Fine photographic portraits by Peter Zelewski.
Canaan Valley ~ Thomas, WV
At The Purple Fiddle, carved from a single log
The big loop is nearly complete at Thomas, less than 3 miles up the road from Davis. Senator Davis bought huge tracts of land here in the late 1800’s when it was still wilderness, then built towns and railroads to extract the resources. He named Davis for himself, and nearby Thomas and William for his brothers. Davis was the timber depot, Thomas was coal.
Canaan Valley ~ Davis, WV
Blackwater Falls
Another side trip (a trend I wish to continue). This one a Christmas present to ourselves. The plan, when T made the reservations a month ago, was to spend two days cross country skiing at White Grass in Canaan Valley. Alas, no snow is hard to ski in. They had a pile not much bigger than a cow pie out front of the lodge with a sign in it, selling it for $120 an ounce.
No matter. No matter even that it rained all weekend. We hiked and explored and read and ate well. No crowds to contend with. Met a lot of nice people, too.
“Come join us, our ship is sinking!”
So they said.
“Sure, I like boats,” says I.
We have a small brewery in our little old one block long town. We’ve lived here long enough that the kids I coached at soccer, when they were first graders, are now past college and grown into young adults. Last night, a few of them stood on the sidewalk outside the brewery and, after a few double-takes at my grey and grizzled countenance, recognized me and invited me in to join them.
Sure, I like boats, says I.
Also, this:
A New Large-Scale Installation of Boats and Tangled Thread by Artist Chiharu Shiota
link: http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2017/01/where-are-we-going-chiharu-shiota/
The Night Bus
“Is that you?”
“Barry Up Early” by Curt Bowman
An email from Steve contains the above subject line and not much more, other than a weblink. Following the link brings me to a page, which contains only the photo of a beautiful painting of a sailboat, with the title “Barry Up Early”.
My first thought is: “It can’t be me; I’m never up early.” Terri, who knows me well, said the same thing, Very skeptical of anything that uses the words “Barry” and “early” in the same sentence.
But it’s on Curt’s blog, and Curt is a friend and a very talented painter. He never said anything about doing a painting that contained either me or early in it as a subject. I tried to think of when he might have seen such a thing. Steve and I sailed with Curt on Annie last year, making a fine day of it circumnavigating Gwynn’s Island. But neither he nor I brought our boats that day. And I was late.
Off Center Harbor
Most of you who follow this blog probably already know about these guys. They’ve been making and posting boat flavored videos for almost four years now. Really great stuff. They cover everything from detailed how-to’s to ride-alongs on some really wonderful boats, whether a beautiful classic sailing yacht or a little homebuilt dinghy.
And the five guys who founded OffCenterHarbor.com have the chops to do it right. Steve Stone worked in the film industry for years. Benjamin Mendlowitz is the classic wooden boat photographer almost everyone knows, as his Wooden Boat calendar hangs in offices and boat sheds all over the world. Maynard Bray was head of watercraft preservation at Mystic Seaport and has been a regular contributor to WoodenBoat magazine. Bill Mayher has had a career as a maritime writer. And Eric Blake has been building boats all his life, along both coasts, and is project manager at the Brooklin Boat Yard.
This site is subscription based, so there are no ads. (Yay!). This means that not only do you NOT get bombarded with sales pitches when all you want to do is relax and learn something, but it means they have the freedom to give their honest opinions about things without concern for which paying advertiser it might piss off. That’s both crucial and really rare when doing research, and you need to find out what really works.
In celebration of their success, they’ve provided the video above for free. You can share it with friends, post it on Facebook, whatever. And if you want to spend $40 a year to get access to more, take my word for it, it’s well worth it.