Miscellany Late spring early summer

We live in Franklin County, which for the most part, is very pretty. Just to the west are the Berkshires, which are even prettier. Then there is Southwest Vermont, which is beautiful, especially if you throw in the Taconic Range which is in New York State. I was reminded of all this when I did a ride from Williamstown to Bennington on Friday. Hope to do some more in the very near future. Any cyclists out there can get some great riding in up in this part of the world. Visitors are welcome at the Cherdack house.

Did battle with some multiflora rose this morning. It's an invasive species that can take over whole hedgerows and large length of forest edge, roadsides, and trails. It has about a million thorns per yard of plant and I lost some  blood, but I think I won the fight, at least so far.

Some Physics

It's been a while since I wrote about physics. I have been reading some of Einstein's writings on General Relativity. I am sympathetic to the idea that space time  can be considered as only an interval between objects ( matter or energy) or more accurately events with no real presence of its own, but I'll have to look at more modern literature to see how this is reconciled with the properties of the vacuum.

Father'sDay Report and the rest of the week

Sunday was spent on a great bike ride, attending a concert at Tanglewood [all Dvorak] and walking around and having dinner in Sotckbridge, one of my favorite towns. This thanks to my wife treating me for Father's Day. I did get a call from Daniel in Colorado.

Took a ride on Tuesday 3500 feet of gain in about 44 mies round trip. It is hilly around here. Best part is I got to see a bear, they do seem larger when you are on a bike and not in a car. I also got to see a really large deer [nope, not a moose unfortunately], chased a garter snake off the road before it became a flat snake, and saw a couple of turtles sunning themselves. I mention this last item in part because I go past a couple of swamps regularly, which seem ideal turtle habitat, but this is the first time I've seen turtles at these places.

Oh well, the other three days of this week so far were spent repairing the porch, replacing a screen door and installing some high quality storm windows.

Trip to Britain Part 4: Wales

While it is always tough for me to leave the Scottish Highlands there was still a lot of beautiful countryside and interesting sites ahead. We went from Glen Nevis down to Chester to pick up Daniel, our younger son, who had been attending a conference on neutrino-nucleus interactions outside London. Chester is a charming town with Roman roots, famous for it's many quaint old half timbered houses. We only spent a few hours there walking about the central town and having dinner at an upscale inn. As we were heading back to our car, we saw lots of groups of three to five young women converging on the more popular pubs and clubs for an evening out, so Chester may be of interest to the younger set out there for more than it's historical sites.

From Chester we drove to Conwy in northern Wales. It is a walled city with a large castle, essentially founded by Edward I in the 1280s as an outpost to help secure his conquest of Wales. The town walls and castle are largely intact except for roofs and floor in the towers.  We toured the castle, walked through the town, and on the walls. The castle was home to  many very bold sea gulls and a few sea gull chicks. I can recommend the Albion Pub for beer and the Castle Hotel for dinners. The countryside around the town is gorgeous, including low mountains, fertile hillsides and the ocean, or at least a wide estuary.

On the second day in Wales, Daniel and I hiked up Moel Siabod outside Betwsy Coed. It was a great day, both for the company and the scenery. Here are some pictures:

Trip to Britain Part 3 Glen Nevis

From Kinlochleven, the village on Loch Leven, it was a short drive to Glen Nevis. Glen Nevis is about a dozen  miles long and bordered on one side by Ben Nevis, the tallest mountain in Britain. While it is "only" 4300 feet high it starts at near sea level so it is about as prominent as Mount Elbert, the highest point in Colorado.  We only got to spend two nights here, at a charming place known as Achintee farm.

The Ben Nevis trail can attract hundreds of hikers per day on a weekend in the spring and summer, but many of the other mountains have just a few hikers on them. I climbed Sgur Na Mhaim [the name means beautifully rounded peak or something more directly connected with Mamores, the name of the range, depending on which guide book you use], a 3600 footer on the other side of the glen from Ben Nevis and met one other hiker at the top. It was a tough slog, gaining over 3000' in about 3 miles, but the path had few boggy spots and was generally in good shape. It was a little daunting to get to what one could expect to be the final stretch and see another 600 ' of scree (loose stone) above you, but the views were more than reward enough. From any of these peaks it easy to count a hundred and more peaks in view, even when visibility is merely okay. This trip to the Highlands was especially rewarding because so many of the peaks still had extensive snow fields adding to their beauty. From there I walked over the Devil's Ridge to Sgur nan Lubhar. The Devil's Ridge is  really narrow, sometimes less than a yard wide, with very steep slopes on either side.  While the path itself is not difficult , it's location makes it exciting. A step a bit off the trail will be your last step.

We had good dinners both nights at the nearby Nevis Inn, a place that caters to hikers and climbers.

Here are some pictures taken from Achintee in Glen Nevis.

This view shows the more austere character of the mountains. The peak on the left is Sgur Na Mhaim

Here they are in a less sober mood.

 The flowers in the gardens make a refreshing contrast to the great stone walls of the mountainsides.

Highland cattle are very picturesque, it's hard to believe that something so big, with such long and sharp horns, can be so cute.


Here is one of the waterfalls on the Water of Ness, the stream that flows through the glen.

Visit to Britain Part 2- Loch Leven Scotland

After Hawes we headed up to Scotland where we stayed at a small hotel, the MacDonald Hotel, at the head of Loch Leven ( the one near Glen Coe.) The staff were very friendly and the food was pretty good. I must admit I do enjoy Haggis. The main reasons for  staying there was proximity to the Mamores, a wonderful range of mountains starting near sea level and rising about 3500 feet. I hiked up Sgur Na Eilde Mor ( Large Peak of the Hinds [does]) on one day and Am Bodanach (The Old Man - how fitting) on another. I rarely do more than one peak a day because of the time I spend at the top, just taking in the gorgeous scenery.

My hike up Sgur Na Eilde Mor was a little longer than need be, because I refused to believe the highly rutted trail I came upon was the right one and ended up following a track that soon deteriorated into a path laid out by a couple of deranged sheep having a very bad day. Following  smart sheep on their best day is still no way to get anywhere. Spend a little time with sheep and you can see where the expression "wooly thinking" came from and why it is so apt.  Anyway, after congratulating myself on reaching the "top" so quickly, I discovered that I was on a considerably smaller hill some 2 miles or more from my goal. Despite this it was a great day. The views of glacially carved ridges and corries (upland glens), rushing cascades, peaks of every shape was worth all the effort and much more.

Meanwhile Jean toured villages and waterfalls and priced local real estate.

Here are a couple of pictures of us at the head of Loch Leven

More about Scotland soon

Visit to Ridge

Got to New Jersey and Ridge last week. Nice to see friends in Glen Rock and at Ridge including Messrs. Howlett, Gilmore, Florance, and Lee, Dr Jaeger. Ms. Muraview and Mrs. Mitchell. It was nice of CaCarly to stop by and stay for a while.

Trip to Britain Part 1

Sorry for the long delay. We were in Britain for three weeks and then our ATT hotspot went down.

We started our trip in Norwich. Norwich has a very impressive Cathedral, a large castle, many very old churches and some other ancient buildings. It also has some interesting second hand/antique shops, an amazing concentration of bus kiosks in its downtown area, and can get very busy.

Here are a couple of pictures of the cathedral:

Our Next stop was Hawes in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales. The Dales are beautiful steep sloped river valleys. In May, and most of the rest of spring and summer, they are an amazing rich green, full of sheep and lambs and criss crossed by an astounding network of stone walls. Jean and I walked to some neighboring villages and then I hiked up the Great Shunner Fell, a local high point. Here are some photos:

I'll post more about our trip soon.