You don't think about jet lag when only flying to the Midwest, but an hour is an hour so I crashed and woke up early. Looking to make hay before the sun shone, I happily discovered that I was close to the Burr Woods Nature Center. I don't have many rules, but one of them is that when I'm staying in a random suburb and that suburb has "a favorite hiking trail" of the home city, I have to go hike that trail at the earliest opportunity. So, it was off to the Bethany Falls Trail.
It was already 83 and humid when I hit the road around 7:00, ridiculous but not so hot that you couldn't just sweat and forget about it. At first, the trail was very unimpressive and I grimaced at the thought of it being anyone's favorite. The trail was well-maintained and the forest was nice enough, but there wasn't much going on. This was a highlight from an "outlook" from forest into more forest.
Eventually, I came to some really cool limestone outcroppings. Outlaws once hid in these formations to escape the law. I only managed to get blurry photos.
Couldn't you see people successfully hiding around these? I sure could! Images of the land with fewer trees and more grinning rascals quickly coalesced.
After finding my way free of the limestone, I looped back into some prairie meadow.
It was incredibly peaceful. There's just something about meadows.
On the way back, I was held up by a few deer.
Then, I mistakenly offended a fit old couple by talking too loud with the deer within earshot. Oops. Fortunately, this sign brought on more than enough warm feelings to push out the embarrassment. I'd love to visit this site periodically to monitor restoration progress!
I admitted to writing the trail off too soon. Still, I'll take New Hampshire, and I don't think that'll offend many Bethany Falls fans.
Before retreating to the AC, I wandered down to the I-70 overpass near the motel. This had pretty much blown my mind when I stayed here last year and gave me a bit of a shock this time as well.
The overpass is I-70; the lower road is MO-7. I've never seen bridge piers between two lanes of a road before. Exiting I-70 East to the state road north, there are two left-turn lanes at the end of the off-ramp. One goes to the left of the pier, the other to the right. Pretty crazy. My dad speculates that the bridge was built when MO-7 was just one lane each direction and they didn't bother to replace the bridge when MO-7 was widened. Makes sense.
Soon, I headed back to Independence to the Harry S. Truman library and museum. I guess it's too well-known to be a fun fact, but the S in Harry S. Truman stands for nothing. It was just considered to more dignified than no middle name.
I had a great time! The museum seemed to have been built around the goal of showing the public that it's tough to be President, mainly because of all of the tough decision that nobody else can make. There's nobody to pass the buck to. Lord knows I pass the buck often enough at work, so the point was well-taken.
Harry S. comes out looking pretty good, but not perfect, and there's a lot of good 40s/50s and general Presidential history along the way. Did you know that James K. Polk was constantly exhausted because he handled most White House correspondence himself? No wonder nobody remembers him - he was too busy with minutiae. I wondered what curious choices our other presidents had made and wondered why I haven't already read biographies of each and every one.
I'm pleased to make the Truman the first presidential library to receive a Main Streets and Back Roads endorsement. America, f*** yeah!
Invigorated, I skirted downtown and followed Marla's directions to a used bookstore on a commercial strip. It wasn't 90% romance novels, as had been reported, but it was pretty close. All I needed, though, was one copy of Blue Highways; three weeks later, it's already a landmark read.
I changed in a school parking lot and enjoyed the wedding more than I'd expected to. Two Swarthmore alums who I thought didn't care for me were perfectly nice and even saved me a seat. Hopefully I'll remember this next time I have occasion to over-generalize and worry based on third-hand reports. The surprisingly good terms continued at the reception, followed by a quality night of dancing. Almost everyone danced, wine was free, and the DJ played the Cupid Shuffle. Not surprisingly, Alicia killed her Maid of Honor toast. The mood was so good, the 90/humid for the walk back to the hotel was only cause for more laughter.
By Sunday morning, I was feeling comfortable on the road again and hummed my favorite travelling song - also my favoritest favorite Rush song - in the shower.
After successful goodbyes back in Independence, the return trip to the airport was an adventure best forgotten, but we did get a few quality minutes at historic Union Station. It's a major train station rehabilitation success story.
The flight home was uneventful and, after the usual "is the C&J convenience worth the wait?" hemming and hawing, we made it home safely. Would I have remembered however I'd have killed an extra hour or two, anyway? Doubtful. It felt good to have traveled and I was pleased Asheville was only two weeks away.
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