Longest Road Trip Since the Pandemic?

[jtbell]

I'm in Atlanta again (or rather, just outside it), on my longest road trip since my previous visit almost exactly three years ago, before the pandemic shut everything down.

https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/mini-road-trip-dont-take-this-place-for-granite.983859/

I'm booked for three nights here. Again the excuse is a big regional stamp show, with some sightseeing surrounding it.

My first stop on the way here was a plantation house near Pendleton SC. Unfortunately it was closed, despite Google Maps indicating that it was supposed to be open when I arrived.

I was curious about this place because of the name. Ashtabula is also the name of a town in Ohio, a port on Lake Erie a few miles from my family's summer cottage on the lake when I was a kid. I was hoping to find out if there is any connection between the two.

 

[jtbell]

The second stop was across the state line, at Toccoa Falls near Toccoa GA. I arrived at just the right time for the relatively low winter sun to produce a rainbow in the mist.

The falls are on the property of Toccoa Falls College. You have to drive through campus to the far end, past a row of dormitories.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toccoa_Falls

In 1977, a dam above the falls burst. The ensuing flood ripped through the college early in the morning, killing 39 people. I remember the news reports when I was in grad school.

 

[jtbell]

New York City is the Big Apple. Cornelia GA has the Big Red Apple.

It's next to the former Southern Railway station, on the route between Charlotte and Atlanta. Amtrak's Crescent passes by here, but doesn't stop, although several predecessor Southern trains did.

The station is now a museum. It has among other artifacts, Cornelia's dispatching board.

The station also served the Tallulah Falls Railroad, which ran past its namesake falls into North Carolina. Its tracks passed to the left of the station, in the second pic above. One of its red cabooses sits there now.

It's now long gone, but some remnants still exist near the station: rusty tracks and former maintenance buildings.

 

[mcastillo356]

Wonderful post, @jtbell !

 

[jtbell]

One more stop from yesterday.

No trains passed by in Cornelia, which surprised me because this is a major route, now operated by Norfolk Southern.

About halfway to Gainesville along the old main road that parallels the tracks and has been superseded by the US-23 / I-985 expressway, I came to Lula, whose name tickled me because it reminded me of the current president of Brazil. I stopped to take a few pictures, and climbed onto an old wooden bridge over the tracks. A train came along. And then it stopped while I was walking back to my car, and stayed there. Fortunately I was able to get back on the road, on the other side of the tracks, via the bridge, else I might have had to wait a while to continue my trip.

 

[jtbell]

Today I haven't done anything, because I've come down with a cold. At least, I think it's only a cold. No aches, chills, fever, or loss of taste or smell. Just a very runny, stuffed nose, and a sore throat, mainly the soft palate at the back of my mouth, which I could feel when swallowing. I didn't get much sleep last night.

So I decided to stay in my room today, except to go down for breakfast, and (in a little while) walk to the nearby shopping center to get supper. The sore throat is mostly gone, and I can breathe through my nose now, although it still drips occasionally.

I'll decide about tomorrow in the morning. If I have to stay in again, at least I can watch football.

 

[jtbell]

While walking back into the hotel after supper, I passed my car and discovered a flat tire.

Google Maps shows several auto repair shops within a mile or two, so I shouldn't have any trouble getting it fixed on Monday.

 

[mcastillo356]

Hi @jtbell, look for the best value for money first. The wheels are, in my personal opion, as important as the engine itself. It's pure safety on the move.
Best wishes!

 

[jtbell]

This morning after breakfast, I did an experiment. I pumped the flat tire back up to 40 psi and waited a bit. After 15 minutes it was down to 37 psi, and after 30 minutes it was down to 34 psi. That should give me enough time to drive to the nearest tire shop safely. About 2 miles mostly via back streets. So I'll do that tomorrow morning.

I added another night to my hotel stay, now leaving on Tuesday. That will let me make sure the repair holds up, and give me more time to recuperate from my cold.

Then I walked over to the stamp show, the original motivation for this trip, in a more expensive hotel nearby, and spent some time there, buying postcards for my collection.

This is another Lake Erie port town, a few miles from Ashtabula.

 

[jtbell]

I did make it to the tire shop this morning with no problems. I ended up fixing my flat tire by getting a whole set of new ones. I was about due for them anyway.

During my previous visit here three years ago, I noted the autonomous vehicle (AV) lanes on the road in front of my hotel. I didn't see any AVs, probably because it was on a weekend. Today, a Monday, I did see a couple of them while driving to the tire shop. So, after I returned to my hotel, I set out to walk the length of Technology Parkway to get a few pictures.

In front of the Peachtree Corners city hall:

And along the road.

To finish the day, I drove to a nearby shopping center in (I guess) old French style architecture.

My goal was the Barnes & Noble bookstore. I hadn't been to one of those in a few years. It seems to me there are fewer books now, and more games and kids' stuff. Vinyl records take up as much space as CDs. I used to be able to count on finding a half-decent (and sometimes rather good) selection of classical CDs at a B&N, but here there were very few. I did see some recent recordings of Beethoven by Yo-Yo Ma, so I bought those for old times' sake.

 

[berkeman]

During my previous visit here three years ago, I noted the autonomous vehicle (AV) lanes on the road in front of my hotel.

Holy smokes! They set aside special lanes for AVs? I guess that cuts down on the fatalities while the bugs in the software are being worked out, as long as you have the extra road space.

 

[jtbell]

Some Googling turned up a page on the Peachtree Corners city web site: Ride PAUL (Piloting Autonomous Use Locally). Where's that "groan" emoji, Greg?

If I had known about it beforehand, I might have tried using their Moovit app to hail it. There's a brewery at the far end of the route. Here's a video of a shuttle pulling out from there:



I didn't see anyone riding besides the guy who presumably monitors the operation and hits a panic button if needed.

Hmmm, I don't know why the video doesn't work. It worked in Preview mode when I was writing this post. It's in my Google Drive account, with sharing set to "Anyone with the link can view". I've posted videos from that source before. Maybe something's changed in the meantime.

 

[OCR]

Hmmm, I don't know why the video doesn't work.

Worked fine for me. . .

Did you do a lol at 0:25 ?

.

 

[jtbell]

Worked fine for me. . .

Hmmm, OK, thanks! I'll try another method in a minute, anyway.
(added) Didn't work.

Did you do a lol at 0:25

Earlier when I was standing next to the road watching it go by, the "driver" stopped, opened the door, and offered to pick me up. I thought it was going to happen again.

 

[jtbell]

Hmmm, I don't know why the video doesn't work.

To be more specific: It shows up normally, as the first frame with a "play" button in the middle. When I tap on the button, the frame goes black, the "play" button now has a red background, and the timeline at the bottom is stuck at 0:00. Tapping on the button now does nothing. This is on an iPad running iOS 16.3.

 

[OCR]

Tapping on the button now does nothing.

Does the Pop-out button work ?

 

[jtbell]

Does the Pop-out button work ?

It launches my Google Drive app, where I can view the video the same way as if I had launched the app myself, opened the folder that contains the video, and tapped on it there. That is, not embedded on the web page.

 

[Tom.G]

To be more specific: It shows up normally, as the first frame with a "play" button in the middle. When I tap on the button, the frame goes black, the "play" button now has a red background, and the timeline at the bottom is stuck at 0:00. Tapping on the button now does nothing. This is on an iPad running iOS 16.3.

Same non-action here.

 

[jtbell]

Update: My new tires got me home OK on Tuesday. I made a couple of stops along the way. I was busy on Wednesday, catching up on stuff, so I haven't had a chance to post pictures yet. Maybe Thursday...

 

[jtbell]

My first stop on my trip home, around lunch time, was in Athens, home of the University of Georgia (UGA). Downtown Athens is strongly oriented towards the student population of the adjacent university. Whenever I drive through Athens on my way to or from Atlanta, I like to stop and walk around a bit, because it reminds me of my grad-student days in Ann Arbor (U of Michigan).

At the foot of College Street, you cross Broad Street and enter UGA through the Arch, which dates from the 1850s.

UGA's North Campus, adjacent to downtown Athens, reminds me of U of M's central campus.

Old College, the oldest building on campus, dates from 1806. Atlanta's beginnings, as the terminus of a railroad line, came about 30 years later!

To get to South Campus where the newer buildings are, you have to go down a hill and past the football stadium.

After climbing uphill again, one of the first buildings you come to is the physics building.

I didn't go inside because I didn't want to dawdle too much, and I don't know anyone there, anyway.

 

[jtbell]

My last stop on Tuesday was the Hartwell Dam on the Savannah River at the South Carolina / Georgia border. On my trip to Florida five years ago, I showed you the other big dam on this river, the Thurmond Dam:

https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/sunshine-state-road-trip.937176/post-5923483

Unlike the Thurmond Dam, the Hartwell Dam doesn't carry a highway along its top. Route US-29 between Hartwell GA and Anderson SC crosses the river a bit downstream. You can see it in the third picture below. Instead, a hike/bike path runs along the top of the embankment which makes up most of the length of the dam. The path across the spillway is blocked off for security reasons.

These pictures are on the SC side of the dam. I didn't stop at the visitor center on the GA side, next to the powerhouse, because it was about to close for the day.