Blue Goose ~ Day 123

September 30, 2014 ~ Miamisburg, OH to Jasper, IN

This incredible Indian Summer is following me wherever I go! Today was again like a summer day with the visuals of autumn: corn and the other field crops drying, leaves changing from greens and browns to the colors of fruit (persimmon, citrus, pomegranate, apples, pears, cranberry, grape), farm stands, school buses....

There is usually dew on my van windows now since the sun rises later every morning.

I was in three states today while I traveled to Patoka River NWR in SW Indiana: Ohio, over the river into Kentucky and then back over the river into Indiana, the river being the great Ohio. I am continually amazed by the engineering and construction of the often elegant and impressive bridges, not only over rivers but also over basins, sounds, swamps, marshes, canyons and lakes wherever I  go.

What an adventure for those who travel by water, for pleasure or for work. Remember, Dave, that guy we heard at Herrick who went down the Yellowstone and Missouri in a canoe? or William Least Heat Moon's River Horse or Jonathan Raban's Old Glory? People do this, and while I won't, I can at least imagine it. Look at a map of the rivers in the US, many of which are no longer wild and freely flowing but are manipulated and controlled by dams and locks, which surely complicates these river trips.

The Grand River is the largest river in Michigan at 252 miles and some of the cities along its route have removed dams; others are considering it, but there is controversy about the removal of the Sixth Street Dam in Grand Rapids with concerns for an endangered mussel, for further invasion of the lamprey eel and for possible loss of a prime fishery. This dam is one of over 2500 dams on Michigan rivers alone.

It's all about the water....

I traveled on interstates for several hours until the last 50 miles when I needed a break from the monotony and took lesser roads to Patoka, passing through small towns, the Hoosier National Forest, winding over hill and dale. It's a pleasant, very Midwestern landscape, a la Garrison Keillor, not ethnically diverse, with tidy homes and large, neatly mowed lawns and farms and churches and small towns, and polite people, gregarious with their own kind.

Patoka River National Wildlife Refuge and Management Area is an interesting and unique refuge due to a complicated policy in place which allows coal mining within its "acquisition boundary," meaning all the land designated for eventual inclusion in the refuge. Since surface mining is not allowed on a NWR, much of the proposed refuge is currently the Wildlife Management (WM) part of the refuge because surface mining IS allowed on this type of land. Perhaps that is why it was not as easy to find, or why the woman in the refuge office in the town of Oakland City was monosyllabic and not as forthcoming as I've come to expect from most employees / volunteers. She had a surgical mask hanging around her neck; perhaps she had a cold. The front reception area was cramped, but I heard guys laughing and talking in the back offices. In fairness, a variety of rather generic printed free material was available for visitors, including one on the Ivory-billed Woodpecker from 2009.

I took a map which showed a complex mix of private land, WM land, NWR, the Patoka River, oxbows, swamps, marshes, woods and fields criss-crossed by county and state roads. I came upon trailheads but only by accident. The map was marginal and not easy to read. I could have asked more questions but usually can usually figure out what I need to know on my own or from explicit maps.

Patoka is a work in progress. All of the refuges are, but this one has the added sensitive issues of prospective private sellers' surface mining "rights" and the fact that strip mining coal is the epitome of an extractive activity...not exactly in the same class as fishing or hunting. On the other hand, by having a refuge here, the coal mining activity is, no doubt, closely watched and deleterious environmental effects mitigated.

I spent two hours, moving slowly on gravel roads in and out of the refuge, as the parts are not contiguous, through a riverine habitat of oxbows, swamps, marshes and hardwoods. Leaves slowly drifted down in the afternoon sun. I would hear trains (presumably carrying coal) and crossed double tracks at least five times but didn't see any strip mining activity.

Patoka River NWR - IN

I stayed in Jasper in a Walmart lot situated above the highway under a nice maple tree, along with half a dozen semis. The noise as they come and go awakens me slightly but doesn't keep me awake. I do admit, though, this nightly ritual is losing its initial feeling of adventure.

I ate at an Applebee's and have been doing that only because I am finding it more and more difficult to even go into a Walmart lately. The restaurant bathrooms allow me to brush my teeth in relative privacy. I need two minutes of not sharing a bathroom to do this, which almost never happens in Walmart but almost always does in one of these generic restaurants. So, I can maintain dental hygiene for only $20-$25.

Finished reading The Boys in the Boat....a good story by a gifted writer.

Close up of waders in the swamp from photo above in Patoka River NWR - IN