Up early, hiked up to Barn Bluff and took in Red Wing. Standing on that bluff you can feel how delicate life is. It was a windy day. I heard stories of people getting blown off. Looking down Red Wing looks like a child's city, you know those ones they can create out individual pieces. It is somewhat of a strenuous hike up the bluff, short but steep. I couldn't help but wonder how Thoreau managed it suffering with tuberculosis, and today there are stairs. His companion wrote that he seemed to be feeling better. I'm not sure he was healing, but perhaps the fresh air improved his mood and spirits, and after all he did love nature. Being in nature would lift anyone's mood I believe.
Driving up to St Paul the change in landscape came to mind. How the terrain and landscape has changed over the last thousand miles since I left eastern Pennsylvania. The farms and change in landscape it seems have impressed me the most. I'm not a highway person. I prefer to stay on back roads when ever possible. Not only because there is usually less traffic, but the scenery is always captivating and offers photographic opportunities not possible on a busy highway.
At Indian Mound Park I walked around the mounds and to Carver's Cave that Thoreau mentions, but incidentally is no longer there but consumed by modern society and vandals. Here, looking at St. Paul and watching the eagles soar I began thinking about the landscape and the changes of time and place I have observed over the last week.
The farms and unused land are probably the most captivating to me. Driving through the Berks and western Pennsylvania the farmland and forests. Into Ohio, which is pretty much like Pennsylvania, the untouched land. The land preserved in Ohio for the history of the original people of this country. Their mounds and areas they are believed to have lived and roamed. Southern Ohio's caves and parks and pristine land. From Ohio to Chicago was probably the most varied. In the morning I walked through the caves in a secluded park and ended the day in a large metropolitan area.
Ohio's farmland, cows, and horses give way to Indiana farmland and wind farms. Driving past the farms makes one wonder with all the farmland why are American's going hungry? Why are we growing corn for fuel and not for the less fortunate? Fuel is more important than feeding children?
The wind farms in Indiana were fascinating to me. In Indiana there were miles and miles and acre upon acre of wind turbines. It gives me hope to see so many of them. Living with the earth.
Then I came to a halt in traffic in Gary, Indiana. I began to think about Freidman's book here. All the people in cars, and generally one person to a car. I was thinking about a paper I wrote when I lived in California on greenhouse gases, as I looked at all the cars, many SUV's surrounding me I remembered this one film I watched doing my research. The narrator explaining how greenhouse gases choke the earth like winding up a window in a car. Sitting there I thought of this and wondered, what are we doing? And where are we headed? Is anyone concerned?
Granted I was making this journey in my car, which is a fairly economical, environmental friendly. as far as most cars go, but it would have been an interesting journey I thought if I had someway to cross the country without a car. Not flying, but a train system and other modes of public transportation that would allow me to get where I was going with out the damage to the environment.
Now that would be a walkabout!
When I approached Chicago I encountered their "tollway." Even though this road is somewhat irritating, stopping, unless you have an express pass, every couple of miles to pay a toll. Is this to deter people from driving? Clearly people aren't concerned by the show of traffic around me. Do people even think of the environment when they are driving through these tolls, or are they just irritated by the inconvenience of it all?
After leaving Chicago I headed to Wisconsin, and again there was a vast change in the landscape and way of life. Back to farm land. The farms in Wisconsin were so neat. They had this comforting aspect to them. I thought how it would be interesting to talk to the people that lived there and even lend a hand for a while. Once again wind turbines began to dominate the landscape. The farms were different than the ones I saw in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa, Illinois and Indiana. The shape of the land changed too. More rock boulders are visible along the road way that reminded me of the highways in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
The bluffs that arose as you headed north along the Mississippi were a striking change in the landscape. the bluffs arise out of the earth and seem to grow as you drive toward the Upper Mississippi. Maiden Rock is awe inspiring towering over head as you stand and look up at it, eagles soaring over the top. Driving into Minnesota, the land of 10,000 lakes there appears to be water everywhere, so clean, crisp and blue. Lake City is touted to be the birthplace of water skiing. Lake City is also the first city I came across that seemed worn out. I rarely went into the larger cities or towns, but this one just struck me as being tired and worn down. The tourist areas are well kept, clean and vibrant but the back part shows a different life. Changes in lifestyle and economic base clearly visible.
Onto St. Paul and the rest of my journey west.
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