Farewell to Cheese

Welcome to West Virginia!

After the previous day, this day was cake.  Baltimore was actually out of our way from our planned final destinations, but Carlin and Kevin wanted to explore Philadelphia and Washington, and I wanted to spend some time with my close friend, Sahar Nouri.  The plan was to leave around 8am and be in Baltimore by the early afternoon.  Much like the previous three days, this morning started with me getting up first, Carlin taking way too long in the bathroom, and Kevin and me foraging for food and loading up the car while Carlin was still doing whatever it is he does in the bathroom.  The main difference this morning was we had to have a small funeral service for Carlin’s cheese, which did not survive the night as well as we had hoped.  Basically, since Salt Lake City, we had been taking in the cheese at each of our destinations and placing it in the fridge to let it re-solidify over night.  The hotel room we had gotten in Columbus, though, did not have a fridge of any type, so we rigged up a plastic bag package that we could then submerge in ice held in the ice container provided by our room.  At face value, the idea was pretty good, but we did not have the greatest value of bags, nor did we seem to remember that ice melts.  So, the morning found a very, VERY water-logged and semi-stinky block of white, extra-sharp cheddar that had to be put to rest.  If that was all the bad luck we were going to have on the trip, I’ll take it!

Welcome to Pennsylvania!

I always forget that Carlin and Kevin have never been this far east.  We were heading kind of southeast on Hwy 40 – comprised of I-70, I-79, and I-68 – which goes from Ohio to West Virginia into Pennsylvania, back into West Virginia before turning back east into Maryland.  It does all of this in about 100 miles:  a very striking series of changes compared to the 2,200 miles of I-5 that pass through only three states.  Carlin was just stunned that not only did we hit four states within 100 miles of each other, but over the course of about 20 minutes we had not only left, but re-entered the state of West Virginia from two completely different points.  The area was much more pleasant to the eye than the Rust Belt had been, and, compared to pretty much all of the previous days of driving, this trip was done in a flash.

We missed the "Welcome to Maryland Sign," so this was the next best one.

Rural Highway in Maryland

Baltimore was a mess to drive in.  It’s one of those old, colonial towns that grew quite large.  This means the streets are narrow, the buildings are all connected, visibility is low, and nothing moves in a straight line.  Despite all of this, it is a very pretty city and seems to have been planned relatively well, disregarding it’s urban sprawl.  It has a pretty rockin’ city bus system, as well as a shuttle that I believe is run by Johns Hopkins University, located in the center part of the city that takes you most places anyone would need to regularly go (downtown, mall, train station, university, farmers market, etc.).  Of course, a lot of the population insists on driving…  Baltimore also has the advantage of being on the eastern rail line which connects it to other east coast metropolitan areas such as Philadelphia, New York City, Boston, and Washington.

No leg of driving would be complete without Kevin sleeping!

Sahar and Me

Carlin and Kevin didn’t stay long.  This was the beginning of the end of the road trip for me as I was staying with Sahar while they took off to another part of Maryland to stay with more of Carlin’s in-laws.  The final part of the journey would be when they’d come pick me up and take me to Frackville, where I would take leave of them for a visit with my grandmother.  We said our farewells, made plans for when they were coming to collect me the next day, and they were on their way.  The remainder of the evening was low key, consisting of a stroll through a nearby park, drinking some coffee, eating some Indian food, getting a quick and dirty tour of the university.