Pictured Rocks

Guatemala Dec 2019

Northeast: The Beautiful and the Broken

Northeast America Mountains and Coast
Part I: The Beautiful

Delaware Coast

The day after my 30th birthday, I once again found myself driving across the country to bask in the beauty of God's creation without the worry of pesky worldly distractions like hygiene.

My travels began with a long stretch, making it all the way to Niagara Falls, a place that I have never been before, and oh man, it is a beautiful sight to just drive up to [Canada Side > New York Side]. 

New York is a wildly diverse and beautiful state. Though my original plans didn't include it, I was very glad for choice recommendations that brought me through the Finger Lakes area, including Watkins Glen National Park, and Taughannock Falls.

A very Watkinsy Glen

This was over a mile of carved archways and steps

A very Glensy Watkins?

Taughannock Falls

My journey continued through the White Mountains of Vermont and New Hampshire, travelling along the Kancamagus Highway [112].

Vermont misty mountains

Fluuuuuuuuuuu-

-uuuuuuuuuu-

-uuuuuume Gorge

The Northeast region of the country is GORGEous [I AM THE FIRST TO MAKE THIS JOKE].
...
In a little town, North Conway, NH, I enjoyed a drink at the Deacon Street bar, where I was the sole audience for an open mic night featuring a folksy guitarist who played a mean cover of 'Girls' by the Beastie Boys

Diana's Baths

Finally hitting the coast, I began my oceanside travel southbound, starting in Maine, visiting the gorgeous Acadia National Park which is just a giant island of MAGIC which takes 2 hours just to drive around.

Little Long Pond, Acdaia National Park

The first major city I visited was Boston, where I started my day running 2 miles  of the Charles River [I was challenged to do this as I would obviously never consciously make the choice to run any amount of distance].

I met up with my friend Cloud, and we spent the evening all over Newbury St., Downtown Crossing, and through the Boston Common where good conversation distracted me from walking through the largest cannabis festival I've ever smelled.

I hit up some other choice locations in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, including Halibut Point State Park, pictured above, before heading to New York.

New York was definitely the citiest city I've ever visited, and after picking up a authentic New York slice, visiting iconic buildings, and walking around Manhattam listening to choice locally inspired music, I spent most of the day in Central Park. 

Took a while to find, but the Gothic Bridge was always a favourite of mine

After spending most of the day walking the length of Manhattan, riding the subway down to Brooklyn seemed like the best option, especially because it had a certain John and Karli to visit (AND their new foster dog Wiggles!). After a wonderful tour of their neighborhood, finishing with a sunset view of the city, I took a good recommendation in Chinatown before taking the ferry back and was on my way. 

The rest of the trip was visiting other major cities like Philadelphia and many other sections of Appalachia with plenty of abandoned buildings to visit , but I did have one last beautiful place to visit at Fallingwater

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Part II: The Broken

If I'm travelling through this part of the country, there is assuredly a lot to see in the way of abandoned buildings.

The first of which was actually an unplanned discovery, which is always a treat. On my first night on the road, I ran into car issues. It was actually at a decent time because I was just about to pull into a trail head parking lot for Eternal Flame Waterfall [Oh! I forgot to include that picture]

I was towed to a local shop, which gave me a perfect place to sleep in privacy until my car was taken care of in the morning. I was driven to the shop by tow truck operator Kevin. Kevin would tell me a story and then say at the end, sarcastically, "well... I GUESS that makes me racist". It does. Kevin was racist.

After leaving the shop, I passed by Hilbert College and saw a building on their campus that looked out of place, as it was a bit overgrown and unused. Naturally I had to investigate, where I found an door pried open in one of the interior corridors [I never will destroy property or break/enter myself but if someone else already did....]. Other than that though, this was a mostly untouched property, with no sign of vandalism or destruction, which is a rarity. The building was an old teaching school by the Franciscan Sisters of St. Joseph County including a medical wing and chapel. 

I was not able to get a picture of the exterior quick enough ... and especially not at this height... so I grabbed one online from the listing website for the property. 

New York also had a number of old train trestle bridges, one of which pictured here. A lot of my trip was plagued with overcast days, which was very pleasant, but makes for very boring skies since I don't know how to best edit those. 

Also in New York State, just outside Utica, was an old outside shopping mall, Charlestown USA, which had been long-since taken back over by nature. - Also, while in Utica, I got to try a local dish called 'Chicken Riggies' at an awesome local bar that let me use their back parking lot to sleep in, so Utica is pretty awesome in my book.

Providence Rhode Island had a really cool abandoned building on Newport Island, in Brenton State Park ... it was significantly graffitied. 

Shortly after Rhode Island, I was able to visit Seaside Sanitarium in Connecticut. This was watched pretty closely as it was in a public park, but the exterior was gorgeous. 

Back in the Southeastern part of New York state I was able to visit the famous Borscht Belt string of Luxury Hotels in the Catskill mountains. Though I ran into great difficulty with the other locations, I did find the Old Nevele Luxury Hotel, a sprawling campus including a golf course, pool, multi-story tower, and conference center. Though it nearly destroyed a pair of hiking pants going through chest-high overgrowth and thorns... this was certainly worth it. 

Everything the light touches...

The Gold Course Gift Shop

Conference Center

Main Lobby

My time was cut short at the Nevele because I was losing daylight... also because that was the closest I was to ever getting caught by security...

Another fun place in New York was the Kinseys Distillery which had expansive grounds

A quick visit to Staten Island, and their many medical facilites, some of which were no longer used.

Passing through the Chesapeak Bay area of Delaware and Maryland, there was another location I didn't previously know about that I spotted while driving the coast. The old Central High School. 

This is why you don't hire horses. You had ONE job!

Crossing the Chesapeake Bay Bridge into Virginia was one of the longest and coolest bridges I've driven, and after ending up in Richmond, I visited the old Belle Island [they have one too!] using a really cool pedestrian bridge that run under the highway, where they had an old hydroelectric plant

Outside Charlottesville, VA was an old Sanitarium used primarily for children, the DeJarnette Sanitarium named after the doctor that brought it such a dark history...

One of the last places I was able to visit was the old St. Peter Paul Church in Pittsburg

Sometimes visiting some of these places, in which the abandoned complex isn't just the exception, but a symptom of the loss a whole community is still feeling presently, it can be difficult to visit places respectfully. There were many places in this whole region I simply did not feel comfortable exploring for these reasons, but I hope walking among the broken will continue to remind me of why they still have deep beauty to them.

In the meantime, I was glad to have this time on my own to think, to pray, to meditate, and to visit some far away friend while walking among both the beautiful and the broken.