A Red-throated Hummingbird with Link to Otter Creek Wilderness Trek

 This faithful visitor—unlike my other avian friends—comes from earliest morning to the near dark of gloaming dusk. The Audubon Society claims that he weighs about the same as a penny and beats his tiny wings 50 times a second. Ah, but look here…a LINK to my recent backpacking trip to the magnificent Otter Creek Wilderness of West Virginia.

Sacred Places in Rural Pennsylvania

This is a rural Presbyterian church in Washington County.  It’s an old, old congregation, founded in the 1700s—though this building dates to 1872.  This church was a significant spot on the frontier during the Second Great Awakening, and you might still catch a whiff of that old backcountry revivalism in the old churches that stand sentinel among these broad green hills.

I was here for the funeral of a once-dear friend from long ago, who died at the age of 49, leaving behind a wife and three children—the youngest just 10 years old.  His was the kind of death that people don’t talk about…not a suicide, but a “death of despair,” as they call them these days.  My friend had deep, deep roots in this place—one of the smartest people I’ve ever known, but so profoundly and inextricably a part of this soil to which his body has been returned.  Over 2 decades ago, when his first daughter was born and we were both in seminary, he asked me if I’d come here to this church to fill in for him at the Sunday morning church service.  He was their student pastor at the time.  I still had horrible stage fright back in those days, so demurred…and forever regretted it.  I really should have worked up my courage and helped the guy out.  And now?  Now these 22 years later, I came at last to this same old brick church on a hill, not to preach, but to see my old friend laid in the ground.

One of the first things I do in any church I visit is look to see which hymnals and pew Bibles they use.  The books here are standard fare for rural Western Pennsylvania.  

In a surprising twist of liturgical awareness, the simple windows of this far-flung house of prayer are colored according to the seasons of the church year: red for Pentecost, white & gold for Easter and Christmas, green for ordinary time, and purple for Lent and Advent.

The little chancel is bedecked all in red for Pentecost…which was once a holiday as big as Christmas.  Or maybe I should say that Christmas was once a holiday as small as Pentecost.

The pews are divided down the middle so that women can sit on one side and listen to the sermon while men sit on the other side and nod off to sleep.  Of course, nowadays, anyone can sit anywhere.  I mean, you’re technically allowed to sit anywhere, but folks in these old country churches always sit in their same regular spots each week on Sunday morning.  You have to be careful not to take someone’s unofficial seat by accident.  People often mark their territory with cushions and boxes of Kleenex.  But honestly, this room probably seats 200, and I’m sure it needs less than a fifth of all these seats.  There’s LOTS of room to spread out…

A clergyman from an old Scotch-Irish family will always have the bagpipes at his graveside.

And this?  This is our local parish up near my camp.  

I’ll probably be seeing more of this place in the days ahead, though I don’t get many Sundays away from Pittsburgh.  It’s dark on the inside but still a place with a bright feel about it.  Of course, up here in the North Country, all these little churches had oil money—unlike the above church in Washington County, which surely had some wealthy shopkeepers and dairy farmers, but little if any income from the coalfields that surround it.  There’s a whole different feel up here in the rural northwest part of the state, as compared to the green hills in its southwest corner.  The north seems more…industrialized.

 

Allegheny River Trail, Brandon, PA

My wife buys potted flowering plants in order to entertain, but then she allows them to die in their pots.  This time around, instead of letting them die, I decided to take them to the graves of my grandparents on both sides, just to give them a place to live and grow.  The graves near New Bethlehem, see below, had been neglected for decades.  I thought I would find our family graves at Rockland (Venango County) in the same sad state.  But I did not.  My aunt or cousin is maintaining them beautifully, so instead of planting flowers, I took a hike.

Little did I know that there’s a long, narrow lane that descends from the Rockland area all the way into the valley of the Allegheny River, as it passes through the northern forests.  People have vacation homes down here, and it really is beautiful.  There’s an old rail trail called the Allegheny River Trail, which runs at times between people’s lavish summer homes and their riverside decks and picnic tables—right through private property.

I followed the trail a little over 2 miles southward, where it passes through some state game lands and through some very expensive looking pieces of private real estate.

There was this strange little place…

And a few of the summer homes out here were old and modest.

This place might be a year-round home—palatial with lots of outdoor space and terraced decks down to the water.

It was sunny and cool with just enough of a breeze to keep things fresh.  The birds were all in concert.  The shade was deep and comforting.  Such a beautiful walk alongside the river of my life.  I like having a life-river.  I’ve lived all over the world and the nation, but I keep returning to places where my old original river still flows.  I need to put the kayaks in this summer…

The rail trail doubles as a road in places, which is not the best of all worlds.  But it would be worth coming back to this hidden place of hidden luxury escapes.  

 

Cornplanter State Forest

Cornplanter State Forest has several smallish tracts in Northwest Pennsylvania. This is the biggest tract along Jamison Run Road, near Tionesta. You can see that there used to be a farmhouse here by the way these old evergreens line the lane.  There are old foundations in among the trees.

I hiked here over Memorial Day weekend, and there were bugs aplenty.  A big band of car-campers had a few vehicles parked beside the road, guarded by angry dogs.  I camped in the woods here years ago when the camping spot I was planning to use was unavailable.  The barred owls serenaded me all night, and it was lovely—even if the woods are unspectacular.  The presence of barred owls in the forest here helped influence my decision to buy property in these parts. 

It seems a little wrong to take this land away from Chief Cornplanter and his people and then name it after him.  The forests here are full of the rusting detritus of the long-ago oil boom.  There are some active wells here still, too.  They make an eerie creaking noise sometimes when you think you and the birds have the woodlands to yourself.  

Taking a closer look at the old oil pump…

On the map, I saw a trackless segment of the Cornplanter Forest that stuck like a peninsula out into the Allegheny National Forest.  It intrigued me, so I bushwhacked a bit, but mostly stuck to old forest roads that don’t appear on the map.  They were very, very muddy, and the bugs were nearly unbearable.  Also, someone did a lot of timber harvesting in this part of the forest, and so it’s mostly just tree carnage, not much to see.  However, I did arrive at the ANF, where the border between state ands and federal lands is clearly delineated. God help us, our federal lands are in trouble with Trump in office.

 

Erie National Wildlife Refuge

It’s a strangely alluring spot with well-maintained trails and lots of wildlife to see. 

The trail system wends through low-lying countryside of forests and marshes, crossing quiet country lanes and dirt roads.

There were many handsome birds on display and a few more retiring creatures. 

I took this enormous turtle for a rock.  It’s about the size of two human heads!  What was he doing here? 

He was being, just being.  He wasn’t thinking anything, or doing anything, or making any plans, or regretting any past decisions or behaviors.  He wasn’t wondering about the future or misremembering the past.  He wasn’t telling himself old, old lies just to keep his morale up.  He wasn’t thinking about his next fix or his next meal or his next chance to shag.  (Actually, I dunno, maybe he was thinking about his next meal; what do these guys even eat?). He wasn’t worrying about the end of democracy in America and the world as we know it.  He was just being.  I think someday I’ll be able to do all that.