Tell us about someplace or thing in your area.

When I was about seven or eight, my mom had a pretty serious boyfriend who was originally from Lancaster PA. We'd sometimes drive out there to visit his family. Anyway, one time, we did the whole Hershey thing. I don't remember too much other than riding a rollercoaster at Hershey Park, but I vaguely recall seeing how the chocolate was made. I don't know if it was a tour of the factory itself or a video or what.

It's funny how life works. You have an experience. It stays with you for a bit, but then--perhaps due to a lack of significance--you move on from it, and never think of it again until stumbling across a random post on HF.

 

There have been five ways of crossing the mersey at Runcorn
The ferry
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RUNCORN FERRY LYRICS

Runcorn Ferry
On the banks of the Mersey, over on Cheshire side
Lies Runcorn that's best known to fame
By Transporter Bridge as takes folks over t'stream
Or else brings them back across same
In days afore Transporter Bridge were put up
A ferryboat lay in the slip
And old Ted the boatman would row folks across
At per tuppence per person per trip
Now Runcorn lay over on one side of stream
And Widnes on t'other side stood
And, as nobody wanted to go either place
Well, the trade wasn't any too good
One evening, to Ted's superlative surprise
Three customers came into view:
A Mr and Mrs Ramsbottom it were
And Albert, their little son, too
"How much for the three?" Mr Ramsbottom asked
As his hand to his pocket did dip
Ted said: "Same for three as it would be for one
Per tuppence per person per trip."
"You're not charging tuppence for that little lad?"
Said Mother, her eyes flashing wild
"Per tuppence per person per trip", answered Ted
"Per woman, per man, or per child"
"Fivepence for three, that's the most that I'll pay"
Said Father, "Don't waste time in talk"
"Per tuppence per person per trip", answered Ted
"And them, as can't pay, 'as to walk!"
"We can walk, an' all", said Father
"Come Mother, it's none so deep, weather's quite mild"
So into the water the three of them stepped:
The father, the mother, the child
The further they paddled, the deeper it got
But they wouldn't give in, once begun
In the spirit that's made Lancashire what she is
They'd sooner be drownded than done
Very soon, the old people were up to their necks
And the little lad clean out of sight
Said Father: "Where's Albert?"
And Mother replied: "I've got hold of his hand, he's all right!"
Well, just at that moment, Pa got an idea
And, floundering back to old Ted
He said: "We've walked half-way. Come, tak' us the rest
For half-price -- that's a penny a head."
But Ted wasn't standing for none of that there
And, making an obstinate lip
"Per tuppence per person per trip", Ted replied
"Per trip, or per part of per trip"
"All right, then", said Father, "let me tak' the boat
And I'll pick up the others half-way
I'll row them across, and I'll bring the boat back
And thruppence in t'bargain I'll pay"
T'were money for nothing. Ted answered: "Right-ho"
And Father got hold of the sculls
With the sharp end of boat towards middle of stream
He were there in a couple of pulls
He got Mother out -- it were rather a job
With the water, she weighed half a ton --
Then, pushing the oar down the side of the boat
Started fishing around for his son
When poor little Albert came up to the top
His collars were soggy and limp
And, with holding his breath at the bottom so long
His face were as red as a shrimp
Pa took them across, and he brought the boat back
And he said to old Ted on the slip:
"Wilt' row me across by me'sen?"
Ted said: "Aye, at per tuppence per person per trip"
When they got t'other side, Father laughed fit to bust
He'd got best of bargain, you see
He'd worked it all out, and he'd got his own way
And he'd paid nobbut fivepence for three

The railway



the Transporter


The old bridge


The new bridge ( just opened )

 

Mantle Rock in the tiny town of Joy, Kentucky. It was used by native Americans as shelter during the forced march west in the 19th century.

 

Then I must have seen the animated fake tour. This would have been like 1987 or 88

 

i'm here, so there's that.

 

South Metro Atlanta

I live very close to Panola Mountain, Arabia Mountain, and Stone Mountain.

" Primarily composed of quartz monzonite, the dome of Stone Mountain was formed during the formation of the Blue Ridge Mountains around 300–350 million years ago (during the Carboniferousperiod), part of the Appalachian Mountains."

At its summit, theelevation is 1,686 feet (514 m) MSL and 825 feet (251 m) above the surrounding area.
Stone Mountain is more than 5 miles (8 km) in circumference at its base.

The minerals within the rock include quartz, plagioclase feldspar, microcline and muscovite, with smaller amounts of biotiteand tourmaline. The tourmaline is mostly black in color, and the majority of it exists as optically continuous skeletal[6]crystals, but much larger, euhedral pegmatitic tourmaline crystals can also be found in the mountain's numerous, cross-cutting felsic dikes. Embedded in the granite are xenoliths or pieces of foreign rocks entrained in the magma.

The granite intruded into the metamorphic rocks of the Piedmont region during the last stages of the Alleghenian Orogeny, which was the time when North America and North Africa collided. Over time, erosion eventually exposed the present mountain of more resistant igneous rock. This intrusion of granite also gave rise to Panola Mountain and Arabia Mountain, both in DeKalb County, smaller outcroppings farther south of Stone Mountain.

 

actual location fact: i'm within walking distance from the longest covered bridge in the US. i drive across it to get to one of the parks i sometimes work at, or to get pizza from dominoes.

there's also a privately owned lighthouse in the next town. people are allowed to walk out there and jump off the platform all summer, and if you happen to be there when the owner is camping, he will probably let you go to the top and hang out up there.

also, the local newspaper reports bigfoot sightings about once a year, and there's a famous abandoned bridge nearby where "giant" skeletons have been discovered.

 

Greenville, SC-

We have a 28 foot waterfall in the middle of the city. Oddly enough I was born here and never knew this waterfall existed because the bridge of a busy road used to cross over it and block the view. In 2004 they tore the bridge down and built a pedestrian bridge and landscaped a really beautiful park around it. The park went on to win some awards and is considered one of the best parks in the country. I remember walking over the pedestrian bridge the day it opened in shock because I never knew it existed and it was so beautiful.






One of my favorite stories about Greenville is the story of Max Heller, a Jewish man who met some Americans who were visiting his native Austria in the 1930s. When Hitler rose to power he wrote these Americans and asked if they would sponsor him so he could come to America. So he moved to Greenville and worked in their factory and later rose to be a manager and eventually bought the factory. In the early 70s he ran for mayor and as mayor he hired a landscape architect to completely redesign downtown to resemble his hometown of Vienna. So the landscape architect narrowed the 4 lanes of mainstreet down to two, planted trees and flowers all along the wide sidewalks, created pedestrian squares throughout the city, and made it as pedestrian friendly as possible. Our main street went on to win a bunch of awards too and is considered one of the best Main Streets in the country

It took the city a couple of decades to catch up with the design, we didn't really start flourishing until Falls Park was built in 2004 due to economic reasons, but now the city is so beautiful and vibrant and has such a European feel to it, all thanks to an Austrian Jew fleeing the Nazi regime back in the late 1930s.

 

ballsy. from my understanding, this town tried a similar thing 20 years ago with slowing main street traffic and making it a pedestrian street, and immediately the entire downtown area went out of business. now the only things on that street other than empty buildings are the local head start, the local mental health/substance abuse center, and a lot of prostitutes.

 

from what I understand we were already at that point when the city was redesigned, the suburbs started growing in the 70s and the city was pretty desolate. Even when I was a teenager in the late 90s the northern end of town was making a comeback but the other side around where the park is now was all boarded up and nobody dared venture to that end of town.

There were a lot of different factors that went into our growth, the city has done a lot to attract foreign business, I remember reading a few years ago that we have the highest concentration of international business in the country, that adds to the European vibe too...it has done a lot to promote economic growth in general then once the park was built it became a tourist attraction and after we started getting tourists a tourist committee was created that does a lot of advertising and promotion for the city. It is actually kind of annoying because they attracted all these people before making sure the roads were ready for the growth, but whatever.

 

second largest impact crater on Earth

some of the metals in your pocket change..or parts of the computer you are using right now ,,or your jewelry probably came out of the dirt below me

nickel..copper...zinc...gold and platinum group metals


we also hold the largest lake located within a city limits...it was the one in town but now its a much larger outer one because the city amalgamated all the smaller outside communities

i am also very close to the largest freshwater island in the world

 

My town was founded in 1307 and lays along the Isar River at the foothills of the Karewendel Mounains on the Austrian border. The village has been famous since the 17th century for its violins, and it has a museum and school of violin making. Zithers and guitars are also made there. Mittenwald is a health and vacation resort and a winter sports centre with a chairlift up the nearby Zugspitze, Germany’s highest peak at 9,718 feet (2,962 metres), is just west of Mittenwald. Pop. (2007 est.) 7,735.

 

diagonally accross the alie from me, there was this place that carved grave stones, i think it was called sierra mountian granite, or something like that.
it is a name that was well known, but the old guy who ran it, i think he had only one or two other people working for him, sold off all his supplies and retired.
there's someone else moving into the space now. i know nothing about them but i'm curious.
there's also a truck tire recapping place, they also sell brand new large vehicle tires, accross on the other side of that alley.

main street in front of where i live used to be the highway before they built the freeway, 50 years ago. its also nominally the route of the bus i catch most often,
but instead it has to run on the street behind me, at the other end of the alley i mentioned, thus my walking by between these places to go wait for it.
reason being they've got the street tore up to redo, i'd swear every utility line that runs beneath it, for supposedly, some sort of bus way.

well both towns, reno and sparks, are using this project as an opportunity to completely redo as much of their portions
of this (4th) street and what lies beneath it as they can while they've got the chance.

oh, you wanted history? well development really got started when the railroad needed a 'pit stop' before crossing the great basin after crossing the sierra mountains.
(that was in 1863 when the line over the sierra's was completed)
sparks is still, last time i heard, a crew change point, though all the dispatching was moved to omaha when the u.p. bought the s.p., thus recreating the old harriman lines that was split up by the sherman anti-trust act in the 1930s.

obviously there's a ton more of that i could add. but this is probably more then enough for one post.

 

I can't and won't live in an area where the stars are not visible on clear nights.

City life has stripped the stars.

It clouds so much when you can't look up at night. You don't even have to live downtown and still can't see the stars cause of city light.

People have lost the sight that their IS something OUT there.

I feel trapped if I can't see the stars.

I can also remember hitting the freeway, double clutching the car from 3rd to 4th, high as fuck. Waiting for the bridge, so I can push 90mph cause I had first exit off bridge. City lights were beautiful, life was good. Shit, don't fuck around you trapped in a egg.

Go out of city lights, find a place where you can look up at night.

It is so important for every individual.

 

We have a Castle !
Halton Castle (Runcorn) | North West England | Castles, Forts and Battles

 

i envy people who don't have to live in cities. i grew up in the mountains and worked in the desert for a short while.
i didn't grow up in cities, so i know what you mean. i live in them now, because for me, having to own a car was an even worse hassle.
still given the choice, and i was maybe a couple of decades younger, i wouldn't be anywhere near one either.

 

a ship canal !

 

If you can see the stars then take a walk, and then look again.

If you need help doing that, find someone who will.