour.

Here's a video of the event. (Round about three minutes twenty in...)

Luckily our driver was a little slower, and on the way down suggested we visit some waterfalls a few miles along our route. They were tucked away by the road, and without his recommendation we would have simply driven past.

Nearly ninety feet to fall.

And so our trip continues, each chance event leading to the next until we have to be at the airport for our flight home.

"It's good to have an end to journey toward, but it is the journey that matters in the end."

Portland - a Local Town for Local People.

Portland is another harbour on the coast of Maine. Although it has the largest population in the State it's not the capital. That distinction goes to Augusta, an hour's drive further North. It's another place that owes its existence to geography; there's a natural harbour well protected from the anger of the Atlantic by numerous outlying islands.

Portland Observatory.

 

Of course, we went to a museum here, but one with a difference. It was an observatory, in the sense of a watch tower, built on a hill to see out to sea over the islands. 

How it looked when it was new in the early days of Portland.

It was built by subscription, as the shipping trade was the life blood of the community.

Still here since 1807.

All that was interesting enough, but we felt that to understand Portland better we needed to get under its skin, so to speak. So we paid a visit to the International Cryptozoology Museum downtown. Yes, International!

We didn't know what cryptozoology was before we went in, and we're not sure what it is now we've come out.

Bigfoot feet casts.

We think it's the study of hominid species that may or may not exist, like Bigfoot in North America or the Yeti in the Himalayas.

It was a bizarre experience, looking at plaster casts that may, or may not, prove that a hitherto unknown creature was clumping around the forests of the world.

It wasn't exactly a deep scientific experience mulling over the weird exhibits.

How to keep warm in cold water.

Not too attractive to a seaman.

We couldn't imagine the rest of it.

This is a modified Ray, manipulated to resemble a weird beast.

Another singularly unattractive mermaid.

Is this a fake?

But then we realised that here was a metaphor for Downtown Portland. Walking around we'd all noticed and commented on the fact that there were more strange characters around than normal. People whistling in the street is ok, but - long repetitive blasts is not normal; a staggering guy with a red scar from his cheek to his hairline; a woman in a wheelchair, pushing the wheels with her hands but also walking with her feet; a woman in a track suit engaged in a conversation with someone as she sat in the middle of the pavement; a bearded hippy pushing an empty supermarket trolley.

This is not Photoshopped.

It was the number of such people that surprised us, and it slowly dawned on us that Stephen King the horror writer came from here. We then caught the bus out to our RV and made a quick exit from Portland.

Witch Town is This?

Diane crosses the road like an American.

We made our way to Boston on the East Coast to pick up friends who flew over to join us. We all noticed on the map that Salem is only a few miles further Northwest from the airport, so the next day we set off to see where the "witches" were tried and convicted of consorting with the devil in 1692.

It's not what you do, it's the year you do it in...

First of all we just had to visit a museum, which was in a street of beautiful houses, most of which were built in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

This is a great museum which I won't tell you about.

We had a really delightful and informative tour; just the four of us with an enthusiastic docent.

Possibly English origin?

But by now I'm sure you don't want to know about another museum - so on to Salem itself.

It's a port, and echos of the past still abound on the seafront, with the wharves and all the usual paraphernalia of days gone by.

The original site of the dock's warehouses.

It was all pleasant enough, but the real purpose of Salem is now sitting on the historical shoulders of the long dead "witches".







Years ago I walked through Tintagel in Cornwall, and was bombarded with King Arthur paraphernalia. Salem is now in the same vein. The whole town is given over to witchcraft and things spiritual - in a huge way.






It seems that the whole history of Salem comes down to making a buck.

I imagine the throngs were all the greater because it was only a couple of weeks from Halloween. (Here the run up to Halloween seems to start at the beginning of August.)




One of the saddest things about all this was the memorial to all those who were wrongly accused and put to death.

The memorial square.

Next to it was a graveyard, and the massed ranks of the weekend crowd were tramping over the graves.

Still it was all good natured, and there was a carnival atmosphere about the place. People just love to be spooked by scary apparitions.

But ironically, the one place where it all started and made everything seen today possible, had disappeared.

The courthouse was just about where this car is now.

The courthouse where the "Witches of Salem" were tried and sentenced to death, has been swept away. No trace of it remains.

A Tale of Two Cities.

On the way to Boston to pick up a couple of friends, we noticed that Worcester was on the way - Worcester Massachusetts that is. It seemed a shame  to go sailing past, so we stopped off for a day.

 

We walked into town, taking pictures of anything with the name Worcester on it.

 

There were old factories and warehouses from the 19th century, and a good deal of new buildings.

 

The civic buildings were grand, a statement of Worcester's wealth here in the US.

Its population is about 180 thousand, around twice that of the UK city, Its crime rate is one of the lowest in the US, and because of past decisions made to encourage investment in the medical and biotechnology business, it hasn't suffered in the recession as much as a lot of the rest of America.

We were told that the City Hall is an exact copy on the one in Florence, Italy.

On investigation, it seems that maybe it was just the style that was copied.

We can only assume that when it was built there was no US civic style, so one was copied from elsewhere.

Outside were a couple of cops chatting, so we asked if we could take a picture of their vehicles - with the name Worcester on of course. A little different from the UK.

The US police have their own style though. Bob's boots were really shiny.

Then Bob, the motorcycle cop, took us inside City Hall. He really wanted to show us something.

On the wall above the stairs were a couple of pieces of military history.

This was last used a couple of miles from where we live.

Note: It was given over a hundred years ago.

Then Bob beckoned us up the stairs, and introduced us to the city Chief of Staff who worked in the Office of the Mayor.

We were invited into the office, and proudly shown other links with Worcester.

The Mayor's seat. The paneling and desk are mahogany apparently.

A more recent gift from Worcester UK. You may make out the bridge and Cathedral.

He spent time chatting to us for around twenty minutes, and we left with some books as gifts.

Gifts from Worcester USA to us.

We wonder if an American from Worcester MA visiting our hometown would get the same kind of treatment?

Later that night we went to a talk given by Robert Ballard, the man who discovered the Titanic.

An eventful day - considering we just walked into town.