August 2020 – Stone Fig

Tea Break

Several years ago my son and his wife gave me a new camp stove for Christmas. The one I had was getting old. I had used it for a good number of years, including camping on the smaller islands of the southern Outer Banks of North Carolina. It attached to the top of a small propane bottle, which also had to be packed out. Its design was lacking and I had to devise a small wind screen that attached to the sides of the burner. My water pots had a hard time coming to a boil if there was a breeze up.

I would drive down after work and launch my kayak at the ferry landing and paddle out to the island in my ancient canvas Fold-Boat. When I reached the island, I would haul the boat up and then hike two to three miles to a good camping spot.

Those miles could be long. The hike across the island was over the dunes and through soft sand, followed by a mile or more on hard packed sand. Reducing the weight of my backpack was always on my mind. Even on these short distances a light pack was a better pack. I was also carrying two days of water as there was no potable water on the island.

It was always best to carry lighter supplies. A light camp stove was a dream.

I would cook my supper on my stove and then wash up at the tide-line. I used the sand to scour everything. I also rinsed it all with boiling water.

As the sun went down, I’d boil water for a cup of coffee. But I was never satisfied with the flavor of the instant coffee I carried. It might have been easy to pack in, but its flavor left a lot to be desired. Eventually I changed over to a dark tea.

After sunset I’d lounge at the base of a sand dune and look out over the Atlantic from a deserted beach. I was usually on the island by myself.

Years later I no longer packed out for a two-night camp on the beach like I had before. There were camping trips to campgrounds in the mountains. I would reminisce about those nights on the beach, and talk about my old camp stove.

A surprise at Christmas was welcome. It was my new white gas camp stove. It reopened possibilities, and I wanted to try it out. It was a sunny day in mid-Winter when I set out for the open fields of the Virginia Piedmont. I packed my new stove and my water kettle.

Other items had changed as well. I no longer carried my water in my World War II Marine surplus canteen. Those were heavy on the hips and did not fit well with the modern packs with waist belts. I now used slim, stainless steel water bottles that fit into the sides of my backpack.

With my gear packed for a day hike, I drove out to the trailhead. After a good hour on the trail, I stopped and set up my new stove at a place where I had a bit of a view of the countryside and a view up and down the trail.

The new stove worked easily, and it had its own integral wind screen. Soon I was pouring hot tea into my cup and settling down on one of the larger rocks to enjoy the afternoon sky.

It was pleasant, and although I missed the ocean and its crashing waves, a trail through the trees with a view out onto the pastures and fields in the valley below is very nice.

I watched an American Kestrel hover and dive to catch a grasshopper. And I let my eyes close as I enjoyed the flavor of my tea as the sun set and an evening chill began to creep up the mountain.

South Works

I took this picture in the early 1970s when I worked for a friend of mine as a Cargo Surveyor in the ports around Chicago, Illinois.

It was long days and hard work. But I was able to be outside most of the time. If I was not outside, on the deck of a ship, climbing up or down the 90-foot ladders that led to and from the ship’s holds, or walking the huge outdoor storage lots confirming off-loading of the giant rolls of steel, I might be inside a steel manufacturing facility, or a cheese importer in one of the Chicago suburbs, or in a warehouse full of imported items. It didn’t matter if it was hard work; it was fun and fascinating work. The ships on which we oversaw the unloading were from nations around the world.

We were up early and on the ships watching the longshoremen and the huge cranes unloading the rolls of sheet steel, bundles of steel beams, or railroad wheels, or 40-foot containers filled with wine or cheese or beef hides or any number of amazing products that were being imported into the Chicago from around the world. These good would be transported for sale in the Chicago area or to other locations in the Midwest.

We worked while the Great Lakes were open for shipping. We worked in the heat of summer and the frigid days of early winter with ice on the decks and snow in the air. The only weather that we did not work in was the rain. When it rained the owners would close the massive steel covers over the ship’s holds so the cargo would not get wet. Steel rusts. Cardboard falls apart. Food stuffs spoil. All of this had to be taken into account as we oversaw the work and inspected the cargoes, usually working for the owners of the shipping line.

The Great Lakes are open for international ocean cargo shipping as long as the locks along the Saint Lawrence River Seaway are ice free. The locks are the portal for ocean going shipping on the Great Lakes. The locks were scheduled to close before they iced up. That was the day by which all ships that had other places to go, had to be off the Great Lakes. For example in 2019 the Locks and the Great Lakes were opened to ocean traffic on March 29, 2019. The season was closed on December 31, 2019, and ships could no longer transit out of the Great Lakes.

It can easily be imagined that the closing weeks of the season were busy weeks as no shipping company would want their cargo vessel trapped in the Great Lakes for three months while the locks are closed.

On this morning I had arrived just at sunrise. The ship we were unloading was docked near the mouth of the Calumet River. The Calumet River stretches from Lake Michigan down into the industrial areas south of Chicago. The entire length of the river was wharves and turning basins, for the ships to tie up, unload, and maneuver back out to Lake Michigan. To the west the Calumet River joins the Des Plaines River via the Cal-Sag (Calumet-Saganashkee Channel) Canal, which carried barges from the Mississippi into this same maze of wharves in the industrial area.

I could not be further from the forests surrounding Chicago than standing on the deck of that ship on the Calumet River. When I turned to the North and looked to the other bank of the river, I could see the decrepit US Steel South Works. Its furnaces and mills were shut down, but the steel assets still stood against the rising sun of that morning.

It was odd, this behemoth of American industry shut down due to foreign competition from more modern facilities in Asia and in Europe, and the products of those foreign mills traveled to their buyers by landing on the wharves and docks along the Calumet River, and by first passing the US Steel South Works, the ancient and ruined guardian of the Lake shore.

The wind was blowing from the North. As it blew across the old South Works, it picked up dust and particles of steel. I could see the flecks of metal catching a glint of the morning sun as they floated in the air around me while I stood watching the cargo being unloaded on that cold winter morning.

Boats and Clouds

Several decades ago I had an opportunity to go to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). I saw places that I had not seen before, and I talked to people about all types of things. I was even asked if I had any Blue Jeans to sell. It was funny. The guy who asked me that was an American who at that time was working for the CIA. Now I think he is in jail.

We were there for three weeks and started in Moscow and the area around it. I was profoundly moved by the World War II memorials. The USSR lost more than 20 million people, some died in internal struggles, others died fighting the Nazis.

As part of the trip we also traveled out to Odessa in the Ukraine and then north to Lithuania. Both were part of the USSR at that time. Lithuania became an independent republic in 1990, heralding the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Ukraine followed and became independent in 1991.

Lithuania is a truly beautiful place. We stayed in the city of Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. The country’s northern climate supports vast forest of conifers and hardwoods. These forests include Larch, Spruce, Birch, and Aspen. The geography supports many stream and lakes, many of which flow north towards the Baltic Sea. It was Fall when we were there, so it was too cold for swimming. And even in summer, I can say from experience, the Baltic Sea is cold on the best of days.

One day we traveled out from Vilnius and visited the Lake area near the historic town of Trakai. The lake shores were ablaze with late Fall color. The Latitude of Trakai (54^o37’N) is approximately the same as the south end of Hudson Bay in Canada. We wrapped up against the Fall chill and walked out into the forest that lined the lake shore. The paths were narrow and wound back into the forest.

On the lake I had hoped we might see an over-wintering Red-necked Grebe (Podiceps grisegena). If there were any wintering birds, we did not see.

The isolation and depth of the forest assured me that in their season they are full of the songs of Lithuania’s native birds. And I was sure that the lakes teamed with ducks on their migration to the far North, or perhaps to this very spot.

There was a lake house. And there were row boats. Being fond of rowing in any season, I asked if there was time to go out onto the lake for a bit of a row. Our host apologized and said we would need to stick to our schedule. I am certain he was sorry that we did not have time. Sticking to the schedule during the times of the Soviet regime was important. I accepted it and apologized to our hosts to relieve him of the burden of not being able to allow such a small excursion.

A heavily traded commodity of the region from pre-Roman and into modern times is Amber, the fossilized resin/sap of ancient conifer trees. Amber is an organic near-gem quality stone. It has a rare warmth of color and can be polished to brilliance. Some Amber, when polished, and if clear, may be seen to contain an ancient beetle or ant. The Amber of the Baltic region is from the Eocene epoch and was deposited about 40 million years ago. Any bugs found in Baltic Amber would not have been the gadfly of the dinosaurs. Deposits of that type were laid down over 66 million years ago and are not found in the Baltic region.

In my visit to this region of frost and magical lakes I received a set of cuff links made from Amber.

The Amber of my cufflinks is clouded from the minerals and tiny air bubbles trapped in the flowing tree sap. The face of the polished Amber shows streamers of milky white. It is a cloud of ancient air and minerals trapped in a scene of golden earth tones. The outside surface of the Amber, the “rind”, is just as fascinating with its deep browns and reds from reactions of the ancient resin to the overburden soils that held the raw Amber. The rind is also deeply pitted from its burial for millions of years.

To touch Amber is to touch earth, sky, and water.

The pictures were taken by me or other members of our group and are under our personal Copyright.

Walking in the Water

When my children were younger, we went out West.

We were on a two-week holiday, and there were sights we wanted to see. We flew into Albuquerque, New Mexico and then drove in a rented car to see cliff houses at Mesa Verde, the Grand Canyon, the Virgin River, the Very Large Array, Santa Fe, and the Four Corners area. We had a full list of places we wanted to see.

When driving between our various destination, we would stop beside the road for lunch. There are often picnic shelters in scenic rest areas on the highways. We would also pull off the road at a convenient spot and make sandwiches of fresh tomatoes and bright orange cheddar cheese. They were easy to make and always delicious.

In the first week of our trip one of our destinations was Zion National Park in Utah. We wanted to hike the Virgin River. The drive into Zion National Park is magnificent. The natural rock formations and the engineering and construction of the road join to make a stunning drive down to the canyon floor. But the best was to greet us at the bottom of the canyon. We had arrived at our destination, the trail head for The Narrows of the Virgin River.

The Virgin River flows through a deep natural gorge that the River has carved out of the native sandstone over the millennia. The trail that leads up through the Narrows is the Virgin River itself. Make no mistake the footing on the large and small stones on the River’s floor is always changing, and it is slippery and challenging. When you start your hike through the waters, you are going up stream. You are hiking against the River’s flow.

Please note that the National Park Service has sets safety limits for protection of the visitors, whether seasoned hikers or children. You need to check in at the Ranger Station to confirm that the River is safe for hiking and to get advice on the distance you will want to go. We did not want to hike the ten miles (round trip) up the River to Big Spring and back. We wanted to spend about an hour in the River. The Park Rangers were able to give us good advice on how far up the River we should go.

We stepped into the River. We could feel the current gently pushing against our ankles as we started our trip upstream. We smiled at the exhilaration. Later we would be laughing out loud at the joy of moving through the current as we continued on our upstream challenge.

And I will say, the challenge is worth it. To walk ankle deep and knee deep and up-to-waist deep against the current – struggling to set your feet firmly on the rocks you cannot see under the rushing water – and to suddenly plunge into a deeper pool – it is truly exhilarating. Even a hike of 300 to 400 yards up the River is memorable. To stand with your companions holding onto them and your walking staff for stability – and looking up out of the nearly quarter mile deep gorge – and seeing the clouds overhead is wonderful. You do not see them move; you feel that you are rotating under the still, white clouds painted onto a pure blue sky high above.

As we moved upstream one of us would suddenly disappear into the water after slipping on a rock, or stepping into a hole. Then we would rise up laughing to the relief of our companions who were shocked at our disappearance as if it were miraculous, followed by an equally miraculous reappearance, laughing, as we burst up from the flowing stream.

On the way back we talked about flash floods and the impossibility of escape in our situation. This is the reason that you must know the weather happening miles up the River. Up there a sudden rain-storm can dump tons of water into the stream and change a fun and challenging hike into a thundering, roiling disaster.

The flow urged us along on our way back to the trailhead. The rocks were just as slippery, but we were use to finding our footing. Soon we were back at the trail head, and in the car, soaking wet, and laughing uproariously at our adventure.

Remember:

The River doesn’t care.
The River can be dangerous.
Check conditions with the Rangers.
Know the weather.
Know the capabilities of the people you are hiking with.
Laugh.

In researching this article I read that the River is currently contaminated with a toxic cyanobacteria. Make sure you read up on the conditions in the River before you go. It might be an amazing drive, but if you can’t hike the River it might be a long trip to disappointment. https://www.nps.gov/zion/planyourvisit/toxic-cyanobacteria-bloom-in-the-virgin-river-and-the-streams-of-zion-national-park.htm

Visit the NPS site about hiking the Virgin River before you go. There is information there that will make your hike more enjoyable – and may save your life. https://www.nps.gov/zion/planyourvisit/thenarrows.htm

Shooting the ISS

I would go out to Manassas on cold winter mornings and watch the International Space Station (ISS) pass overhead. For me it was also a chance to go out and enjoy the crisp winter breezes and the sounds of the fields and forests on those cold winter mornings.

Overhead there is a silent rustle of an owl’s wing. Beyond me in the field I hear the deer snorting, NH-SNPHFF, as a deer clears its nostrils to get my scent. I can just hear the accompanying stomp of its foot. The deer are close at hand.

I stand quietly to listen for other sounds of the woods. To the west in the largest stand of hardwoods I hear a Great Horned Owl calling. A resonant, deep bass call, it is a chilling sound. It echoes through all of Creation. that surrounds me.

My eyes have adjusted to the darkness, and I look up.

I suck in a breath of cold air as I see the piercing points of the stars and planets far above. I have chosen a moonless night because the darkness will be deeper, and the stars and planets will stand out with greater clarity.

I orient myself. There is the Big Bear/Dipper (Ursa Major), and it shows me the way to Polaris, the North (Pole) Star, at the tip of the tail of the Little Bear.

Whenever I see Polaris, I always ask myself, Why does the little bear have such a long tail?

I look at my watch. I have twenty minutes before the ISS passes overhead in its orbit. It will reflect light from the still-hidden sun and shine as bright as any star in the night sky.

Before I set up my camera I lean back against my car and look up. I can pick out a few constellations and primary stars. I see a smaller satellite pass overhead. The satellite is a moving point of light among many stationary points of light (the stars and planets).

I want to eliminate any extra movement of my camera as that will blur the stars and gives them “tails”. However for satellite photography, including the ISS, I want the photo of the object to show a tail/trail so you can pick it out on a print where the stars are points of light. The satellite will show a tail/trail of light because of its movement across the sky.

I set up my tripod with my camera mounted on my home-made Azimuth Tracker. The Tracker moves the camera in relationship to the axis of the Earth so the stars will remain as points of light. The satellite will have a tail/trail in the photograph.

And I am ready.

I have been out for about 30 minutes. The time for the shuttle’s arrival and procession across the dark sky is near. I watch the southwest quadrant for my fast-moving target. As it appears, I depress the plunger on my locking extension cable to open the camera’s shutter (I am using film).

I count the seconds as I turn the crank to move the Azimuth Tracker and my Camera. Within three minutes I am done.

The wind has picked up, and the eastern sky is beginning to show a little light.

As the light grows in the east, I pack my camera and other gear into the trunk of my car. And then I lean against the car to again look up into the still dark sky. I see another small satellite swim through the darkness. An early bird is disturbed by my presence. It flies out of the Walnut tree and into the darken sky.

I know that is a hint that I should leave for the start of my day. I climb into my car and head into work.

After the film is developed and prints made, each picture carries in it the coldness of the early morning, the feel of the wind, and the sounds of the open field.

My picture at the top of the article shows the trail of the ISS. And the stars have short tails from the not-perfect alignment of my Azimuth Tracker. And the tail/trail of the ISS shows giggles form the wind.

To see the ISS use the NASA tool may be found at: https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/