Wilkes-Barre sign

Kirby Park

Levee Trail

Grass and sky

Market Street Bridge

Grass and clovers

Obelisk

Looking toward Wilkes-Barre

Eagle gargoyle

Looking toward Wilkes-Barre. In normal light, the Citizens Bank sign is green, and the Guard Center sign is blue.

The abandoned Sterling Hotel

Sterling Hotel

Looking up at the Sterling

Door

Tyvek snaps in the wind

A couple of other downtown buildings

After a while, I switched away from Infrared. I love the stylized images produced by the infrared shots, but the technique requires a lot of patience, a tripod, and trial-and-error. I wanted to walk around and do some freer hand-held shots.

The same buildings again, in normal color

Scratched wall in a dingy alley

Plants growing out of a wall of the Sterling

Citizens Bank and other buildings

Masonic Temple / Fallout Shelter

Another shot of the fallout shelter sign

Brick patterns on the Masonic Temple

Downtown

We really only covered the bridge and a couple of blocks of downtown. The city looks very cool in infrared, I’ll have to do more of this.

We drove down to Hickory Run State Park to do some hiking. First, we tackled the Hawk Falls trail. It’s a 0.7-mile out-and-back trail. As usual, we stretched a short hike into a long one, taking lots of photos and exploring every nook and cranny along the way.

The trail was wide, much like the one I hiked with my mom at Nescopeck State Park the previous week. But this trail surface got rougher as it went, and was hillier, so it was more challenging. Still, it was a fairly easy hike, but a lot of fun.

Wide trail

The trail started with a smooth surface and went gradually downhill the whole way out. We were following a stream called Hawk Run. We crossed the stream, which was really gushing (presumably due to Saturday’s rain), on a bridge.

Sarah on the bridge

Hawk Run

The trail

The trail continued following Hawk Run. We got a nice overhead view of Hawk Falls and climbed out on some rocks to get a better view. There was a Pennsylvania Turnpike bridge nearby, which meant some highway noise and a manmade structure interfering with the natural setting, but at the same time, it added an interesting element to the scene.

Roots

Foliage

Hawk Falls

Sarah, and the rocks down which we climbed

Sarah, with mountains in the distance

Turnpike bridge

As we hiked on, we saw Mud Run, and found the confluence of Mud Run and Hawk Run. The water from both was flowing quite vigorously, and combined with Hawk Falls, the sound mostly drowned out the highway. There were some impressive sights and sounds, to be sure.

Sticks/roots dragging in the water

The trail by Mud Run

Turnpike bridge

Hawk Falls

Another shot of Hawk Falls

Here, the trail ended and we turned back. What was a gradual downhill hike to this point was now a gradual but constant climb. We made quick work of it, though, this time around.  We’d hike a lot faster if we didn’t take so many photos, but we see no need to hurry. Hawk Falls, and the streams and forest were all quite enchanting, and we savored every moment.

Next, we drove to another trailhead to hike part of the FIreline trail. While that trail is 2.5 miles long, we only hiked about half a mile out, turned around, and hiked back. We wanted a good view of the mountains and read that there was a nice vista there. Plus, it was getting dark, and we wanted to be done before it did so.

The Fireline trail is another wide one, but this one is rated “Difficult.” The part we hiked was easy, so I can only assume it gets more difficult as it progresses. We were hiking toward the nearly-setting sun, and the whole mountain was glowing as a result. The ruddy rock surface to the trail, combined with the golden light, made for an almost alien appearance.

Fireline trail

We reached the vista and heard a huge flock of some kind of migratory bird above us. There was a massive cloud of birds, and they made quite a racket — I have no idea what kind of birds they were, and I couldn’t get a good shot. But we had great views of some surrounding mountains, and the Lehigh Gorge. Shooting into the sun made it difficult to get good shots — the valley was fairly dark, but a few turned out well. I could see coming back to this spot at different times of day, during different seasons, etc. I’d love to watch it evolve.

The sun, about to set over Lehigh Gorge

Sarah, getting the shot

Us

The sun sets

The whole scene

Sarah

Me, enjoying the view

Red rocks on the surface of the mountain

It was quite a beautiful setting. I can’t wait to go back and explore more of the 23 trails at Hickory Run. The neighboring Lehigh Gorge State Park has 20 miles of rail-trails waiting to be explored, white water rafting, etc. I’d love to go camping at Hickory Run for a weekend, and explore both parks. There are even designated bike routes between them.

Michael: You know, they have a name for that.
Me: What?
Him: When your chain gets all bunched up.
Me: Ooooh! I hope it’s chainstipation!!
Him: No, it’s chainsuck.

This is the first time ever that someone else has come up with some dumb word dumber than my dumb word. On that note, I have a new blog called Sarahdigm Shift. I know, I know, it’s dorky. Although our idea for a joint blog was nice one, Michael writes almost exlcusively about adventuring, whereas I do not. Hopefully, he’ll eventually write about other things but at least now I won’t be cluttering up his biking badassery with my “heh, chainstipation” posts.

Last night Michael and I were going to ride at Hardin Ridge in Hoosier National Forest. Despite its claim to be easy, I wasn’t doing very well. As I’ve mentioned, I’m not particularly in biking-up-big-hills shape. Michael got a little frustrated because he said I wasn’t trying. For me, that’s like saying to someone who has carved a turkey at Thanksgiving dinner, “Here, perform surgery on this patient. What, you’re scared? Gosh! You won’t even try?!”

Anyway, he went on without me and that was fine with me. It was at a pretty spot near the lake but from what I understand the trail itself wasn’t that impressive.

Today is my first day of class. New school, new field, new campus. And I’m goofing around online. Same bad habits. Anyway, at the orientation for the School of Library and Information Science (SLIS, and its students are called *sigh* Slizzards), the dean said:

“Indiana University has the 13th largest university library in the nation. That might not turn you on, but it should.”

Oh, and the assistant dean is a woman named Ralph.

What have I gotten myself into?

We watched a movie together the other night for the first time in ages. We have never gone out to see a movie together, primarily because 1. it’s expensive, 2. we hate crowds, 3. it’s nicer to watch a movie in a place where your feet don’t stick to the floor. However, we often watch movies together at home (thank you, Netflix) until life just got untimely. We watched Alfred Hitchcock’s “Notorious,” and part way through, this took place:

Me: “That mom is such a biatch. I hope someone calls her that to her face.”
*movie continues*
Me: “Damn, no one has. How come no one ever calls someone a biatch in black and white movies?”
Him: “Sorry, sweetie, I guess they’re just dated like that.”

I don’t know why but that killed me.

Last night, our new neighbors (a couple Muslim fellows who refused to shake my hand presumably because I have a Christian vagina) came over. We heard a knock and Dawood/Dagwood/Dahwud (I call him Dudewood) brought over some turkey mignons (whaa?). He explained that he just bought them and didn’t realize they were wrapped in bacon. So he gave them to us. We considered that perhaps we should bring him the blood of some Jews in return but we didn’t have any on hand.

Disclaimer: I really like (and have had friends) who are both Muslim and Jewish; I just have a sick sense of humor. Also, Dudewood seems quite nice.

Other disclaimer: That was the only time in my entire life that I’ve ever said “biatch.”

I’m typing this on a real keyboard. And I’m clicking with a real mouse. You see, today I (err, Michael) set up my new computer. It’s a Gateway with a 17-inch flat-panel monitor some dual-core something or other that made Michael drool at Best Buy. All I care about is that it is 50,000 better than my four-year-old Compaq laptop whose U key stuck since day one. It’s faster and prettier and I can compute like the wind. I also ordered a Microsoft Natural Ergo Keyboard 4000 from Amazon. I’m going to type with much fanciness. It should arrive at my latest possible convenience since I consider myself a free super saver.

In unrelatedness, Michael and I were doing the got-distracted-by-life-and-Sarah-forgot-to-make-dinner business so we were at Denny’s at 11 p.m. tonight. Across from us was this guy talking to two fairly ugly girls. One looked like she walked out of a Green Party convention and the other ordered a steak “as bloody as possible” and eggs “as yolky as possible” (to people with language/eating skills — that would be “rare” and “sunny side up”). Now, this guy starts talking about how he would never walk outside barefoot and the only trails he likes are made of concrete. Michael, of course, calls him a girlyman and we continue eating our Zesty Creole and Two Sausage and Cheese Bowl. Then it happens.

“Why would anyone marry a soldier except for the money?”

Our girlyman has said what has possibly been the worst thing I’ve heard while eating breakfast at almost midnight at Denny’s. Perhaps he hasn’t noticed but soldiers make jackshit. They make more than what they’d made working at McDonald’s in the ghetto, but joining the military isn’t exactly a get-rich-quick scheme. These are also men who are willing to sacrifice their lives, to become killers/defenders/heroes, to be stationed thousands of miles from their families, to lose their sense of decency, to follow orders and save countries so that I can eat my damn sausage in safety and comfort.

Women marry soldiers because they’re human — and lovable — like the rest of us. Some woman out there finds that soldier sexy, intelligent, dedicated. I doubt a woman finds the girlyman to be any of those things …

The reviews for the mountain bike trails made the first part seem like it should be fairly easy. Well, maybe they’re easy for a seasoned biker but for a girl like me … not so much. I fell within the first few minutes, acquiring an awful looking bruise on my right hip. I decided that the point of biking is to be having fun, and if I’m not having fun I should stop. The paths were littered with rocks and I was scared the whole time. So Vermie (my brand new red Columbia bicycle that Michael got me for my birthday!) and I waited at a playground. While I was there, I played on the swings and listened to a shaggy haired man from Martinsville play “Knocking on Heaven’s Door” at his family reunion. Michael kept going and kicked his own ass, which is good and bad. I’m glad he had fun, but I worry that he’s going to get hurt. I’m glad he’s conceded to take his phone with him in case of an emergency. On the road from the playground back to the car, we whizzed down this hill. Vermie got up to 30 mph! Insanely awesome.

Today we decided to do some geocaching. We printed out the info for three but we only got a chance to find two before it started getting dark, too dark for me to see. We had a nice hike and saw some bones and some holes (sinkholes? ROTC?). This was the first cache where we got to deposit some of our signature items and the first where we picked up a travel bug. Michael was excited! We also had a fun time finding a clever one hid at a newspaper stand. All of this adventuring has been awesome, but we’re definitely exhausting ourselves. Michael and I have both discovered how hard it is to manage work, a relationship, adventuring, and all the other hobbies we both enjoy. Hopefully, we can find ways to integrate photography, geocaching, biking, and hiking and still have time to sleep! Speaking of which, I’ll be headed to bed soon … I’ve definitely been kicking my ass lately!