How can I live my life any more irresponsibly? By taking a multi-week road trip to the East Coast of course! Who needs to work (you can tell the importance of your job by how easy it is to miss a few weeks [with no pay of course] and have no one notice)? This whole expedition began with my buddy Riles inviting me out to New York for the Packer-Giant game. I have a friend who goes to grad school at Penn St. so I thought I’d visit him and from there it spiraled out of control to a trip encompassing New England from Walden Pond to Bar Harbor, Maine to the Green Mountains in Vermont and finally Niagara Falls. I may die, but hey, it was a good time!
The road trip began with me driving from EC to Madison after a day working at Hoffman Hills State Rec. Area. I had to leave early enough to catch the Badger-North Carolina basketball game that night. I of course waited to the last moment to pack everything so I was late for the tip. I arrived at the Slaney’s house in Madison and if there is crazier place than that I’d like to see it. There is never a dull moment and my good friend Mark was there to help breakdown the game. Mark is one of the people whom I feel honored that calls me a friend. Despite our cheering and beer chugging, the Badgers lost. I was expecting a worse outcome, so I was surprised when we only lost by 3.
I woke up “early” the next morning and headed out on the road to make it to State College, PA, home of Penn St. My friend Kris lives out there and is going for his PhD (his girlfriend Kristin is only going for her Masters so she is obviously slacking). Being a man I didn’t use the GPS I had at my disposal. It’s more fun to work through directions in your head (plus from Madison to Pennsylvania there are only 4 different roads to take). I had emailed a host of friends with knowledge of my route and the Northeast to solicit ideas on where to go. My Indiana expert was Laura who struggled to come up with places to visit there (not a good sign). She tossed out the idea of visiting the Indiana Dunes, which I had heard good things about. I planned to camp there but plans changed and I trucked through, getting sidetracked in South Bend, IN. Notre Dame may be a bit pious for me (If I wasn’t going to hell before, I sure was going after my Notre Dame visit). It was interesting to see the iconic sights that have been given a meaning through sports like Touchdown Jesus and the Golden Dome. Walking around campus and Notre Dame Stadium it felt different than any college campus I had been to before. Maybe it was the vast numbers of out-of-staters or the religious feel, but I felt like I didn’t belong. As I walked up to the Golden Dome, bells started to ring, which startled me, and caused a “Jesus Christ” to pop out of my mouth. Whoops! Overall, it was great seeing one of the classic campuses and stadiums in the country.
I had wasted too much time in South Bend so I had to make up some time. The old Intrepid motored the rest of the way through Indiana and Ohio without stopping. Turns out western Indiana received a lot of snow recently as the countryside was covered with an early season wet snow that clung to the north side of the trees, giving away the direction the wind blew during the storm. Northern Indiana is known for not only Notre Dame and Michiana (that’s what they call the weird border region between Michigan and Indiana [I guess “wasteland” was already taken]), but being the RV capital. I knew this but finding out there was a RV Hall of Fame in Elkhart obliterated my mind. I have no idea what this place would entail. Do they have RV’s from people who have taken them on epic road trips? Maybe they have the first Airstream or other technological improvements. If they called it a museum that would make more sense than calling it a Hall of Fame (calling it a Hall of Fame does a disservice to other great Hall of Fames like the Bowling Hall of Fame in St. Louis). Regardless, that might be the lamest place in America.
Ohio came and went without a pit stop. I set the cruise at about 6 over the speed limit and was passed by maybe 5 people the entire state. Ohioans drive slow. The only thing of mention in Ohio was the town with the unfortunate name of Sandusky (I looked for Tommy Boy at Callahan Brakes, but to no avail). Not a good time to be a Sandusky.
I arrived at Penn St. at 10 pm (Pennsylvania is beautiful in the dark) where I was greeted by Kris and Kristin. I beckoned Kris over to my trunk where I revealed the bounty of Wisconsin beer and cheese I had smuggled over state lines. There were four Wisconsin microbrew 6 packs and he chose the Dave’s BrewFarm Matacabras and New Glarus Black Top. I selected the beer based on awesomeness and the chances that it could be found out East. The BrewFarm was my ace in the hole because it was such a small brewery, plus it is Wisconsin’s only wind-powered brewery. Kristin had thrown a bunch of leftovers from the CSA into a soup and I slurped it down quite eagerly. Kris and I headed out to Zeno’s for a few local libations. I let Kris choose the first pitcher and he managed to select the only beer on tap that I had had already (or heard of for that matter), Victory’s Hopdevil. I was wearing a Wisconsin Badger sweatshirt so I had to give people some crap after crushing them a few days earlier on the football field. I turned over the beer menu and to my chagrin; the first beer on the list was Dave’s BrewFarm Matacabras. Really? I couldn’t believe it. It’s great that you could find it out in Pennsylvania, but it diminished my effort (although it was $6 a bottle and I bought the 6er for $10).
Clever bike shop name at Penn St.
Friday was a late starter for me. I putzed around and headed to campus just after nooner. I like walking around college campuses and seeing the architecture and history that comes with a campus that’s been around for well over 100 years. I thought about wearing another Badger shirt but decided against it, they’ve been through enough already. The gloom of the skies overhead accompanied me as I waltzed around campus, going from the scurry of students in-between classes to the sparse sidewalks as the learning commenced. The symmetry of the walkways, buildings and big old trees always fascinate me. I love pedestrian malls with majestic 200 hundred-year-old elms or oaks arching over the people walking about, not seeing the beauty that hovers over them. Kris skipped out on his studies and we checked out the art museum on campus. I’m quite the philistine when it comes to art. We moved on to lunch (they ID at all hours at pubs and bars in Penn St. It’s weird seeing a bouncer at 1 in the afternoon) and then a final jaunt over to Beaver Stadium. It seats over 100,000 people and is a monument to Joe Paterno. There is a statue of JoePa outside the stadium with a quote that has new meaning these days “They ask me what I’d like written about when I’m gone, I hope they write I made Penn St. a better place not just that I was a good football coach.” There may be an addendum to that after the recent events. I gave the stadium the old Wisconsin salute and headed back to get ready for the evening. Euchre was on the docket.
The Kris’s and I went to the Darkhorse to meet up with a 4th for cards and beer. The Kris’s teamed up and attempted to derail my partner and me. Over the course of the next few hours I made my way through local beers like Otto’s, Troeg’s, Elk Creek, Weyer and Sly Fox. The game ended in a tie at 3-3 as we moved to a new bar to meet up with folks who had attended the hockey game. One of the first comments I heard was “I love Bald Eagle State Park! The do pumpkin chucking!” My kind of place. Outside of the bar was a Penn St. sign, too tempting to not tamper with. I pretended to pee on the sign while Kris snapped a few photos. The bouncer kept yelling at me telling me how cool I was for doing that. We finished with the photo op and headed back to the bar and were promptly denied access to the bar. He said, “The cops may not have known what you did, but I do.” A few cops had driven by while I was pretending to pee but didn’t seem to care, but this bouncer had it out for me. I congratulated him on catching me pretending to pee and we headed home.
Dave: Always a pleasure to read about your adventures. You are truly getting the most out of life. Who needs to work when you have beer and a blog? Can't wait to hear more. You've brightened my day...well at least the last hour and eight minutes of it, anyway.
ReplyDeleteJane W