A Sleepy Sunflower Sunrise

 Only 40 minutes from home is a rural sunflower farm, nestled in the Shenandoah valley, by the river, and with the wonderful name of Lost Bottoms. With its fairy tale name, I was entranced, especially as they invited people to come and admire their sunflowers from dawn to dusk, and for free, although donations are accepted. I'd been trying to come for a couple of weeks, but being floored by COVID, had been unable to venture out onto the driveway, let alone out to a field in the middle of the boondocks. But on Saturday, I felt well enough to drive out there, and left early morning, so I arrived just after sunrise.

I was the only person there, and it was beautiful. A cool breeze wafted across the fields, the dawn colors were slowly fading into the pale blue sky, and I was surrounded by flowers. There were rows of cosmos and zinnias in front of the sunflower field, and a small bench with scissors to cut any flowers you wanted to take home with you. I walked into the sunflower field, thousands of bright yellow faces turned to greet me, and noticed immediately that there were thousands of bees on the flowers, still, and sleeping. It was incredible, I'd never seen anything like it. The cuteness of finding a bee snoozing in a flower at home is delightful, witnessing so many of them slumbering in this field was simply overwhelming. I had to just stand and stare, and the more I looked around the field, the more flowers I noticed had little bumblebees fast asleep. And so I stood there, watching as the warm rays of the sun began to awaken them, and some started to stretch their little legs and slowly crawl across the flower heads to grab an early morning dose of nectar, while plenty of others were deciding to sleep in. It was a momentous occasion.

I walked very slowly among the flowers, not wanting to disturb anybody's sleep, and took care not to knock any flower heads as I slowly strolled along the path. I was actually in a sunflower maze. The sunflowers only came up to my shoulders, but I had no idea where the path would take me through the flowers, and didn't really care. I was happy to wander where I was led.

The whole field had an enchanted feel to me now, with the dreamy bees, but also because the sunflowers were entwined with blue and white morning glories. I had no idea whether they'd been sown intentionally, or if they were just 'weeds', but it added a wonderful entangled dimension to the field, with twisting vines climbing up the stalks and framing the sunflower heads. It was gorgeous. I have to add here that my photos are not the best. Due to my fuddled brain from being ill, I had the camera on the wrong setting and so all these shots are merely JPGs, and not RAW images as I usually take. So I wasn't able to do much processing, but this just merely gives me a reason to return next year, when I think I'll try to arrive even earlier in the morning.

I took my time walking around the field, delighting in seeing more bees waking up and slowly stumbling across the sunflower heads. I don't think I've ever seen so many bees in one place before, it was magical. Birds were twittering and gooses honked from behind trees, likely on the river banks. Crows croaked, and goldfinches swooped and bobbed across the tops of the sunflowers, abruptly landing on one that looked particularly tasty. The pale golden dawn light was disappearing as the sun rose higher above the mountains, and more bees became active as they warmed up. The blue morning glories began to fold up their petals, but the white ones stayed open a little longer. They were all wrapped and twisted around the sunflowers, tendrils peeking out above the large flower heads, or reaching across a space to latch onto anotherone. They obviously didn't hurt the sunflowers at all, I didn't see one sunflower looking as though it was being strangled, even though the thin vines were twisting the whole lengths of the sunflower stalks.

The day got brighter, and I felt I needed to retreat. The sunlight was getting whiter and hotter, and I was becoming conscious of a headache starting, which would later become another migraine. I took a last long look at this wonderful field, coming to life as the buzzing became louder, and stopped to just take one last photo of some bees that were still waking up, slowly trundling around the sunflower as they rubbed the sleep from their eyes.

Broken Buildings in New Jersey

 It's been a over a week since I went up to PA and NJ with Emily, Eric and Richard, to explore some sites that Eric had discovered. It was a fabulous day, a long one, and I got home late. I had bounced out of bed early on Sunday, planning to visit a sunflower farm, but my legs gave way, and a bout of extreme dizziness had me sitting on the bed again. Within 30 minutes, I was covered with blankets, shivering, and beginning a week of bed rest with my first, and only, I hope, experience with COVID. Obviously, the processing of photos was not considered for a moment, nor was anything else that used a few calories of energy. I felt completely drained, was exhausted, and had no interest in anything, except sleep and short bouts of English TV police dramas. Even 11 days later, I still feel tired and struggle to concentrate on anything for too long, but I wanted to get the urbexing trip documented, so it will be relatively short, and may contain grammatical errors.

We started early in the morning from DC and drove and drove, stopping briefly for breakfast and bottles of water; it was gearing up to be a hot day. Up in NJ, we stopped at an old house, hidden by vines and large trees. It had a fabulous old organ in front of a bay window, a tragedy that it has been left to rot by the previous owners, and will eventually be crushed, as the old wooden beams, struggling to hold up the house, will eventually give up their task, and cave in. I would like to witness that, as I imagine it may be quite musical. Upstairs, was a landing with an open window and walls filled with bird cages and nesting boxes. This was very odd to see, and we spent a while, discussing why they were there. I found another wall of wonderful old wallpaper.

 

 

I always look for beautiful vintage windows and curtains to photograph and today didn't disappoint.

Our next stop was an abandoned Egyptian restaurant. There were another 3 people there, about our age, and also photographing the place.

The building wasn't old, and the decor inside wasn't that impressive, plaster pillars and walls covered in Egyptian hieroglyphs and a couple of sarcophagi. The one laying down in the foyer was pretty cool, its cracked facade managing to look almost authentic if I closed one eye. We couldn't hang around for long, since Eric had noticed there were cameras on the scene. We had also spotted a lot of new cables being laid, so hopefully, the building is being brought back to life. 

Eric also found an old roadside 50's motel sign, which I loved. And on we went, this time, stopping at a 50's style diner, almost hidden by shrubbery.

We had a quick scout inside, lamenting the loss of an authentic vintage diner. Everyone loves a good breakfast, and we wondered aloud how this business had not succeeded, until we realized its demise had been a fire, and was likely just not worth resurrecting afterwards, due to too much damage. A shame.

Our last stop of the day was further south in DE, a sprawling industrial complex, with some of the old buildings erected in the late 1800's. It looked like it had been a pipe manufacturing plant of some kind. We found empty warehouses, rooms with large machinery left behind, a warehouse with shelving, metal wheels, electrical components, spare parts, and even an old lab area.

Eric had not been here since last year, but he noted that already more vandalism had taken place since his last visit. In fact, while we were scouting around one large building, we found evidence, and later heard the voices, of copper scrappers. They had left a large bag filled with their booty, ready to go, and were in the process of collecting more, and evidently not concerned about who heard them. Either that, or they didn't care. We kept quiet and put space between them and us, as we kept photographing.

We left after a couple of hours, and driving south, decided to stop at a tavern for dinner. It was excellent food and beer, and nice to be able to wash up after our day of grubbiness. It was a long drive back to DC, and then another 1.5 hours for me, which was fine. I had a Stephen King audio book to listen to, and a bottle of Diet Mountain Dew to keep me awake. The drive would be fine. But apparently, the next morning would not....

Beasts at the Fair

I had a lucky week last week. On Monday, due to the Audible app not working properly, I ended up, thanks to customer service, with 3 free books to download. Then on Tuesday, I won 4 free tickets from our local radio station, The River 95.3, for the Warren County Fair. So on Saturday afternoon, Elliott and I went to the fair, and I gave the other 2 free tickets to the lady on the gate to pass on to someone else.

I'd not been to this fair before. I'm a big fan of the Clarke County fair, as the local kids dress up along with their pets, plus I love the venue, and I've also been to the Fauquier fair, just the once. I won't return there as I wasn't impressed at how the animals were kept in the shed. It was way too hot, and I had to ask a number of times for empty water bowls to be filled. Here, at the Warren County fair, the animal shed was gloriously cool, with big fans blowing, doors open and not one creature with an empty water bowl, or looking uncomfortable. The fast asleep pig made me chuckle with its front leg in the air, unable to lay flat on the ground, due to its wide girth. The chickens posed cheekily for me and seemed to be the best of friends. All the livestock here were beautiful animals, many lying down in the summer heat, but obviously not suffering from it.

This incredible wooden ark was on display. Built by hand on a 6:1 ratio, the same ratio as modern oil tankers, which are designed for stability. It was made locally, in Amissville, VA, and incredibly detailed, with hundreds of carved wooden animals, stalls and provisions. I have no idea how they managed to carry that into the fair, it must weigh a ton, and take hours to set up. It was amazing.

 

We walked towards the track where the monster trucks were on display, passing a beauty queen posing for a photographer with a funnel cake. The drivers were by their huge trucks, dwarfed by the giant tires. An older lady drove the truck, Muddy Girl, which I was very impressed by, and she told me the tires can range from $300 - $6000 each, hence the reason for repairs being made on them as long as they'll last. I'd noticed a line of screw heads on one of her back tires, and she smiled, saying it was one of the repairs, where she'd snagged the wheel on a concrete barrier while coming round a corner. Another monster truck, Sasquatch, was out in the field, offering rides to folk for $17 each, a 5 minutes roll twice in a circle with no thrill bumps or fast acceleration. We shook our heads at the money families must be spending. With entry, food, drinks and souvenirs, it had to be a minimum of $200 for a 2 kid family. We had a lousy meal of 3 dried up chicken tenders with greasy fries for $15; it was barely edible. Elliott's iced tea was $8. I had a $2 bottle of water.

We managed to get seats on the bleachers, from where the view was pretty good, and couldn't believe it when we spotted a family, with kids and pushchair, strolling across the track, oblivious of the danger. Only in FroRo...

The monster trucks lined up at the edge of the field, getting the audience fired up with their tremendously loud engines. I was impressed to see quite a few kids whose parents had got them to wear ear guards. And as soon as they were lined up, I was disappointed when they then shut off their engines. Next the kids on their ATVs came out, racing around a small track, and I have to admit to being a little relieved at the short show, when they rode off and were replaced with mini monster trucks, also driven by kids, one of them an 8 year old girl! They didn't do any jumps or spectacular leaps but they all looked really cute. And then the big engines fired up, and I moved to the edge of my seat in anticipation.

Muddy Girl started off with a reasonable jump, and then Killer Bee, who I'd posed with in the pit, jumped almost vertically, and landed on his back. Everyone leapt to their feet with dread, as the truck lay motionless. Then there was some movement, and the driver appeared unscathed. The crowd exhaled audibly as one, and we watched a JCB trundle out to put the truck back on its wheels again. I have to admit that I was interested to see that the underside of the truck was brightly painted and shiny, and supposed it was for moments like these. Like a model, there's no bad angles!

Backdraft and Outlaw performed some righteous leaps, wheels spinning and engines roaring, but for me, it was all a bit of an anti-climax after Killer Bee's mishap. By the end of the first half it seemed that Outlaw was in the lead for height and length of his leaps, and they all rode slowly back to the edge of the field, revving their engines for maximum effect, where they then sat quietly for the break. I posted a video of the fantastically throaty engine growling by Outlaw. I wouldn't mind turning up to work in that one day, especially if I could just drive over the top of all the traffic stuck on Rte 66 in front of me.

Another truck with people standing in the back sped up and down in front of the crowd throwing t-shirts. The kids were racing up and down with them, hoping to grab a lucky catch, and a lot did, they were pitching out quite a few goody bags. Elliott and I got restless waiting for the monster trucks to restart and our interest had waned, especially as it seemed they would be doing the same jumps again. We wandered off to roam among the carnival rides.

We strolled about, taking a few photos, but I was mainly enjoying seeing the kids having fun. There were no thrilling adult rides, and I was a little miffed that no adults were allowed in the funhouse. I always love those. It wasn't packed with people but we guessed that would change once the monster trucks were finished and the sun went down. I took a couple of shots of the stunning sunset, and then we made our way home, joining a few others who also wanted to leave before the mass exodus. Rural life is grand, we were home in 20 minutes.