Laura was driving Roy and me to Story time at the Westerville library. Yes, I was a passenger for a change. I saw the red corvette emblazoned with State Highway Patrol Laura with her younger eyes read the smaller white lettering (which is blurry in photos and blurry to my eyes ) that the vehicle was seized due to multiple DUIs (Driving Under Influence).
Here’s an article about how the vehicle is used
Had a wonderful time in the desert terrain, the mountains, the cacti, the National Forest, the wedding and surrounding festivities. It was all beautiful. And of course I enjoyed knitting around the fire pit with good friends, too.
But these autumnal colors called to me before sunset. I’d just gotten off the plane. Here as I looked around the landscape I saw the familiar. I pulled off at the rest stop along the interstate as it was such a contrast from where I’d been just this morning. Tried to capture it.
You think about things.
Interstate Route 78 headed east to NYC. Usually you’d be zipping along, doing sixty-five.
The giant lighted sign said INCIDENT AHEAD! Stop-go-stop -stop! You try to not feel frustrated. You’re not getting anywhere fast. You’re stuck. Trying to get to the Holland Tunnel.
“The drive west along I-78 across New Jersey is one of the most exceptional highway geology tours of North America” geologycafe.com (I was driving East on 78 but the rocks looked the same on either side.)
Years ago I read about the Geology along Interstate 80 in an essay in The New Yorker , north of my route. I thought of that piece when I saw these rocks.
There are signs warning “Falling Rock”.
John McPhee, author of In Suspect Terrain one of four volumes now combined in Pulitzer Prize winning book Annals of the Former World writes “Human time, regarded in the perspective of geologic time, is much too thin to be observed: the mark invisible at the end of a ruler.”
“The interstate leaves the Newark Basin and enters the Highlands of the Reading Prong. The next fifteen miles includes some of the most complex geology in the region. The road crosses sections of folded and faulted Precambrian rock, early Paleozoic sedimentary rocks, and additional outlier patches of Newark Basin rocks. Near exit 7 the interstate climbs Musconetong Mountain then drops” From the Geologycafe.com
You can’t pull over, stop your car and get out of to take a photo on an interstate but you can roll down your window when you’re stopped. a
nd think about just how old these rocks are.
This is Ellis whom I met in Cambridge Ohio. I thought he was selling eggs. Cambridge, OH on Interstate 70 is halfway between Pittsburgh and Columbus.
I’d pulled into a Cracker Barrel to buy a giant set of checkers and use the rest room.
We got to talking, he told me about the price range for the various brands of balls but I didn’t need any golf balls.
Turns out he was from my neck of the woods. West Mifflin, McKeesport, Duquesne- all in the Pittsburgh vicinity.
He will attend a niece’s wedding and unfortunately that’s the same day as his 60th reunion from high school. Hope I got that all correct, sir. Thank you.
To give you a better perspective on his location- above is a crop of the photo below.
Driving from Columbus to Pittsburgh I pulled off the exit and photographed this sign. Looked like an outline for Batman.
Didn’t drive in to see if I could find a clue what the sign was for originally.
This week’s challenge was something to think about on my trip from Pittsburgh to Columbus Friday afternoon. Sorting through images I had in the archives. (in my mind, obviously) Nothing jumped out. And then-
an opportunity presented itself, right in front of me. Standstill traffic. On Route 70 West, Friday afternoon.
A 3 1/2 hour trip took almost SIX hours to drive today due to congestion from road work and merging to a single lane and perhaps a bad accident that was cleaned up by the time I got to the site.
I saw police and emergency vehicles driving the other direction with lights and sirens.
A truck reflected the sky AND an old fashioned airplane is in the left door panel. It looks like a bird. The sky seemed to merge with the reflection in the shiny truck. Nature and machine-made merge. I waited to merge to the left single lane. Other interpretations of merge are here
