In Clarkston, Michigan, west of Detroit, we stumbled onto the best way to arrive at a Dead concert:
This way, please
Front row parking
As an aside, the Westies got to park together, too, though they were relegated to one of the “regular” lots:
The venue was cool – DTE Energy Theater – if you imagine the lawn at Tanglewood tipped up 20 or 30 degrees (so you can see the stage! From The Lawn!) it’s kind of like that. Also, Sugarbush friends, there’s a ski area right outside:
About twenty-five years ago I joined a research project to develop a computational methodology for predicting the metallurgical phase changes, dimensional changes, and stresses that occur during the heat treatment of steel. This was a joint project, coordinated by the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences in Ann Arbor, MI, with about 10 partners including the bearing manufacturer I worked for, a couple of the big auto manufacturers, a handful of national laboratories and university research labs, and a small consulting firm located near Cleveland. A core group of us worked together closely for the next several years developing a computer-aided engineering tool that has now evolved into a software package for heat treatment simulation called Dante.
Members of this core group got to know each other pretty well and formed some close friendships that lasted well past the culmination of the project. I continued to work with Dante and my Cleveland friends after I left my corporate job and started out on my own. Although we’ve stayed in touch since then, I hadn’t seen my friend Lynn in more than 12 years. Happily, we were able to fix that last week. In fact, when Lynn called me back to let me know this get-together could work, and I heard his voice saying, “Hi Doug, it’s Lynn calling” (exactly the same greeting as every phone call I ever had from him), those 12 years just kind of fell away.
Lynn, Ethnea and Doug
Stairway to heaven, er, the ledges in Cuyahoga Valley National Park
Ethnea, Sue and Lynn on ledges trail
Lynn and his wife Ethnea showed Sue and me some of the amazing county parks they have near their house (the Cleveland Metroparks), and a national park, too – the Cuyahoga Valley NP (I was a little disappointed that there was no entry fee, because otherwise my Senior Pass would’ve let us all in for free). We also got a tour of downtown Cleveland and dinner in the Tremont neighborhood at a classic, off-the-beaten-path pub called the Prosperity Social Club (certainly one of the coolest names for a pub that I’ve ever heard), with great food and (of course) excellent beer.
Cleveland skyline
Cleveland at dusk
New EY building
From Cleveland, we headed to a state park campground in Lakeside-Marblehead, OH. They had a few walk-in sites set aside for the weekend and we were able to snag one of those. This was undoubtedly the densest campground we’ve been in, and because it was a sunny, hot weekend the place was pretty full. But it’s in a beautiful area, with great views of the Great Lake (that’s Lake Erie, for my New Englander friends) so it turned out to be a great place to wander from. We found a bike ride that would take us to the ferry to Kelleys Island, a destination which was highly recommended by Lynn and Ethnea.
Measured in feet?
That recommendation turned out to be completely justified. There’s not much traffic on Kelleys Island since the only access is by boat – mostly golf carts and bicycles among the few automobiles – so we did a little walking and a little riding. We hung out at the Kelleys Island Brewery for a while (great beer, great sandwiches), wandered back into the center of town where there was a music festival going on (really good music, and a little more beer), and biked up to the north side of the island where there is a geological feature called Glacial Grooves, said to be the best known example of the scored and scraped granite made by the advancing glaciers that formed the Great Lakes, the Appalachians, and all the rest.
Sue on KI ferry
Personal tiki lounge
View of our campground from tiki lounge
Kelleys Island Brewery
View from KI Brewery
Michael McDermott headlines KI Musicfest
Roadhouse Family Band – note 10 year old drummer!
Glacial grooves
Glacial grooves
Special bonus feature, this post only – TWO sunset photos (both by Sue):
Sunset over Lake Erie from ferry dockSunset over Lake Erie from East Harbor
We’re now through the third of our scheduled stops and our third week on the road.
From Lewiston, ME we headed over to West Gardiner for a drive-by jam session with my friend Wilbur (aka “Cowboy”) from Blues Guitar Unleashed. This was the inaugural music stop on the trip and the first field test of the suitcase drum kit. We’re calling it an unmitigated success. Wilbur and Naomi are also RV’ers, so we had a lot of (non-musical) notes to compare, as well. We all had a great time, and Sue and I very much enjoyed getting to know Naomi and Wilbur in a closer and quieter setting than the big jam sessions where we’ve met before.
We didn’t get any photos (still working on developing effective travel-blogging routines and habits!), but Wilbur got a couple of us:
Maybe the hardest part of packing up and hitting the road is what we’ll leave behind. One of these is this band. Doug and I have been the rhythm section in an ensemble we call the Ira Friedman Project, a group of amateur musicians ‘with a collective obsession for music making’ (piano-man Rob’s words) who have been playing music together twice a week for 6 months. Sure, it’s allowed us to improve our musicianship and expand our repertoire, but it’s also been outrageous great fun and has led to a magical bond among new friends.
As we head out looking for jams around the country, we’ll be missing playing with Rob, John, David, Charlotte, Sally – and of course ensemble organizer, band director and musical coach Ira Friedman.
Guys, we promise to keep playing and learning and jamming while we’re ‘on the road again,’ and the West Hill Sessions can resume in November. Thanks so much!
Yup, we probably could fit a full size drum kit into the RV. But then we’d have to bring a tent to sleep in, and that’s not gonna happen.
I found this concept on the internet, accumulated the odd, used and spare parts over the past year, and built my RV drum kit. Test drove it last night. It’s perfect!
When people ask where we’re going on our upcoming adventure, we honestly say ‘we don’t know.’ What we do know is that where ever we go, we’ll be looking for opportunities to play music with others. Not quite sure how we’ll find the others – we figure we’ll figure it out…
So we stored the RV for the winter in a hangar at the little local glider airport. When we stopped by to retrieve it, we were chatting with Paul, the pilot who owns the hangar. He naturally asked where we were going and got excited at our usual response. ‘Hey, I play bass!’ Two hours later, we were jamming at the house…
Here we are day minus 30 plus or minus of the adventure and we’ve already had our first RV-related jam session! Guess it won’t be that hard… A sign of things to come?
