Stephen Mark Rainey's Blog, page 140

From High Point to Haw River

Despite the winter chill, I think I've spent more time outdoors than indoors this weekend—mostly hunting and hiding geocaches, of course. Yesterday, my friend Bridget "Suntigres" Langley and I spent the better part of the day on a cache run around High Point, which included everything from simple park-and-grab micros to creatively camouflaged trail hides to terrain-intensive challenges. That's my favorite kind of day—at the end of it all, a fair number added to my total cache count, but a focus more on quality than quantity of finds. Afterward, Kimberly and I did dinner, drinks, and games with the typically uproarious Jenny Chapman and Doug Cox, all of which lasted till one-something in the morning. But lo, four new caches down the road had been published earlier in the evening, so at two in the a.m., I was back out there at it—missing being first-to-find by a matter of minutes. Evidently, I wasn't the only night owl on the hunt.

Today, it was out to Northeast Park, one of my favorite spots along the Haw River, to hide a new cache (a replacement for one of the entries in my Destroy All Monsters series that had been demolished by restless daikaiju). While out there, I decided to bushwhack out along the river for one of the more remote hides, which was actually intended to be reached by canoe or kayak. It wasn't all that long a hike—just under a mile—but fairly arduous, requiring a few improvised water crossings. The cache itself, "Row, Row, Row Your Boat..." (GC126G9), is pretty old and in need of owner maintenance, but by gummy, I finally get to cross it off the list. As I've mentioned many times, the Haw River is one of the most scenic rivers in the NC Piedmont, and there are plenty of caches to be found at various points along its path.

Now, I'm a little bushed, but at least I managed to work off a few bites of that oh-so-delicious burger from last night's visit to Lindley Park Filling Station....

Click the pics to enlarge.

A couple of the more entertaining hides in High Point. A little cedar log that
opens up to reveal the hidden bison tube, and a fun little geocacher trap.

Cachefishing, anyone?

You never know what you'll find in the woods. The Northeast Park
Conference Center, perhaps?

One of the entertaining non-traditional bridges I made use of to cross the water.

The only crossing spot on the Haw River at Northeast Park, which is
not without its hazards.

Aww. These folks took the easy way.

Damned Brugger's Thai Spring Rolls

Ms. B. and I often get together to conjure up a variety of Asian recipes—I'm particularly glad she shares my fondness for Thai cuisine—and we've managed a number of very tasty dishes. One of my favorites—which she has undeniably perfected—is Thai fresh spring rolls. We usually stuff the rolls with ground turkey, but last night we tried them with shrimp. While I generally prefer shrimp to turkey, I find I actually like the turkey rolls better...by a slim margin. Life is full of surprises, don't you know. I made up some seriously hot pepper sauce (with fish sauce, lime juice, and serrano peppers), and we also had on hand some Sriracha (hot chili garlic sauce) and sweet Maesri brand spring roll sauce. Here's our recipe, or a reasonable facsimile thereof; bear in mind we always vary things a bit in the prepping. The amounts below serve two happily; adjust as needed, but bear in mind that you are responsible for the math, not me. Preparation time is about 30 minutes. It's easier if you have a partner who can prepare the wrappers while the other stuffs the innards.

What You Need:
1 lb shrimp (after cooking, peeling, and de-veining) or ground turkey
1 dozen rice paper wrappers
2 cups chopped cabbage (bak choy or napa)
1 cup cilantro
1 cup diced mushrooms
1/2 cup chopped spring onions
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
juice from 1 lime
2 tbsp hot chili oil
fish sauce
diced serrano peppers (1 to 10, depending on your tolerance for heat)

What You Do:
1) In a large bowl, thoroughly mix cabbage, mushrooms, spring onions, serrano peppers, lemon juice, and about 2 tbsp fish sauce.
2) Pour your Thai chili oil into a very hot wok or skillet. Add chopped garlic and cook for about two minutes, stirring frequently; then turn heat to low.
3) If you're using ground turkey, dump it in now and brown. If you're using shrimp, wait and throw it into the mix right at the end, so it won't get tough.
4) If you're using turkey: once it's browned, dump into the skillet the mixture of cabbage, cilantro, mushrooms, spring onions, serrano peppers, lemon juice, and fish sauce. Let simmer for three to five minutes, stirring frequently. If you're using shrimp, add it to the pan with only about a minute to go.
5) Remove from heat.
6) In a bowl of very hot water, soak each rice paper wrapper for about one minute (you'll probably need to change out your hot water every three minutes or so during preparation). Spread the wrapper onto a non-stick surface (an oiled wooden cutting board works nicely) and blot with a dry paper towel. Then spoon about three to four tablespoons of your cooked ingredients onto the wrapper. Fold the ends over; then grab one of the unfolded ends and roll the bugger into a happy little cylindrical shape.
7) Voilà.

Dip these guys into your preferred sauce, and they'll rock your world—though after about an hour, you'll be hungry as hell again. I recommend a few sticks of crushed almond Pocky to fill that gaping void.

We accompanied our dinner with a bottle of Chateau Morrisette Cabernet Franc, which is easily among this winery's best products. Their Black Dog red table wine is also a winning accompaniment. Of course, hot saké is never a bad accompaniment, either, but we were in a Cab Franc mood....

Pastorale

Too busy and/or preoccupied to blog this past week, apparently. Back to work after the most satisfying long holiday, lots of writing, activities on the caching trail, being social (or something like that). Spent most of the day yesterday across the border in Virginia. Headed out to Fieldale, met up with Tom "Night-Hawk" Kidd, grabbed a new cache (alas, missed out on the first-to-find, though I did get several this week, including one today), and did a little maintenance on "Cachefishing" (GC1PA13). Then it was over to Danville to grab a few new ones, mostly on the Richmond & Danville Rail Trail, out east of town.

I'm never uncomfortable out hiking alone, and certainly not on this trail. Still, there's something about it, more so than many of the trails in this region, that speaks of a certain eeriness...no doubt because it goes way out into picturesque, sparsely inhabited country, where my writer's mind can concoct all kinds of...uncomfortable...scenarios. From end to end, the trail is about five and a half miles; I've biked the whole thing once and hiked portions of it several times (most notably for Triskaphobia, one of the truly memorable cache hunts of late). Yesterday was a temperate but gray day on the trail, and I ended up actually meeting a couple of young women, also geocaching, from South Boston. We found a few together, and then parted ways.

The rest of the hike, I didn't see another living soul. Yet I could constantly hear sounds of distant life: occasional gunshots (lots of hunting gr ounds out that way), lonely birds, furtive voices, and dogs howling—quite mournfully, which only intensified the impression of remote isolation. All most conducive to mentally composing creepy tales, though my mind was admittedly more occupied with hunting the caches at hand. The trail runs past the very serene Mt. Zion Cemetery, where, I am quite certain, zombies gather in their free time, although I didn't actually see any yesterday. Of course, I stand a much greater chance of being accosted by the unsavory living than the not-so-dead, but then that's what makes the prospect all the more entertaining....

When I arrived back at the Rodan Mobile at the Shawnee Rd. trailhead, I performed my good deed for the day, or...well...for however long. There's a ton of trash out there—the disgusting, inevitable refuse of so much disreputable humanity. I spent about half an hour on cleanup detail and filled up a garbage bag, though I don't think I made a very significant dent in the mess. Come spring, when adverse weather may be less a factor, I think I'll sponsor a CITO (cache-in, trash-out) event at that trail head. Get a few cachers together, and the place will be damn near pristine again.

There's one more cache out at the other end of the trail, which I look forward to claiming in the very near future.

Sure, it looks like a peaceful, serene setting, but Night of the Living Dead started out
in just such a place, now didn't it?

Stonewalled

I've never been particularly fond of New Year's Day and its attendant traditions—as if January 1 is some magic milestone where the world changes, and you suddenly have the wherewithal you didn't have 24 hours earlier to fulfill your every dream. Far as I'm concerned, New Year's Day represents just another step along that ever-fun path to one's inevitable death. Still, I've never had reason not to celebrate when celebration is due, and this year...well, of course I did. Saturday afternoon, Ms. B. and I hauled ourselves and a couple of days' worth of provisions to the mountains of Virginia for a little sojourn at the Stonewall Bed & Breakfast, on the Blue Ridge Parkway near Floyd. Along the way, we stopped at Villa Appalaccia, a small but impressive winery that, to our happy surprise, we found open on New Year's Eve afternoon. Excellent, excellent wine, which, we learned, is made from grapes that are grown in slate earth, rather than the typical clay of the region. Apparently, it makes a significant difference, and I may have never enjoyed a wine more than their Sangiovese and Aglianico varieties.

The Stonewall has several guestrooms in the main house, but we opted to stay in the very rustic, very tiny View Cabin, located some distance away in the woods on the property. Spartan, to be sure; there's an outhouse for taking care of your personal needs—fortunately well-tended—and if you want to stay warm, you'd better fire up the old wood stove. The cabin is wired for electricity, at least, so you can plug in your electronic devices—though you won't pick up the inn's WiFi way out there. (Despite the distance from any population center, cell/3G/4G reception is quite good.) There's not room for much more than a bed, a chair, and a table, but we found it clean, stocked with wood and other necessities, and ultimately quite comfortable.

Once ensconced in our luxurious lodgings, we headed out to dinner at Chateau Morrisette restaurant and winery where Kimberly and I dined last New Year's Eve (and I found the inspiration for a new novella ["Adventures in the New Year"]). If anything, this year's fare at the restaurant was even better than last year's (filet mignon for the old man and peanut-crusted chicken breast for the young lady), and I was here introduced to an intriguing house "winetail" called the Bloody Indy—a concoction of their Independence white wine, tomato juice, and potent spices. A startlingly good drink, though more akin to a Red Eye (an old favorite of mine) than an actual Bloody Mary. This year, there were no uncomfortable after-dinner adventures, and we rather enjoyed our own little private welcoming of the New Year, sans Dick Clark or any other vestige of civilization's noise.

I might mention here that there have been some recent bear sightings on the property, so we were advised to make a lot of noise when coming and going on the path between the cabin and the inn, particularly at night. Thus, we took it upon ourselves, whenever we were out and about, to holler "Bear!" at strategic moments. I don't know that it frightened away (or attracted) any bears, but the squirrels sure looked at us funny.

Breakfast at the Stonewall is something to behold. A massive spread of eggs, bacon, country ham, pancakes, french toast, biscuits, danish pastries, fresh fruit, juice, coffee, several varieties of tea...you name it. I find proprietor Scott Truslow's bacon to be the highlight of this feast. He has his own special method of preparing it, and it's worth raving about. A lot. So don't be surprised if every now and then on this blog or in person, I up and start singing about Stonewall's bacon. Fair warning.

Then, off to Rock Creek Gorge, not too far from the inn. There's a ten-mile loop trail through the gorge, and we did about five miles along the creek at the base, rather than tackling the sheer incline from Rocky Knob, up on top. A couple of caches were involved, of course. The highlight for me was coming upon an old, private farmhouse way back in the gorge, accessible only by the trail, which absolutely could have been the setting—transplanted from the mountains of Vermont to the mountains of Virginia—for H. P. Lovecraft's "The Whisperer in Darkness." The atmosphere here couldn't have been more suited to a Lovecraftian tale, and since Kimberly hasn't read the story itself, I gave it to her pretty near verbatim.

I do understand she slept less well last night than the previous night....

Last night, temperatures dipped well below freezing, but we built a great big campfire and roasted Nathan's hot dogs and marshmallows, accompanied by some of that fabulous Villa Appalaccia Sangiovese. The bitter wind drove us in before too late, though, so we settled into the cabin and watched Larry Blamire's The Lost Skeleton Returns Again on my laptop, which more than hit the spot for us. This morning, another fine breakfast, and the rather sad departure. A few caches along the way—including one at a beautiful little park in Danbury, NC, which involved an enjoyable vertical ascent to a scenic point overlooking the Dan River.

This evening, our friends, the Albaneses, invited us over for dinner and a movie—Case 39, starring Renee Zellweger (to whom Joe refers as "Sphincter Face," an epithet that I gotta tell you, however rude, resonates madly). A most entertaining horror flick, and this little gathering made for a pleasant welcome back to Greensboro.

I hope those of you who drop in here have a wonderful New Year, such as it is. And if you don't stop in here, well, just never you mind, since you're not seeing it anyway.

Click on the images to enlarge.

The View Cabin, a short distance through bear-infested woods
from the Stonewall Bed & Breakfast

This random picture adorns the wall in the rest room of the main house at the Stonewall Inn
(along with a newspaper article about the sinking of the Titanic). I don't know what
this is from, but I love it.

Fun folks with suitably blood-hued vintages at Chateau Morrisette

Brugger took this shot of us in the mirror at the bar at Chateau Morrisette.
I rather like it.

Along the trail in Rock Creek Gorge

Old farmhouse back in Rock Creek Gorge. Surely, the very site of HPL's "The Whisperer
in Darkness," transplanted from Vermont to Virginia

The first sunset of 2012 as seen from the View Cabin

Ending the Year With a Boom and a Clamor

I woke up this morning with Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture in my head, lord knows why. When I was a youngster, my folks had a Mercury album version, conducted by Antal Dorati, recorded in 1955, I believe. It featured a fabulous orchestration of the piece, followed by a narrated account of how the sound effects (cannon and bells) were compiled for the recording. I used to listen to the album endlessly when I was around four or five, and I probably haven't heard that particular version since I was around ten. I figured I'd look for it on YouTube, on the off chance I might find a decent recording of the music.

The entire Mercury album was the first thing that came up on my search. And what a treat to listen to the narrative for the first time since I was just a wee lad. Sometimes, I really do love the InterWebz...

It's in three parts, so I'm putting the links here. Don't know if you'll enjoy it as much as I do, but it is a brilliant piece, after all.

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:


May you have a Happy New Year. Or at least one that stops shy of hideous.

A Bald Knob for Christmas

Damned Rodan at the crest of Bald Knob, just before sunset

A mighty fine Christmas Day, I have to say. Kimberly and I came to Mum's last night, and this morning, my brother arrived. We exchanged some very nice gifts, including some decent clothes for me (some would say it's about time) and a digital camera for Ms. B. Following the traditional afternoon feast, Kimberly and I headed up toward Rocky Mount, VA, to hike up to Bald Knob Ridge after a relatively old geocache. Not a long hike, but somewhat arduous going up the steep incline. I knew from the cache description that there was supposed to be a decent view of the surrounding countryside from up there, but it far exceeded expectations. We reached the summit just before sunset and discovered steep, craggy rock faces covered in lichen and cacti. We had fantastic views in all directions and took a slew of pictures. The cache itself was fairly challenging because it had been moved from its original coordinates, and making my way up and down the rocky incline was at times rather treacherous. At last, I managed to locate the thing and sign the logbook. Once back at the bottom, we headed off to another nearby cache and then back to Martinsville, where we paid a brief visit to our old friends, the Wickliffes, who made sure we were properly fed (they clearly have not paid attention to the universal admonitions never to feed the Damned thing). I have to say, though, after our exertions on Bald Knob, the chow—the subsequent wine from The Grove Winery—really hit the spot.

Happy horrordays to the lot of you. Niters.

Don't look back, Brugger, it's a long way down!

From the summit: view to the north

From the summit: view to the south

Done?

Shopping done...presents wrapped...presents suffer cat damage...presents re-wrapped. Yesterday, caching all day with Mark Case in Burlington; I think I logged eleven. This morning, up with the sun, out to Friendly Center for a couple of last-minute deals. Then...oh Yesu...I'm out of cat litter, so it's off to WalMart. Blech. Next...off to the Grove Winery with Kimberly for a picnic and some wine. All is well.

Triskaphobia!

So here I am down in this underground pipe. What's that sound? A dreaded subterranean bigfoot, perhaps...?

A little while back, I was getting somewhere near finding my 4,000th cache when talk of going after "Triskaphobia" (GC2935M) came up among a number of local cachers, most of them significantly madder than I. So of course I said, "Absolutely." Come last night, I was four shy of 4K, so I went out in the rain and snagged them. Then, early this morning, it was out with a group of cachers from both near and far (well, as far as the NC Triangle), and—armed with what we hoped was the proper equipment—we set out to conquer this dreaded three-headed beast. I didn't quite know what to expect, other than at least a portion of it involved negotiating some extreme terrain. Stage 1, we determined, was a walk in the park. Wait...did I say "park"? Not park. Dark. Stage 2: that's where Audra "Homestyle" Webb comes in. She's bad, she's mad, she's...hitting the heights. Quite literally (see photos below). As she made her way to perform the necessary task, there was much jubilation from the peanut gallery: cheering, singing, and a jovial young voice yelling, "My mom is committing suicide!" Happily—at least for the rest of us, as it would have made proceeding a bit tricky—there was no gory death involved. Onward to Stage 3, where Mr. Ken "Alethiometrist" MacDonald donned the necessary gear and made the descent into the hairiest of heights. (Again, see photos.) But...oh, shock! There's nothing where there ought to be something. One of the previous finders confirmed that we were right where we were supposed to be...but nature or something more insidious has made off with a key puzzle piece, and we must rely on the wisdom of others to acquire the necessary information. Fortunately, we are able to continue, and only a short time later, I'm striking find #4,000 with my hiking stick.

To be sure, "Triskaphobia" ("The Fear of Three") is not a cache for the faint of heart, small animals (including wallabies, wombats, and woosels), or badly drawn cartoon characters. Those of us who made the journey today must sincerely thank the members of the first-to-find group who shared essential wisdom with us, or we would never have managed to reach stage 1, much less any stages that followed. Compared to what they went through to get the smiley, ours was a picnic at the beach (minus the ocean, sand, food, etc.). But the adventure made this one of my most memorable caches, and surely a fitting object for my 4,000th find. Granted, had it been my 333rd, I would have surely captured the kharmic energy of the entire universe, but since it wasn't, I didn't, and just never you mind.

Click on the pics to enlarge.

In the men's room at the Corner Cafe. Here is wisdom.

Audra makes her way toward one of the stages of "Triskaphobia" (GC2935M).
Don't look down, Audra!

Onto the dangling ladder. Definitely don't look down, Audra!

Audra doing what she does best: singing karaoke in very strange settings.


Ken "Mr. Alethiometrist" MacDonald getting fitted to hunt for another stage.
"Don't you have this in pink and blue?"

Damned Rodan hits 4,000 finds. We R Team "R We Stoopid?"

After all this, Audra, Lonnie "Moncure Bee Dude" Drain, and Larry "HDJP" Roach went out and about into the wilds of Pittsylvania County to hunt some more unsuspecting caches. We found a few, all very nice...encountering several other friendly neighborhood cachers on more than one occasion. Alas and alack! At one particularly scenic spot...right amid a sea of squishy soft mud—Larry ends up with a flat tire. It's quite the job to make reparations here, as jacks sink and collapse, spare tires fail to cooperate, and a dead deer lying nearby keeps giving us very hard stares. Eventually, however, we prevail and are back on the road again. A couple more highly entertaining caches—more for the surrounding scenery than the caches themselves. An old delivery truck rusting away peacefully in the woods (at least until Audra tries to drive it away). A haunted house that suddenly comes alive with the sounds of demonic laughter...oh, wait, that's just Audra's young'uns, Zachary and Amanda. But no...oh, lord, they're way over yonder, and the mad wailing is coming from within the old, abandoned ruin. Oh, dear, it's just Lonnie, as giddy as a ghoul in a house of a thousand corpses. Getting him out of the place is harder than changing Larry's tire.

Then it's off to the Happy Holidays event (GC366M4) at the Corner Cafe in Ringgold, where we have sixteen tons of fabulous food and a bunch of cache containers for the Dirty Santa exchange. Yay! It's unbelievably good stuff, since I haven't eaten in a month. Or at least since this morning, which is just like being a month ago, given all that we fit in today.

Martini time. And where's my damned masseuse?

Near "A Permanent High" (GC2ZY2K): Cache on delivery!

At first, just ghostly.

Good Christ! Zombies! Would you go caching with these creeple people?
If you said "yes"...ten points from Hufflepuff.

Special BLUE DEVIL ISLAND Christmas Bargain...Kaput

Thanks to a flurry of orders, my stock of autographed copies of Blue Devil Island is now sold out, so that's all she wrote, at least for now. I appreciate all who picked up copies, and I hope you enjoy the book—or, if it's a gift, that the recipient won't curse your name (and mine) for all eternity.

Whirlwind

With Ms. B. at Wine Styles. The young'un is the photographer. We're not laughing with her,
which can only mean....

December 9 to December 11: Daughter here, working on short story, office Christmas fest (and feast), Wine Styles, working on short story, Zen sushi, Chapel Hill, working on short story, RDU, daughter gone, Benjamin Winery, working on short story, Hyco Lake, Piedmont College Trails... Holy ghods, was there a weekend?

Old dude is a little sore after a lot of hiking and caching today with Audra "Homestyle" Webb and her daughter in Person County, NC—at Hyco Lake and then at the Piedmont Community College nature trail. Nothing terribly menacing to life and limb, just a fair bit of up and down over a few miles of terrain. Another 14 caches under my belt, and I'm seven shy of 4,000.

Mark has a teachable moment. Way back, a while back, I was hiking along the Haw River and photographed an odd device that I thought might be a Martian fighting machine. Found one at Hyco Lake and got to examine it at close range. It's just a critter feeder with a camera mounted on it. Go figure! Of course, this does not mean the Martians are not invading.

And now back to writing. Must...finish...short story.

L: Audra taking a picture of the photographer, with the Martian fighting machine looking on.
R: A marker for the Frisbee golf course, or a talisman to hold spells for all kinds of unspeakable rites in the dark forest? You decide.

[image error] L: Audra discovered Wilson!
R: The tree grew around the cache container, popped the lid off, and made it
a permanent fixture. We signed the container itself.