Checking In
I just finished a 7-hour drive and all I want to do is collapse into a clean bed. But I’m in a relatively good mood because this is the closest I’ve had to a vacation in three years. I’m thrilled to get away from litter boxes, the guy who shares his rattling exhaust pipe noise, and the dog who barks at me from behind his door if I so much as fart while walking down the stairs. I’m here to check off another national park from my list: Cuyahoga Valley in Ohio.
There’s no smoking allowed anywhere inside this motel. The lobby doesn’t reek, so my hopes rise that I might be able to breathe and not have a headache for three days. I’ve stayed in a lot of motels that say they’re non-smoking and even have little “No Smoking” table tents in the rooms. Right next to the ashtrays.
I dial for help checking in and a female voice tells me she’ll be ‘right there.’ That phrase usually means one of two things: they’re on their way, or you’ll be waiting a long time and they aren’t going to tell you that. She finally shows up and starts to check me in, when a man appears out of nowhere to interrupt her in Spanish. Google Translate is out to lunch and I’m excited for the chance to use my language skills to help someone. The man can’t get into his room. We have a three-way conversation for 5 minutes that goes like this (translated):
“What’s the number?”
“327.”
“It’s 327.”
“We don’t have a 327.”
“They don’t have a 327. Are you sure that’s the number?”
“Yes.”
“What’s the number again?”
Ms. Clerk finally has to go up to let him in. When she returns, I ask what his room number was.
“317.”
“Ohhhh…” I stare up at the ceiling, wondering how I got that wrong and laboriously translating the numbers in my head.
My good deed for the month completed, I enter the elevator like a pack mule into a bathroom stall. The doors open on my floor and I’m knocked sideways by the stink of cigarette smoke. I lumber down the hall to my room, trying to breathe as little as possible. The key doesn’t work, and I pause to stare at the number on the door: 217. I look down at my little paper key sleeve:
201.
I got 17s on my brain. I roll my eyes and waddle back the way I came. My room, of course,
is directly outside the elevator doors. I drop my stuff inside, pee, then take a little tour of the
motel to get the blood flowing out of my butt. My floor is the only one that reeks of cigarettes.
The Room
The motel I’m staying in has won me over from many satisfactory stays across the country. I’m not fussy; I want a clean room that doesn’t stink like cigarettes, quiet at night, a functioning bathtub, and wifi. For the first time in decades of traveling, I’m disappointed for multiple reasons. The room doesn’t stink in general, but the curtains reek if I put my nose up to them. This isn’t something I do very often, but couldn’t resist on this occasion. There’s a microwave and a tiny fridge, but the latter smells of rotten food. One of the wall lamps is hanging out of its socket and kept from falling onto the floor with duct tape. There’s a two-inch gap at the bottom of the door to the hall that I stuff a towel into so the stink doesn’t seep inside. The tub has scum on the bottom and no drain plug. I must have a bath, so I clean out the tub and call the front desk for a plug. They don’t have any, so I stuff a plastic bag in the drain hole and chuckle at my creativity while I enjoy a hot soak.
A haphazard stampede begins above me around 3pm and continues into the night. I imagine a child up there jumping off the bed and running across the floor, then skipping back to the bed. Jump, run, skip. This happens from about 4pm-11pm every night I’m there. I call the front desk a total of five times over three nights, but apparently they don’t kick people out for noise. I’m too tired to pack all my stuff and move to another room because something is keeping me from sleeping at night.
Bridal Veil Falls
Sleet fell overnight and the motel’s parking lot is covered in icy sheets and bumps. I’m determined to explore, so I do the Ice Rink Shuffle out to my car. The main roads are merely wet, and I stop at a gas station for breakfast. I get out of my car and eyeball the sidewalk in the pre-dawn light, trying to figure out if it’s frozen or just wet. Footsteps crunch around the corner of the building and I glance up to meet the eyes of a tall man with a bag slung over one shoulder. He holds out a hand and smiles. Not to be mistaken for a Damsel in Distress, I wave him off and say, “I’m fine, thanks.” I realize too late that his smile was so sweet and genuine that helping me might have made his day. As I shuffle inside, I find myself wishing I’d taken his hand, just to give him that little pleasure.
The sun rises and I appreciate the fluffy snow-covered landscape while I search for the Park entrance. Google Bitch tells me I’m only half a mile away, but that can’t be right, because I’m in the middle of a ‘rural neighborhood.’ Large houses sitting on multi-acre lots. They all have monstrous lawns that take hours to mow on a fume-belching noise machine. National parks are supposed to be havens of peace and quiet, not a stone’s throw from someone’s trampoline.
I pass a snow-covered sign that might have announced the park entrance. But that can’t be right, either. National park entrance signs are supposed to be at least six feet across, four feet tall, and wide enough for you to lay on. You climb on them to take pictures that make other people envious of your trip. This sign was a metal afterthought about two feet square.
Google Bitch tells me to make the next turn for Brandywine Falls, which is one of the park’s main attractions. I slip and slide down the steps to the overlook and at least the roar of the water masks the traffic noise. The park photos of this waterfall are cleverly angled so you can’t see the road passing over it or the houses three hundred feet away. The water is a little brown, but the ecologist in me knows that this happens after a lot of snow or rain. What makes my lip curl is the scummy froth near the edges that look like cave trolls washed their dishes upstream.
I head next to Bridal Veil Falls with my curiosity piqued. Chris Thile has an instrumental music piece with the same name, and I’m eager to see what’s so special about the waterfall. I wander around in the fifteen-degree cold for twenty minutes, cursing the inadequate signage. I’m grumbling my way back to the car when I see what I’ve been looking for: the sign for the waterfall is only visible as you leave the parking lot. My fingers, butt, and quads are going numb, but I scoot across the road and into the trail on the other side. I’m at the overlook in a few minutes, staring around underwhelmed. A trickle splashes from one rock shelf to another on my right, before disappearing into a cleft in the earth on my left. I snap a few photos and walk away confused. I’m later enlightened by a friend that THE Bridal Veil Falls is in Yosemite National Park.
Something Going on Down There
The Visitor’s Center doesn’t open for another half hour, so I slip and slide down to the nearby lake to amuse myself. I end up with some beautiful photographs of stormy grey clouds over snow-dappled evergreens and frozen water. I follow the tracks of two coyotes around the lake and snap a few shots of perfect mouse prints in the snow, every toe and claw visible in the fine powder. Fresh snow starts to fall in lazy, fat flakes.
I arrive at the Visitor’s Center a few minutes after they open. I’m shuffling through the salt chunks on the sidewalk and nearly jump out of my skin as a sound like Atlas with a chest cold explodes from above. It’s only an 18-wheeler engine-breaking on the interstate overpass. Yes, you read that right: an interstate runs right across the middle of the park. I’m so grateful I decided to come here for some peace and quiet.
A masked Ranger greets me as he exits the building with a salt bucket. “Hi, how’s it going?” He asks.
I decide to be in a good mood. I’m on vacation, after all. “I’m cold, how are you?”
“I’m okay, but it’s almost not cold enough, you know?”
I raise my eyebrows at him. “Well, fifteen degrees is cold enough for me. What do you mean?”
“I don’t know, it’s hard to explain…”
“Right, well have a good one.” Midwesterners are so weird.
I go inside and an older man in park volunteer uniform asks if he can help me with anything. Then he touches his groin.
Ignoring the hand gesture, “Sure, what kind of programs do you have going today?”
Ranger Not Cold Enough has returned from the sidewalk and answers, “Nothing. There’s only five of us here today.”
That seems to be four too many.
“Really? And the train doesn’t run during the week?”
The elderly volunteer pushes at the crotch of his pants again, “Nope, not in winter. They only run on weekends until May. If you want to come back then…?”
You couldn’t pay me to come back here.
“Okay… so, the website says to visit in the off-season and during the week to avoid crowds, but you don’t have anything going on here in winter except on weekends. Is that it?”
“Right.” Both men answer.
Mr. Crotch is pressing on the side of his scrotum again. I desperately want to ask him what’s going on down there. He’s not groping himself to be lewd. It looks like he needs a good scratch. I’m fascinated. I’ve never seen anything like this before. The curiosity is about to burst out of me. I glance sideways at Ranger Not Cold Enough. He hasn’t even noticed the phenomenon. I guess it could be a nervous behavior… some people chew their fingernails, others poke at their genitals?
I take my time reading all the displays in the small, tidy building. I learn that the Cuyahoga River was once so polluted that it caught fire. They’ve since cleaned it up and sensitive species are returning. Great news! Now, if they could just get the trolls to wash their dishes somewhere else…
