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| A nice evening view from what must surely be the only traffic-free road anywhere near Gainesville |
In early spring of this year, I spent a few days in Gainesville, GA, where my
mom grew up; where my folks met and got married; and where, at my
grandparents’ place, I spent some of the most heavenly days of my youth (see
“Sabbatical,” March 1, 2022). That trip largely involved researching my Ameri-Scares novel,
Georgia: The Haunting of Tate’s Mill, which is now long finished and in the queue for
publication by Crossroad Press. Since then, I’ve made the virtual
acquaintance of fellow author Leverett Butts, who lives in the
Gainesville area and with whom I’ll be sharing the contents page of the
upcoming
Kolchak: The Night Stalker anthology from Moonstone Books. During these past few months,
I’ve been craving a return to my Georgia stomping grounds, so, this week, I’m
heading back to do some further stomping. And come Wednesday, I anticipate
meeting Mr. Butts in the flesh.
Monday, October 10, 2022
It wasn’t much past dawn that I rose this morning (with considerable help from a passel of cats). I had packed up last night, so there was little for me to do other than shower, feed animals, kiss Ms. B., and hit the road. Counting stops to eat, pee, and geocache (plus a few minor traffic hold-ups), it was about a six and a half–hour drive down; fairly typical for the 300-plus-mile trip. This time, I did the unthinkable: I made no special stops for geocaches until I was only a few miles from Gainesville (though I did grab a couple when I stopped for lunch around Anderson, SC). Traffic was heavy the whole way, which was hardly unexpected since traffic is always heavy on I-85. And let me tell you: there cannot possibly be a trucker shortage any longer, for there was no way one more truck could have fit on the highway between NC and GA. My god, it was wall-to-wall, and at times nerve-wracking.
Once here, I checked into the
Ramada/Wyndham
hotel, which is where I stayed on my previous sojourn. It's comfortable,
reasonably priced, and as conveniently located as any hotel can be in
Gainesville. At
Tino’s, the Mexican restaurant on the premises, I grabbed a trio of excellent
street tacos. Sadly, they no longer had the brisket tacos that sent me over
the moon the last time I was here, but no matter; these made me happy, as did
the large jalapeno margarita chaser.
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The very large guardian of one of the geocaches I found on the way into Gainesville this afternoon |
Unfortunately, by way of my previous visits to Gainesville, geocaching-wise, I have about cleaned up the town — certainly everything within walking distance of the hotel. Still, one does not undertake a sabbatical such as this one without geocaching, so, just as the sun began to set, I got in the car and hit the southern outskirts of town. I found several caches, many of which were along a nice, all-but-deserted road near the airport. And what a fuckin’ relief to find some respite from the blasted traffic here! After caching, I parked my car on the street in front of my grandparents’ old house and set out walking around the neighborhood, which skirts the edge of downtown. Almost unconsciously, I ended up retracing one of the routes I regularly walked as a youngster. While much of Gainesville has become almost unrecognizable, there’s just enough of that old neighborhood left to retain some of the magic it once held for me. I quite enjoyed the lovely evening trek, which netted me a couple of (much-needed) miles of hoofing it.
Tomorrow, I’m planning to visit my old alma mater — the
University of Georgia in Athens — and get in some serious geocaching,
for caches in Athens there certainly are.
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Do not think for one minute I'm not serious about this. Sign found at
the restaurant where I had lunch in Anderson, SC. I need one of these. |
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| One fine dinner |
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The GA Dept. of Veteran's Services building. Close to my grandparents'
old house, it stands out as one of my most vividly remembered buildings in town |
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| Paul Smith Cleaners on Bradford St. Sadly, it's no longer in operation. Paul Smith was one of my great uncles. My great-aunt Julia — Uncle Paul's sister — worked there when I was little. |
I think that, for today, I am altogether done with both walking and peopling.
According to my handy-dandy health app, I walked over seven miles, mostly on
campus, and my little doggies are feeling it. And according to my
Fed-Up-With-Humanity meter, I threw myself in with more human beings per
square yard than even when Brugger and I spent several days in Chicago back in
May.
This is not to say I didn’t enjoy myself; I had a fine time of it. I hit the
road about 8:00 a.m. this morning and arrived in Athens roughly an hour later.
My first destination was a concentration of geocaches in the neighborhood
where I lived during the summer of 1980. It was and still is an attractive area,
but that was not a happy time for me. The place had no air conditioning (and
that was one fucking HOT summer), and the house ended up constantly overrun by
teenage redneck assholes whom my drug-addled roommates unilaterally decided to
give free rein. I wish circumstances had been better then because it really
was a cool place (other than temperature-wise) in a lovely setting. Outwardly, at least, the house and grounds haven’t changed at all — though I kinda
hope the folks who live there now have central air.
Once I’d found a few caches in that area, I headed down to the University of
Georgia campus. Although I can’t say my university experience was everything
it could and should have been (mostly thanks to less-than-sound decisions
made by your humble narrator), I do have many pleasant and vivid recollections
of those days. But holy cowz has the population density gone through the roof.
Again, this is hardly unexpected, but the rigors of getting around campus
without being run over — either by vehicles or by students on foot and/or
other modes of transportation — are considerably more daunting than forty-some
years ago. (This, by the way, is not because I’m slowing down in my old age; my typical pace tends to prompt young and old alike to holler “Would you please slow the fuck down?!”)
I certainly saw more of the UGA campus today than I did in my two-and-a-half years as a student there. Between the stages of several Adventure Labs, a couple of virtual caches, and a slew of physical caches, I explored numerous nooks and crannies I never would have had any reason to explore back in the day (although it’s not out of the question that I actually did visit some of these places while in a drug-induced fog). I stopped in at the old School of the Arts building, which is now the School of Something Else, but its confines are still largely familiar. As a student, I shared numerous art classes with Mike Stipe of REM, and though we were hardly close friends, we did have a few interesting conversations now and then.
I found a first-class lunch at Trappeze Pub — a bacon jalapeno burger
with fries and a locally brewed IPA, which I liked a lot, though its name
eludes me at the moment. I followed that up with a bit more walking and
caching until my phone battery damn near gave up the ghost. Eventually, I
hoofed it (on sore feet), back to the car, and spent the next thirty-some
minutes trying to get the hell out of Dodge... er, Athens. Along the way, I passed
The Taco Stand, which is one of the few familiar local establishments that’s still around
after all these years. Back when, I always enjoyed going there, although — no joke! — one
was guaranteed to suffer a rumbly tumbly for a spell following a
Taco Stand meal. This evening, I did not stop in.
By the time I arrived back at my digs in Gainesville, I had pretty much made
up my mind to stay inside for the evening. I doubt seriously my little feetz
are up for any more hoofin’ it.
Tomorrow, it looks like rain in the forecast (which will suck), but I’m very much looking forward to meeting Lev Butts. I’m still hoping to manage some geocaching in the morning, lord
willin’ and the creek don’t rise...
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Oglethorpe House, the dorm I lived in between 1979 and 1980. Things have
changed quite a bit around the old place. |
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Sanford Stadium. I saw a lot of football games there when Herschel
Walker was the team star and had a reasonably valid purpose in life... quite unlike today. |
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| A lovely lunch from Trappeze Pub |
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| The old School of the Arts building, where I earned my two-thirds irrelevant Bachelor of Fine Arts degree |
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| The Taco Stand — still rumbling tumblies after all these years |
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| Old horror writer with not-so-old Leverett Butts at the Smoke House restaurant just outside of Gainesville |
Well, the creek did rise, but I guess the lord was willin’ because I got up
fairly early (thanks largely to an alarm of some sort going off nearby) and
headed straight out for some geocaching. Thankfully, the rain was intermittent
and not very heavy. I set my sights on the Oakwood area, a few miles southwest
of Gainesville, near the local campus of the University of North Georgia,
where friend Leverett teaches. We had a 1:00 p.m. lunch date at the Smoke House BBQ restaurant, but he had suggested that, if time permitted, I might
stop in at his office earlier in the morning. So, I snagged a few caches along
the way, located his office, and proceeded to make a pest of myself. We
chatted for an hour or so, and then he had a meeting to attend. I still had a
few nearby caches nearby to attend to, including a trio on the nature trail
there at the university, so off I went. I found two of the three (the third is almost certainly missing), as well as a peculiar
thingummy high up in a tree (see photo below), which I suspect is meant to be
“art.” Who knows, though? It could just as easily be something nefarious, such
as a disguised beacon for the Martian invasion force or something such. If the
Martians land in Gainesville with their fighting machines and deadly black
smoke, well, we’ll know why, won’t we?
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Another of the lovely, big honking Joro spiders that now populate this area |
At the appointed hour, Lev and I met at the Smoke House, and... oh lord... the smoked dead cow was heavenly. H-E-A-V-E-N-L-Y. After lunch, we sat out on the restaurant’s front porch and shot the shit for most of another hour. Talk about a much-needed tonic! Both as writers and as reasonably human-type people, we have an awful lot in common, and our meeting was surely the highlight of this trip.
The geocaching highlight, at least so far, was a multi called “Six Feet Under” (GC22KDP). The first stage takes you to a graveyard on a little-traveled road and
then to an old tunnel at an abandoned business park. I tell you, it’s tough to
beat a graveyard and a tunnel as stages of a single cache. Now, it’s
not a deep or long tunnel, but hey... it’s underground, secluded, and dark. My
kind of place. Finding the cache proved to be a somewhat unexpected challenge,
but find it I did. So... yay! I also found some incredible mud dauber nests —
huge and complex, like nothing I’ve ever seen back home. And spiders... oh,
yes, there are spiders. Big, colorful orb weavers, called Joro spiders; quite
beautiful they are, even to this former arachnophobe. Apparently, they are
relatively recent arrivals to the area, originally from Japan. Since they
appear to thrive here, it’s likely they’ll eventually migrate to North
Carolina. No complaints from me, since... unlike the burgeoning masses of
humanity... they’re harmless and likely good for the environment.
After “Six Feet Under,” I grabbed a handful of other caches, but since the day
was getting long in the tooth, I decided to pack it in, hoping against hope
that I might beat a miserable rush-hour traffic experience. Well, the time of
day clearly matters not a whit here anymore. As I have elucidated in no small
detail, the traffic in Gainesville has become so ungodly I’m afraid such a
ridiculous concentration of human beings in a relatively small area is going
to shift the mass of the planet to an unsustainable degree and the earth is
going to go spinning straight into the sun. Thank you, motherfuckers. Thank
you all so bloody freaking much.
I put just over two miles on the feetz today. While they were still a
little miffed about yesterday’s big walk, at least they didn’t give me any
grief or complain about being abused this go-round. Who knows, though... tomorrow is
another day and there are still lots of caches to hike after.
I’ll be back.
L: No, I do not know what that thing up in the tree is supposed
to be (art, I suspect). I found it along the nature trail behind The
University of North Georgia at Gainesville; R: A mud dauber nest
in the tunnel at "Six Feet Under." This sucker measured well over two
feet from top to bottom
Thursday, October 13, 2022
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| A view of Lake Lanier from the trail at Lanier Point Park |
I kicked off the morning by visiting
Inman Perk Coffee Shop
on the Square, a short walk from my hotel. A fine café au lait, and then it
was off to the northwestern corner of town and
Lanier Point Park, which offers a couple of scenic hiking trails along the shores of
Lake Sidney Lanier. On my four-mile trek à pied, I found seven caches, a stairway to nowhere, and... a sudden moment of anxiety when I thought I had lost my extra battery pack for
my phone. Happily, I had not (apparently, I had absent-mindedly put it back in the car between the
first and second legs of the hike). Several times, the sky spat a little
rain, but overall, the weather was pleasant, with an occasional balmy breeze. I didn’t
encounter another living soul on the trail, which made for a relaxing
experience in the woods.
Since Brugger and I discovered Southern Recess Gastro Pub in Spring 2012, dining there is a personal priority whenever I’m in Gainesville. I had originally thought I might have dinner there tonight, but
since this morning’s breakfast consisted of a few grapes and the hike had flung a fair
craving for vittles upon me, I decided to head there for lunch. A damned good
martini (x2) and the bleu cheese burger of the gods satisfied the craving. Typical of my experiences at Southern Recess, the food, drink, and service were all first-rate.
So far on this trip, I’ve claimed just over fifty caches, and I’ll probably snag a few more before it’s all said and done. Spending this time outdoors, whether on wooded trails, on the campus of the University of Georgia, or in random, odd corners of Gainesville, I’ve found so many “new” and wonderful places I otherwise never would have. If you’re not a geocacher, you likely won’t relate, but this is how I achieve that crucial zen, and — going back to the first paragraph of today’s entry — it feels not just desirable but necessary.
Tomorrow, I’ll be heading back home. This trip has been invigorating, relaxing, satisfying, and — on occasion — stressful. Time changes all things, of course, and Gainesville has certainly changed in the decades since I spent so much time here. I don’t find much of it positive. There are many newer, highly desirable amenities, and, in some areas, substantial remnants of the pleasant, low-key town I’ve always treasured still exist. Yet, to a greater extent, this place is nothing more than an overpopulated extension of Atlanta, with traffic ills the likes of which even the NC Triad doesn’t yet suffer (although if developers have their way, it won’t be much longer until it’s equally awful, and developers always have their way). Here, just driving a few blocks involves more sitting than moving, and except for maybe late at night, there is literally no respite from it. More than most maladies in this life, I despise massive concentrations of human beings in too small a space, where the infrastructure was never designed for it, and all the upgrading in the world will never keep up with it. After this trip, I don’t know that I want to come back in the near future.
Sometimes “progress” is anything but, at least to those of us who prefer a quality of life that doesn’t involve playing sardine in a fucking tin can once you go out and about. Still... to me, Gainesville is truly where my family originated, and my connection to it feels deep and unbreakable. I can’t help but love this town in more than a few ways.
I’m sure I will come back.
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| A neat little covered bridge that leads to the trail at Lanier Point Park |
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| On the bridge |
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| Another bridge, this one leading to nowhere in the middle of the woods |