The desert salt flat and bright blue sky met far away at foot-level. Massive trains crept by on twelve sets of tracks, their red and black and white bodies sharp against the imposing sky.

Every picture snapped became the best picture I’d ever taken.

A crowd of backpackers milled about, complete with keffiyehs. Are you catching the train to New York with us? they asked.

I’m from New York, I said.

Scrapwood littered the ground, part of a set of tracks being pulled up. I stacked it on a wide woodpile. Time had warped two pieces beyond value. Placed one atop the pile and tossed the other aside.

Found an underground workshop and climbed inside, down the ladder. In the back, a man leaned his torso through a curtain and worked atop a shrouded workbench. Even after reaching my camera through the curtain and clicking the shutter, I couldn’t see what he was up to.

The trains rumbled overhead. Figured my camera must have dirt on the sensor.

—

Photo by Mallix via Flickr.

Thinking about the millions of ways to exist on the Camino de Santiago. Again.

Read more in my post on Vagablogging this week.

Thanks for checking it out…

Ultreia!

Planning a summer tour while the Civil War is raging? We recommend a train ride through New Jersey to the coal-fields of Pennsylvania.

Advertisement from the back of Harper’s Magazine. August, 1864.

UPDATE:

Here’s a link to the full text copy from Google Books.

Journey to the Coal-fields in a larger map

More below:

“But it is only after entering Pennsylvania (the whole eastern half of which is traversed by connecting lines) that one can fairly appreciate the extent and variety of scenery which the route affords. Mountain ranges of characteristic grandeur, cleft here and there by abrupt fissures to their very base, through which stately rivers lead their pomp of waters to the sea; rich and beautiful valleys, sometimes so narrow, and, withal, so picturesque, as to remind the traveler of Swiss cantons among the Alps, and sometimes allowed a broader and longer reach by the yielding mountain ranges that inclose them; forests that still retain the rugged aspect of their primeval wilderness, and romantic cascades. The mention of these features but feebly suggests the reality as seen by the eye. The reader must actually visit the Delaware Water Gap, he must himself climb the Pocono range, he must follow the Susquehanna in its winding course for a hundred miles, he must himself look upon the Valley of the Wyoming, with its tragic memorials and its beautiful villages, he must see with his own eyes the rich Valley of Lebanon, he must be drawn up the inclined planes of Mount Pisgah at Mauch Chunk, he must actually realize these things in his own experience, for it is beyond our power adequately to describe them. The sketches too, from the hand of the artist, good as they are, but suggest an outline of the real scene, destitute of the rich charm and body of reality which color imparts, as also of the element of vastness, so prominent in most of the scenes delineated.

To the scientific tourist there is a distinctive attraction connected with traveling in Pennsylvania generally, viz., the fact that in a geological sense this.state is literally the keystone of the Union, for in its peculiar formations is to be found the key to the geology of the whole country. It was in this state that the first ridges of the Appalachian range were thrown up, which were followed at intervals by other parallel ridges to the southward. There is also this additional peculiarity: that in Pennsylvania, more than in any other state, the coal measures have been preserved, having been simply opened up by the natural convulsions incident to the upheaval of mountain ranges, and not, as is generally the case, entirely swept away by an excess of violence.

It is to this peculiarity that Eastern Pennsylvania owes its rich treasury of anthracite coal, from which it derives the greater portion of its wealth. These anthracite coal-fields are accessible through two important connections of the Central Road, viz., the Lehigh Valley, and the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad, as previously stated. Of course to the tourist there is a greater charm, as regards novelty, in the mechanical developments of resources of this nature than is the case in the ordinary appliances of agricultural industry, and for this reason, added to many others, the route which is under consideration is eminently fitted for the purposes of excursionists.

Considered in this connection, the route naturally divides itself into two—a longer one, extending nearly to the southern border of Pennsylvania, and a shorter one, included within the limits of the anthracite coal region. By the former of these we are conveyed as far as Hampton Junction, along the Central Road, where we take the Lackawanna Road through Warren County to the Water Gap, and from thence over the Pocono Mountain to Scranton. From this point, over the Lackawanna and Bloomsburg Road, we proceed through the Wyoming Valley to Northumberland, where we take the Northern Central Railroad to Harrisburg, the southern limit of our route, from which we return through Reading, Allentown, and Easton to New York, over the Philadelphia and Reading, the East Pennsylvania, the Lehigh Valley, and the Central Railroad of New Jersey.”

Seriously — this is a repost of the instructions given by Cole Gainer to a friend on Facebook. Pass it on to anybody in there who might benefit:

If you decide to walk:

Leave early, bring water.

Walk down the rails until they disappear. Then just look left and follow the path up that’s been created. It goes by the hotel and is pretty easy to follow. (Look for my awesome Uruguay hat, I may have dropped it there.)

Take the low path and then head back on the rails. Some tricky parts come up where there are waves and stones to jump around but this bit is relatively easy and exciting.

Walk for about 20/30 minutes and then you will hit another area of washed out rail. WHEREVER THERE IS RAIL WITH NO GROUND UNDERNEATH – DO NOT CROSS IT!! Already made that mistake and it was no fun. By now the Peruvians should have established signs where to head into the jungle. We tried to leave stones and paper but they may be gone from new rains. Anyway, always look at least 100-200 feet before a washed out rail and you will see the path into the jungle that gets around it.

After this second crossing you walk for awhile with the regular astounding scenery and a couple land bridge crossings you need to run past one at a time so that they don’t slide beneath you. Who knows what differences there are now two days later but I’m sure the locals have found a new way around – and if they haven’t, then it’s your time to shine!

Keep walking, cross a rockslide on the rail, keep going. About 3 hours in you will get to a big long blue/white house. An old woman there will feed you all for a couple soles. At the end of her house the road is completely gone. Rest there then head into the jungle at the end of her house right before where the road drops off.

Follow the path, twist around some rock. Cross a creek, be wary of an angry dog, pass some houses, and get back on the rail. From here you can manage for awhile or at least make it up as you go. The first two jungle entrances I mentioned are the biggest pointers so far. Later, there are two more ones. One is marked by a log and some paper on it. If you tried to keep going you would cross rail with no land and just river underneath it. I did this. DON’T DO THIS! Go around in the jungle. Any time you think you can’t go any farther, just pull out the Boy Scout smarts and look for the path that I/we/someone has made around.

The last key jungle turn comes around marker 87. You’ll see sticks and rocks showing you where to head up into the cliffs. I made an arrow in the dirt but I bet it’s gone now. Go up in the cliffs and don’t come back down. Even when you see the rail somewhere around where marker 85-83 should be – don’t go to the rail. Another mistake I made. Stay on the high road, look at the mountains, pretend you’re on LOST, see how beautiful it is, pass the cemetery, keep going. Past the cemetery you’ll see ruins in the distance that people are working on, you can get on the rail there but then you go right back up through the ruins.

You start to see towns now but you need to avoid the rails even though you’ll see them. You’ll also start to die here. This is where my limp kicked in. Hopefully you’ll have rested much more than I did. For some reason I thought it was a race. When you hit the towns keep on the high roads – forget the rails, they are decieving and washed out every few hundred meters. If youre lucky you can maybe catch a ride into town now, the only problem is some of the town roads are flooded, but at least you’re out of the sticks.

You can do it, especially if you take it easy and don’t have that sinking feeling that your on your own and no one will know if you fall into the river and die. I’m sure the paths are well trodden now. The American embassy chick said they were expecting a few hundred people (mostly locals) to walk out in the following days. Unfortunately when I went she said there were less than 50 that had come out. The trail should be well blazed and it’s beautiful.

Climbed through the woods, up the steep face to the lookout. On the way up heard a parked car blaring the latest autotune, expected to find some homeboy and his girlfriend. Instead, a circle of people, lots of leather jackets, heads bowed, arms around each other. Big man in a suit saying a prayer in Spanish.

Crossed the road, made myself scarce, continued up the trail a ways, then stopped and looked down to the lookout. Just in time to see the big man in the suit dump an urn of tan ashes into the wind. The ashes didn’t plaster onto anyone’s face, just swarmed in the air through the crowd.

Nobody seemed to mind a final taste.

[Free rhyme inside]:

I’m a zoomin human who flew in from outer space

I’m just cruising through, I aint got much time to waste

Refusin to be consumed by the consume in your race

I’m a zoomin human who flew in from outer space

I’m azzzumin,
That they were producing
Forward movement
Seein right through them
Know who they usin,
YOU
Gotta be doin
Such a gullible human
Now you pushin consumin
That aint all…
THEY abusing
EXCESS
Fresh pollution
And we find it so amusin
Even though it’s a nuisance
Corporate, institutions
The killingest of weapons
And the freshest excuses to use them
The loudest beliefs
But aint allowed to smoke Cuban

It must be too soon in
Your young evolution
To let go of your devil
And of his delusions

I’m a zoomin human who flew in

From out of place

I’m a zoomin human who flew

–Shane Christensen

Photo by McMarcLouwes

Less than 700 words and most of it’s quotes, but it took till four in the morning.

Bottom line: No matter your age, it’s not all sunshine and sailboats out there.

“Dazed people walking the streets of Port au Prince keep saying the same thing: “Haiti is dead.” And on one level that’s true — this small country has just endured one of the most searing natural disasters in history, and death is everywhere.  Death is on sidewalks, on the roads, in rivers, buried in rubble and noticeable only by its smell.  The scale is so unimaginable that the usual human traditions and courtesies for the dead have been suspended: many thousands of bodies have been collected by backhoe and dumped into mass graves with no more ceremony than the rubble that goes into the same pits.

But admidst the carnage and chaos there have been remarkable glimmers of hope and strength, of heroism and selflessness. I’m sleeping in my truck in the parking lot of a hotel; outside the walls thousands of Haitians, with nowhere else to go, are camping out on the streets.  But as night descends the singing starts, jumping voices sounding through the darkness, spirituals and ancient songs sung from those streets late into the night. I listen to this from inside the truck as I drift to sleep; its jarring and achingly beautiful.”

–Chris Hondros, via Foreign Policy.

Photo Chris Hondros/Getty Images

(Read it aloud):

I am fluid
Drunk from a cup
Held in the hands of a druid
Fresh breath you drew in
I, the tension
In cupids bow
Am the penetration
Struck your heart
The projectile point that flew right threw it

I am fluid
I am,
I
Flow with
Tear drops
Drip in a moment of grace
Drift, evaporate, its how I levitate
Slit through mountains like a glacier
I am fluid even when frozen

I am coastin, shwishhhhh….(basketball sound)
Times two it… swishhhhh
Slip through fish net
Sip
A rogue wine in the crystal you are holdin
I am

The answer that’s still blowin
In the wind
River mill grinder of grain
A portion of my power contained
In revolution
Let loose in
I am groovin
Ongoin
Turbine turbo boostin
Injected into a vein of social pain
A belt that’s loosened
A forgetten language that’s still spoken
So fluent

I am fluid
A perfect heart beat
Lets loop it, techno muse
I told you
I am fluid
Inconclusive, not reclusive
We are
One and the same so you are included
In this movement
Walls made of granite or made of panic
I cut through it
I am

I am fluid
I am the daily commuted
I wont be muted
Full of music
I am fluid

I am
Fluid
So elusive
More fluid than mountain dew is
Move with
The motion of Nike swoosh is
How I just do it

I am fluid
I grew it
Hydroponic, supersonic
Like Hailey’s comet
But I’m the comet that struck your planet
BOOM
I’m on it
Aloe vera on a wound
I calm it
Fuse it
Shaman chewed it
Chased it with whatever flavor
Wine into water
You choose which

Like an immigrant’s name
Switch
Save you savior
Save your space ship
Shape shift
Every shoe fits
Melt me down and take two hits
Concentrate your juices
I am a constant state of fluid
Compliment your food with
Quench your thirst,
A blues riff
It’s too thick?
Dilute it
Like a 24 hour drive through is
I’m open all life
I am fluid

–Shane Christensen

Photo by Tony the Misfit via Flickr.