In part three of this American journey I expressed some doubt that I would fulfil my promise of 20 memorable events in our experience of America over the years. But fear not because I’m going to finish off the twenty in this blog. In this blog I’m going to write mostly about what might be called one-off happenings. Just the twinkling of an eye in some cases but which have lived on in our memories all these years.
You don’t get any more twinkling or distant in time than the first one. This was 1978 and, given it was in the early days of our first ever visit to the USA (on our exchange), it is probably the first ‘proper’ memory of that country. And it’s a strange one.
A colleague, at the school where I was working on exchange, owned a boat, a yacht in actual fact I think it was called. The fact that an ‘ordinary’ teacher owned a yacht didn’t surprise me in the least. Such was my view of how rich Americans were compared to us poor Brits. In fact he had inherited it from his dad who had been an admiral, but this did nothing to remove the gloss from the experience.
This was the ‘moment’. The boat was moored in one of the estuaries / creeks off of Chesapeake Bay. To get the boat from there into the open water we had to use the motor. The ‘moment’ was when he turned off the engine, it went absolutely silent until the wind hit the sails. A sound quite unlike any other. And then we took off across the water of Chesapeake Bay as if by magic. And that’s what that moment was. I can still remember it perfectly.
By the way, I’ve kept the photos on this blog very modest. So there’s just two both from this trip. One of them is possibly my favourite photo of myself and my daughter on sad yacht. Second one, Mrs SH in younger days, same yacht. You all know what the Grand Canyon and Empire State looks like, so you don’t need those. The rest you can probably look up if you’re of a mind to do so. Which is one way of saying I can’t find our own photos of these places.
My second choice is very different and much more predictable but memorable nevertheless. It qualifies by virtue of it happening in an instant. This was our first sight of the Grand Canyon. What made it so staggering is that you can’t see it at all until you stand right on the edge of it and look down / over this huge tear in the earth’s surface. And you mean to say that that tiny river down there did all this. Wow. Not a word I use lightly but, wow, again.
I remember David Hockney’s ‘joiner’ at Salts Mill gallery of the Grand Canyon. There must have been maybe 500 postcard size photos in this work of art. It gave a little bit of an idea of the grandeur, but of course couldn’t capture that first sight. We’ve never seen it again and maybe that’s a good thing because I imagine nothing could ever capture, in the same way, that first sight of something as close to infinity as I will ever get, on this earth anyway.
Back to a more humble, but equally magic, an event. This time in Colorado. It’s a surprise in some ways that I’ve got this far in these 4 blogs without mentioning the Durango – Silverton train ride. Look it up on Goggle or ask for the great train rides of the world and it will be there. We’ve done it three times. But this time was in December and in winter the train doesn’t go all the way to Silverton on account of the snow.
On this journey it only went as far as Cascade Canyon (I think I’ve got the name right). 8,733 feet up in The Rockies, my phone says. It wasn’t snowing as we set off from Durango but, as we climbed, it started to snow and snowed more and more until, when we got to Cascade Canyon it was, as they say, white over. The train stopped. Just us, the engine gently simmering away (did I mention it’s a steam train?), and hundreds of snow-covered pine trees (I think). Again, as the train stopped, and a relative silence descended upon us, the moment seemed perfection, 8,000 feet up in the Rocky Mountains surrounded by virgin snow. Can’t do it justice but there we are.
Number four out of five has to be our first sight of the Empire State building. I know I’ve mentioned it before but I’ll say it again for that first moment, the sight of it on the horizon as we came in on the subway from Queens I think (or was t Long Island?). America here we come, we thought, and we did from there on. In those days the World Trade Centre buildings still stood but, if you wanted the iconic American skyscraper, there it was in the distance.
And now, with my very last choice, I’m blatantly going to cheat. I’ll do this by making my twentieth choice* (fifth for this blog), a twentieth equal selection. And they’re not really ‘moments’, such rule-bending. They won’t mean a lot to you but each one means a lot to us. So there was our country club stay in Smallpoint, Maine ( a state I haven’t mentioned but we’re very fond of, if you want relatively secluded, sandy beaches, this area of Maine provides it, not to mention ridiculously cheap lobster sandwiches). The country club on the beach, if that’s not a contradiction, where we stayed is another story for another time. A different America for sure.
While we’re in the North East, there was my week teaching summer school in Plymouth State college, New Hampshire. Ever since my exchange year I had wanted to teach in an American college. This time I finally managed it. I felt I had arrived. I hadn’t, but that again is another story.
Throw into this melting pot, our first sight of the Pacific Ocean at Venice Beach and then, just up the road, the road-sign with the legendary, to us, Ventura Highway (from an America song of the same name, the group as mentioned in the last blog) along with similarly the first sight of the New Jersey turnpike sign (from Paul Simon. Sad aren’t we?)
Finally, to round off this opus, and it’s not easy to know how to decide where to end. I’ll finish in Durango, Colorado. If we have a ‘home’ in the USA (which we don’t really, just the land) this would be it. So I’ll finish with what was a nice cowboy town last time we saw it, and a passing reference to The Strater Hotel, The Ore House steak restaurant, the little diner, name of Carvers. And much more. Even after 4,000 words there’s a great deal I might have said. But that will do. At least for now
*You may have noticed I got my numbers wrong for blog America 15 – 20, should have been 10 – 15 and this one is 15 – 20. You probably didn’t notice.
I do love these blogs, I guess we share memories of many of the same places. We did return to the Grand Canyon, different time of year, more people and not the same impact so I think you are right not to return. Preserve the memory!
it’s tricky deciding whether to go back to a place or explore a new one or just stay at home? At our age.