36 more hours in Charlottesville

In his New York Times guide for a weekend in Charlottesville, Joshua Kurlantzick did an admirable job of capturing many reasons to visit the neighborhood, but he couldn’t capture them all and some of us might disagree with the list sites and eateries he chose to include. That locals might disagree with the list he provided in his 26 October 2008 story is easily understood; there are many possible reasons: There’s too much to cover in 10 or so bullets; hidden gems are hard to find quickly; people might interpret his lenses as colored by common tourism; etc.

So, I thought we might suggest a few alternatives for those 36 hours, or for a return visit. I’ll start the list with a few quick recommendations (in no special order) and readers can add more in comments:

Apple in Boston’s eye

Well, it apparently looks like this now, but when the Google street view vehicle passed it a few months ago, it looked like this. Sadly, I didn’t take a photo when I was there in early April 2008. I wonder how long it will be before this photo is updated. Should I snag a copy before it changes?

View Larger Map

Write for rails

If you live in my neighborhood of Earth, you would benefit from increased railroad access, and the time is ripe to write a note in support of more frequent rail service. How do I know you’d benefit? Even if you wouldn’t ride a train between C’ville and DC (or NY or Greensboro or etc.), it would be better for our environment to take more cars off the highways, reducing he congestion and pollution they produce. If you would ride the train, you would have the benefit of being able to work or snooze during trips rather than having to drive. I’m writing a letter to the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation supporting plans to have more trains running in the piedmont corridor of Virginia.

You can do so, too. Courtesy of the Cville Rail (Charlottesville Citizens for Better Rail Alternatives), you can learn a lot more about the benefits of having greater rail access along the piedmont corridor. You can also even get a sample letter.

In addition, you can get more information about Virginia-wide rail service via the Web site of Virginians for High Speed Rail (yes, it does need a hyphen, but that’s the way these folks spell it). For rail-buff-wannabes, there’s also interesting info at the Web sites for the Rivanna Chapter of National Railway Historical Society and the Central Virginia RailFan. Also, see my earlier post on the topic of riding rails in Virginia.

Bye, Albert

Albert Hofman, the scientist who synthesized lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) in 1938 and then tripped on it 19 April 1943, died. The basic-science chemist who was searching for drugs that had medical benefits (e.g., stopping bleeding after childbirth or mitigating migraine headaches) figured out how to create derivatives of lysergic acid called amides and the 25th one he found, he later learned, had hallucinogenic properties. Interestingly, it took 20+ years for his discoveries to actually turn world around…and they did. Hunh? What? Where? See the obits in the Telegraph and the LA Times

Traveling the US

Create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.

I’ve visited a lot more states in the US than countries in the world. I still have a few to go before I can claim all 52 states (including DC and PR), but this is the record for me so far.