Lake District

Given how much of a keen walker I am, it's always been a bit of a source of shame that I've never been to the English Lake District.  Well, I managed to rectify that omission this week just gone.  When a good friend said he was getting together a few of us to go the Lakes I jumped at the chance - especially when someone else does most of the organising!  

We stayed at a cottage in Chapel Stile in the Southern Lakes, not too far from Ambleside rented through Wheelwrights who appear to have cornered the market in holiday cottages in this area!  It was a good location and the cottage was lovely - a little bit dated in some of the decoration but big and with an excellent kitchen.  I only banged my head on the low beams once too...

The weather was a little variable but we managed to get to do some great walks - including about 90% of Crinkle Crags (got lost in the mist on the tops so called it off early) plus a trip along the Langdale Valley and out to Ambleside and also Grasmere and Keswick.  

Things that are probably commonplace for people who've been before, but new to me and that I recommend;

- Grasmere Gingerbread.  Simply yum and makes the visit to Wordsworth's grave especially fragrant!
- Sticklebarn.  Great pub with fab food run by the National Trust.  
- Bluebird Bitter.  From the award-winning Coniston Brewing Company - very tasty, especially when sampled at the excellent Britannia Inn.  
- And I even managed to get a little run in as part of my training for the Nottingham Half Marathon

I loved the fact that even a little stroll along the valley floor was stunningly beautiful and a little hike up would soon become almost alpine - I'll be back soon I think!

DC

I've been in wintry DC (it's bitterly cold with a North Easterly wind off the Chesapeake) for a day and half now and I'm still behaving like a child in Disneyland - there's so much that I want to see and do it's hard to prioritise.  I have however had to dig deep into the depths of my battered and dirty rucsac to find some warm clothes - having been spoiled by t-shirt weather in Houston and Bentonville I suppose I should just see this as a useful acclimatisation process for getting back to Nottingham. 

I'm staying just over the Key Bridge from Georgetown so I've been making the most of the bars, restaurants and shops (some good Christmas gift opportunities) just over the river while spending most of the daytime in downtown DC seeing all the monuments, museums and sights.  I'd like to pretend that this is an extension of my Company Towns research topic (DC being the ultimate company town for government), but in reality it's a totally self-indulgent time for me to wallow in all the political and cultural things going on.  And I'm loving it! 

I started off the day with a Segway Tour of the major sights.  I was a bit sceptical of this - wasn't sure if it would be a bit corny or if I'd injure myself on the machine but I can't recommend it enough - huge fun and a great way to see the city.  We covered about eight miles in around three hours and it was much more fun than walking and enabled you to see more of the city.  It was freezing cold as you whizz along at up to 10mph (don't forget your gloves like I did!) but the sights make up for it.  

Roughly speaking the tour covers: OEOB, The White House, The National Archives, The Naval Memorial, The Capitol, The National Mall and all the museums, The Lincoln, Washington and MLK Jr Memorials, The Vietnam and Korean War Memorial and lots else besides.  Plus you get to do some "off-roading" on the Segway and enjoy some good banter with your fellow tourists.  

The Capitol Building - can't wait for my tour tomorrow

The Washington Monument looms over everything you see in DC

Vietnam War Memorial still incredibly moving even on a repeat visit

After that and a warming lunch I decided to check out the view across the whole city available from the top of the tower of the Old Post Office.  Apparently this building has been sold to Donalt Trump to redevelop as a hotel.  This'll probably be better than its current slightly sad incarnation as sort of shopping centre and dusty tourist attraction but my opinion of the bewigged one has gone down significantly following his unhinged election night outburst on twitter.  

I then went on to the National Archives where you can see the original Constitution, Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights; along with a huge amount of other stuff.  I loved the exhibition about the Cuban Missile Crisis: it really illuminated something I'd only previously read about in books with contemporary documents, recordings and photographs.  The usual over-abundance of school-children only slightly dampened my enthusiasm for the place with its powerful sense of history.  

Finally (I was dragging my feet like a recalcitrant tweenager at this point) I popped into the Smithsonian Institute Castle to make sure that I'd identified all the places within the huge SI network that I wanted to see.  There's a great ten minute video (only slightly spoilt by being hosted by Ben Stiller) that outlines all the options so I've now got a clear plan for tomorrow.  

Need to get to bed now as I've got an early start for my tour of the Capitol tomorrow - can't wait!

Reflections on Election Day

(Warning, seriously geeky political post below.  Normal service (err, that's more of the same then...) to resume tomorrow).  

I'm safely in DC for my final stop before coming home and back to reality.  Despite probably the second worst hangover of the whole trip (see here for the day after the worst) I was incredibly excited to get to the nation's capital especially after such a great result for Obama and the Democrats last night.  

Thought I'd do a post looking at some of the election results that I saw some of in my travels and also look at why the Republicans had such a terrible night.  

I had a slightly odd election night - I spent it in Nashville which was a late addition to my schedule and was at a dinner at The Standard Club.  You can probably guess from the website that there weren't many members of the Revolutionary Communist Party in the house that night and I was the token liberal at the table.  I was meeting with Doug Tatum who is a long standing friend of the Roosevelt Scholarship and having read his book, 'No Man's Land' I was intrigued to be meeting him.  There were a few other people at dinner from a diversity of backgrounds and we had a good discussion about the election and business - but I think I was always on a losing wicket being 4-1 against when we got into the real political stuff.  Think I acquitted myself reasonably well however.  

I then moved on to the Fleet Street Pub.  I usually avoid these kind of 'British bars' like the plague but I'd seen that Drinking Liberally were having their election watching party there so I knew that I'd be among kindred spirits.  Obviously it was a totally phenomenal result - far better than my (amateur) predictions and a great night.  The atmosphere in the pub wasn't as electric as you might expect - there was a kind of resigned relief rather than anything else - people had been reading the polls (see below) and hoping for best and the result was a cathartic relief rather than anything else.  

A few of the races and initiatives I've been following;

- Michigan Collective Bargaining.  This initiative, which failed, would have enshrined in the state constitution the right for trade unions to collectively bargain.  Passing this initiative was a very high priority for the UFCW colleagues that I met in Detroit and I'm gutted for them - I know how hard they were working.  The only positive thing is that the status-quo is kind-of ok - ie unions are able to bargain with employers and no-one is actively threatening to take that away like in Wisconsin so fingers crossed that things muddle along.  

- Washington gay Marriage.  On a more positive note, I'm delighted that this initiative to legalise gay marriage passed in Washington.  From a purely ideological point of view I firmly believe in the right of any couple, whatever their genders, to marry if that's what they want, but one of my Servas hosts in Seattle was a gay couple so here's to Sara and Rebecca - many congratulations on your upcoming nuptials!  

- Minnesota.  Again a great result on initiatives - rejecting restrictions on voter participation and gay marriage.  See some thoughts here on my experience of the election day process - asking for more ID can only harm this.  And a strong return to office for Rep. Keith Ellison who was kind enough to host me for a day in Minneapolis - what a guy!

- Montana Senate.  For some reason I've always been a fan of Senator Jon Tester.  I first came across him in 2006 via Daily Kos and I've always been a fan of his plain-spoken plaid shirted image so I was chuffed to see that he retained his seat.  Having travelled across most of Montana on the train my admiration for his ability to retain what is a very rural seat (great quote here: A profile of Tester after his 2006 election described his as "truly your grandfather's Democrat—a pro-gun, anti-big-business prairie pragmatist whose life is defined by the treeless patch of hard Montana dirt that has been in the family since 1916") for the Democrats and promulgate a broadly progressive agenda has only increased.  

Now as to how Obama won and why so many people thought he wouldn't I've just got a couple of comments.  

1) This isn't new or original, but the strength of Obama for America's GOTV and "ground game" was obviously decisive.  And it looks like a laser-like focus on places like Cuyahoga County in Ohio (basically, Cleveland and its suburbs) paid off in spades.  

2) The revelation for me on election night was the amount of self-delusional thinking around 'skewed polls'.  A quick detour before we get into this.  Many people will recognise the concept of group think and the 'echo chamber' where you end up believing your original opinions even more fervently when you discuss it with people of similar views.  And I'm as guilty of this as anyone - I socialise and work with people of very similar views and so always come up with a start when I meet people who fundamentally disagree with my views and almost forget why I believe what I do.  And so it's perhaps not a surprise that I hadn't come across the idea of Skewed Polling which apparently had been a common discussion point amongst Republicans for the last six or eight weeks.  The basic theory is that the public polls (which had been showing small but significant leads for the President in all the swing states for the last couple of weeks at least) were oversampling Democrats and were based on a 2008 turnout model.  This was all total news to me at dinner on Election night but I was firmly told by the Republicans present that Romney was going to comfortably win and that the polls were all 'skewed' (classic group-think).  This line of thinking generated a whole industry of recalibrating the polls - eg UnSkewed Polls.  (As an aside, it should be noted that the polling companies (like YouGov, MORI etc) many no money (or make a loss) on political polling - they do it to create publicity and as a loss-leader for more lucrative commercial work - so they stake a lot of credibility and future commercial work on getting it right and have little incentive to do anything other than report the truth as they find it).  This belief in Skewed Polls is a great example of group think and somewhat delusional self-belief - great summary from a friend here.  

3) The Republican ticket from top to bottom was pretty poor.  Romney was robotic and walked into stupid own-goals over not releasing his tax returns.  But the real issue was the terrible Senate candidates.  Again, a well-worked theme so I'll just link to a couple of articles that summarise it well: Akin and Mourdock on rape and a more general summary

Phew.  Ok, stopping now.  In summary: Obama won because they had a good plan and operation; some good results on gay rights and for unusual Democrats; trust the polling data; Republicans are terrible at selecting candidates. 

Georgia On My Mind

(I promise the terrible punning blog post titles will end soon)

I'm in Jasper, Georgia staying the some contacts made through the Roosevelt Scholarship and I've been made to feel incredibly welcome - all you hear about Southern hospitality is totally true.  I arrived on Friday night sorry to leave Bentonville and North-West Arkansas but I've hardly stopped since so I've not had any time to feel sad about my trip nearly coming to an end.  

I'm staying out in Jasper, Georgia which is about an hour from Atlanta and is the home of the Georgia Marble Company - I'm in a company town without even planning it!  The marble from here was used to make the Lincoln Memorial which I'll be seeing in a few days.  The trainline to and from the quarry runs just past the home where I'm staying and I can hear a train clicking past as I type this. 

On Saturday we went to the annual Chomp and Stomp festival in Atlanta - a mixture of beer festival, running event, live music and lots and lots of chilli.  We were able to sample a lot (a lot!) of chilli and I also tried some of the beers from Sweet Water Brewery from Atlanta - I can recommend the IPA in particular.  It was a really warm and sunny day and I could have stayed from much longer, but we were on something of a packed schedule.  I really liked the atmosphere in the neighbourhood that the festival was held - a place called Cabbagetown - it felt a bit like Sherwood in Nottingham: lots of independent businesses, people really engaged in their community and some great green spaces - the kind of place that I like to live! 

People enjoying the early Autumn sun

That is a lot of chilli that's been eaten!

We had to dash off to make sure that we got to Stone Mountain in time.  This is an enormous granite monolith which would be impressive enough but it also has a huge carving of three Confederate commanders in the side to commemorate the American Civil War.  The surrounding park was quite Disney-fied but the mountain itself was pretty spectacular especially the walk down (we took the cable car up!) to ground level.  A great view of Atlanta and the surrounding suburbs.  

A not very good picture of the carving.  The white mound to the left is a man-made ski-run...

Today (Sunda) was a long trip again to see the Little White House at Warm Springs.  This was where Franklin Roosevelt went to get relief from the debilitating effects of Polio and ended up living and working here - it was whilst meeting local people here that he was prompted to develop progressive policies like the New Deal, rural electrification and the Public Works Act. 

A pretty humble house, even for the 1930s. 

The museum here is really impressive - telling a lot of the story of FDR and his work plus what his life was like down here.  You can also travel to the original springs and bathing area where FDR found relief and also prompted the research that ultimately led to the discovery of the vaccine for Polio and its virtual elimination.  I've always been a fan but today really opened up a different side of the man and his work. 

Tomorrow I'm meeting with Coca-Cola at the 'World of Coke' in downtown Atlanta - worried that my Diet Coke addiction might get out of hand once I'm left to roam freely in that place...

North-West Arkansas Preconceptions

Something of a packed day today including some serious pre-conceptions squashed, a mini-road-trip and me being presented the Freedom of the City of Bentonville...

As per yesterday's brief update I've had most of my original ideas about this part of the country challenged if not totally blown away today.  One of my work colleagues told me before I left the UK that for a while he was planning to move here for work and was really looking forward to it.  I looked at him a bit strangely and was somewhat sceptical.  Well, I'd probably join him on the plane if given the chance now - seriously.  Well, maybe I'd hold out a little longer for the Chicago option but this is a strong second!

I met with three people from Bentonville City Council - Troy Galloway, the Director of Community Development, Mike Churchwell who heads up Transport and finally Mayor Bob McCaslin.

A few thoughts and things learnt;

- Bentonville downtown is brilliant - could almost be a facsimile of a 1930s small-town America used for a film set but it's a living and breathing city centre mixed-use location - shops (including what looks like a great bike shop. I've not allowed myself to go in - there's only so far I can stretch my baggage allowance on flights...), restaurants, bars and offices.  I note the irony that this is exactly what opponents of WalMart say their presence destroys but here it is, in their own home-town.  A few pics inc one of the original WalMart (a five-and-dime store that's now a museum);

- I knew that WalMart either explicitly or otherwise encourage their suppliers (CocaCola, P&G, Unilever, Kraft, Nestle etc etc) to have an office here but I didn't know how big they were (up to 400 people) nor now many companies have in fact co-located in the Bentonville/Rogers/Fayetteville/Springdale are: around 1400 in total!  There are some interesting parallels here with Boeing's supplier base in Seattle and how venture capital and legal firms have strong presences in Silicon Valley. 
-The City's daytime population pretty much doubles with the commuter influx into the City from surrounding locations but the focus at the moment has been to manage that traffic through more road building rather than any attempt to move people out of their cars.  The team know that this is next but haven't yet been able to find a way to ease people out of their cars and into public transit in quite the way we've been able to do it in Nottingham and Europe more generally.  
- The City's relationship with WalMart is generally very strong but hasn't always been so - back in 2005 the company was working with central government to secure improvements to a particular road and had secured 80% of the funding - the remaining 20% to come from the City.  Unfortunately no-one had thought to engage with the team at the Council which led to some red faces and hasty rejigging of budgets...
- The Mayor spoke very passionately and from a position of knowledge (he headed up a Bentonville team for Kraft for many years) of the good things that WalMart do and how they operate in an ethical way.  I directly asked if WalMart put people out of business and he said that wasn't the case.  Like many people I've read books like 'The WalMart Effect' and been sceptical about the value that big-box retailers bring to the consumer landscape so it was great to be challenged in a knowledgeable way on those views.  
- The Mayor presented me with the Key to Bentonville - as per the photo at the top of this post to celebrate my visit.  This was obviously a huge surprise and a great honour.  

There's loads more info and detail that I captured but that'll do for now - safe to say that I'm hugely looking forward to my next few days here in NWA!  

PS - managed to find some beer at the brilliantly named County Line Liquor today so I'm back in the game on that front.  I'm in Benton County as indicated on this map so there are a number of options around but none that are hugely close!  I learnt today that there's a ballot inititive (referendum) to make the county 'wet' at next week's vote.  

PPS - longtime readers will be excited to hear that I got a haircut today - a snip (haha!) at $13. 

Quick Hit on Bentonville

Tired after a long day of travel (in no way do I regret saving £30 by booking a flight rather with two changes rather than a direct one to get me from Houston to Bentonville - oh no) but thought I'd just jot down a few thoughts on Bentonville / Arkansas so far.  Walmart brings me here - and along with Detroit is probably one of the highlights of the trip for me in terms of my research project for the Roosevelt Scholarship. 

In no particular order;

- when flying into Northwest Arkansas airport I was struck by how green the countryside was.  I'd developed this mental image of Bentonville as a sprawling industrial city but it's a pretty small place (about 35,000 people) and set in some great countryside - not for nothing is Arkansas called 'The Natural State'.  I think I'll fit in a visit to the Ozark National Forest whilst I'm here. 

- in the airport the majority of adverts on the walls are for companies focusing on retail and Walmart - offering to help with your supply chain, merchandising, sales etc etc - first sign of a true company town.  

- the map you get with your hire-car shows all the Walmart head office locations alongside hotels and restaurants - nothing else is worth a mention...

- Benton County is dry - something I discuss here but had totally forgotten about.  Had I remembered I might have saved myself 20 minutes wandering around a Walmart wondering where they'd put the beer...

Meetings with Bentonville City Council tomorrow - more to follow. 

Half Dome

16.2 miles. 
4800 feet / 1500 metres of ascent. 
Just over 9 hours total. 

Wow.  I'm only in Yosemite for three days and I have been checking the forecast since about August.  As it typically my luck it looks like Monday and Tuesday will be a bit ropey so decided to go for it and do my 'big climb' on the first day.  Half Dome totally dominates the surroundings so it was always going to be at the top of the list. 

I got up at the ungodly hour of 6.45, shoved down a dubious buffet breakfast and hit the road - a mile trek to the official start of the walk.  I'll not try to do a blow-by-blow account of the trip but suffice to say it was pretty punishing.  The 'official' time is for around 12 hours so was pleased to get it done in around three-quarters of that, but I'm certainly paying for it now - am self-medicating with beer for the sore knees and feet.  

I did the Yorkshire Three Peaks this summer just gone and that was longer in a linear sense (26 miles) and about the same in terms of ascent (1600 metres) - the difference here was the heat (it was at least 25C at some points I'm sure) and the total relentless nature of it - there was no respite from the climbs and the shorter distance made it very punishing.  

Hopefully a series of photos will give some sense of the day - with some commentary under each one.  

Starting off so early most of the valley walls are in shade - which was nice from a temperature point-of-view and also because you could watch the sun move slowly across the face of the rock and reveal the colours and shading that was hidden in the darkness.  This is a shot of the challenge from quite early on in the day - I kept pinching myself and saying, "am I really going to climb that?". 

Lots of the walk was through wooded areas which was cool - some huge trees that obviously had been around for many decades - even when they're scarred with fire otherwise struggling.  There were also lots of wildlife in evidence - particularly squirrels and a curious bird that looked like a blackbird or a jay but sparkling sections of blue. 

This is one of the views from the highest point that I got to.  A photograph really doesn't do it justice - as far as the eye could see was mountains, valleys, trees, granite and sky.  The sky!  

I didn't fancy the final 400m up the final summit, especially as the ropes were officially 'down' so it would have been a hand-over-hand job to get up there on quite slippery granite.  There was a group of proper climbers there and they said that the view wasn't any better on top compared with the 'saddle' - so that reassured me!  I was very happy to be satisfied with what I'd done!


Yosemite (or at least, Curry Village where I'm staying) is a curious place.  When I got here on Saturday afternoon my heart sank a bit - it was all very Butlins: an ice rink, cinema, terrible food etc.  But then I went into a very well stocked mountaineering shop and got authentically surly service (that's always the way in those kind of specialist shops).  But overall my impression was of a very busy and noisy place with lots of unruly kids running about everywhere.  And I was totally convinced that there was a bear snuffling around behind my canvas tent cabin at various points in the night but this morning I realised it was the enormous biker guy snoring...  

I set off so early this morning that I didn't get a sense of what everyone else was up to, but coming back in this evening passing the car-park on the way to my cabin there were about 15 cars left in a carpark at least ten times that size which was full 12 hours before...  So I think it'll be quieter at least for the next couple of days!  Having a bit of a think about what to do for the next two days - weather looks a bit iffy so might do some smaller stuff with shelter built in...

One More Sleep

I'm currently in a fairly terrible Motel 6 in Merced, California as a half-way point to Yosemite.  I've been looking forward to this part of my trip (Yosemite, not the Motel 6) since I booked my accommodation for the National Park about two months ago.  It's about another two hours drive from here to Yosemite so I decided to break the journey here overnight so I wasn't driving tired.  Pleased I made that call as it's been a series of early starts for the last few days - I'm looking forward to a bit of a lie-in tomorrow.  (My smugness is being slightly abated at the moment by the incredibly loud sound of a train passing by what feels like right outside my window - let's hope they don't run all night...). 

My last day in the 'Bay Area' of California was cool - I went up to Berkeley with two purposes in mind: to visit the The North Face outlet shop and to check out the University campus.  The day was a big success on both counts - I snagged a new fleece, a zip top, a hoodie, a base layer t-shirt and a hat for $108 - about £70 - stuff that would cost at least three times that in the UK.  Now I just need to think about how to get it all home!  This obviously sets me up well for the upcoming trip to Yosemite.  Big thanks to David at work for suggesting a visit to this store!

I then headed over to the University of California campus at Berkeley.  There was a strange wetness in the air which I am told is something called, "rain", I am unfamiliar with this at this stage.  Further research may be required...  The campus is incredible - totally blows away my alma mater of The University of York - and made me wish I was 19 again so I could study there!  I loved just wandering about the campus and dodging the various student societies urging me to register to vote, attend a football game, pledge to support Israel, pledge to support Palestine and something about good dental care that I never truly understood.  

The libraries (27 of them!) are certainly impressive and I loved seeing all the different architectural styles of the different academic, residential and social buildings.  Plus I'm obviously still retaining my boyish-good-looks as I kept getting asked for directions to various places as if I was an enrolled student...

I then popped down into Berkeley proper (the campus is like a town to itself) to grab some food at Triple Rock Brewery and Ale House.  I had a slightly disappointing pint of beer but some good food that set me up for the rest of the day. 

About 2pm I decided to head East out of the Bay Area and into California proper so as to avoid the rush-hour traffic.  In the end it was very light and I got to the motel about 5.30 - it was still very hot which hopefully bodes well for the Yosemite action!

Seattle

So I've not blogged for several days - don't worry, I'm still alive, just been busy having a great time!  I arrived relatively early in the morning on the Friday and so had some spare time in the city before I met my Servas hosts, Sarah and Cale.  I popped up the Columbia Centre tower which gave great views out across the City and the various bodies of water that surround it.  I also took the chance to visit the legendary Pike Place Market - I saw some fish being thrown and also took advantage of the great local artists to pick up some Christmas presents. 

I met Sarah at her office downtown and we walked up to Capitol Hill - the neighbourhood where they live.  I'd read a lot about the Seattle micro-/craft-brewing scene so I was pleased when we went to a local bar to sample some of them.  The evening then took its usual turn when you go for a "quick one" after work... We went for some excellent Mexican food in a local 'hispter' cafe and then sampled most of the local beers - especially from Elysian Brewing - their pumpkin ale is excellent!  I displayed my usual self-control and light-touch when it comes to drinking and seem to remember displaying my British beer-mat flipping skills to any and all that wanted to witness them.  

So it was obviously with a spring in my step and a totally clear head that I went off to the Seattle Art Museum the next morning.   It's a really great space and had some cool exhibits - I'm just not sure that I made the most of it...  

The Museum also has a satellite campus of outdoor sculpture so I dodged the rain and took in that.  In the evening we went over to a local neighbourhood that was doing a kind of 'open house' at the artists' studios - you can see some info here.  

I moved on to another Servas host on the Sunday morning - Rebecca and Sara live in Mount Baker a few miles away from the city centre so it was interesting to see a different side of Seattle life.  We did a whole variety of things over the three days I was with them, the highlight probably being a tour of several wineries and also going to a local bar to watch the second Presidential debate.  I really enjoyed the conversations with Rebecca and Sara about the local and national political scene and what it's like to live in Seattle.  

Seattle is a great city - still doesn't knock Chicago off top spot, but I like the culture and stunning scenery - even the British-style rain wasn't too bad!

(I'm going to do another post in a bit outlining the companies that I visited whilst here in Seattle). 

Final Thoughts on Detroit

I'm writing this in Chicago airport: I was freakishly bumped to an earlier flight (vs my rubbish experience leaving Cincinnati) so I've got a couple of hours to kill.  I thought I'd jot down my final thoughts on Detroit - it's a place of contradictions and variety and I'm sure that I barely scratched the surface.  But hopefully I'm seen a bit more than just the 'usual' downtown areas.  (I don't know when I'll get a chance to post this so some of the timings might be off!). 

 

I went downtown for the morning the other day - mainly to post some stuff home (both from where I massively overpacked but also from things I've been given or bought along the way.  Top tip to scholars doing this trip in future years is to take less stuff that you think you'll need).  I took the opportuninty to wander around the city centre area.  As per my previouspost the overwhelming impression is one of emptiness - it's clean and feels safe and has all the infrastructure (roads, buildings etc) of a much larger and busier city than it is now but there's simply no-one around!

I stumbled across one of Detroit's 'Urban Gardens' - this one was sponsored by Compuware, one of the local employers and I spoke with the people seconded from the company to staff the garden.  One of them was a long term resident and told me that 15-20 years ago it was even quieter than now - he could have laid down in the road beside us for 15 minutes and nothing would have happened - no-one would be there to either tell him to get up or in his words, "no-one would even be around to try to take my wallet". 

They also filled me in about a couple of names that have consistently come up in coversation - Matty Moroun and Phil Cooley.  The former is a local landowner (he owns Michigan Central Station and also the bridge and tunnel over to Canada - more on him later) and the latter a local businessman and self-promoter.  Both divide opinions, shall we say...  I ate dinner that night at one of Cooley's restaurants - Slows BBQ.  The food was ok, not as great as I'd been led to believe but the place was totally packed to he's obviously doing something right. 

Talking of food, and being a huge Man vs Food fan I couldn't go to Detroit without sampling the delights of a Coney Hot Dog - some info on the backstory here.  I plumped for what's supposed to be the more 'authentic' of the two rival restaurants and can confirm that it was qutie an experience - the mixture of mince, chilli, hotdog and raw onions will stay with me for quite some time...  I shied away from one of Adam's volume challenges on this ocassion - another chance will present itself I'm sure. 

I was due that afternoon back at the offices of the UFCW where their Secretary-Treasurer had promised me that he would show me the political offices of the local Democratic Party.  For a political nerd like me this was obviously very exciting, not least because I'd be able to look at lots of maps of different Congressional Districts...  The office was very much like all the Labour Party committee rooms I've been in: slightly messy, lots of junk-food, assorted literature and posters along with a hardcore of activists phone-banking and stuffing envelopes.  Probably the best part of the visit, apart from the collecting of much literature and bumper stickers (yes, I've got one for you Rory!) was when my host, Rick, took me on a short drive to some of the local neighbourhoods. 

I'd already learned that Detroit's not all decay and disorder and there are some pretty acceptable places but where Rick took me was totally unexpected.  Firstly for Nottingham readers the district of the City rejoices in the name of 'Sherwood Forest' and especially for Jane and Brian if they're reading this it is usually just know as 'Sherwood' and is one of the more desirable places to live in the City.  Some things are the same the world over, eh...

As you can see from the photo below the properties in this neighbourhood are pretty desirable - 5+ bedrooms and lots of big gardens.  Rick told me that places here would typically sell for $150,000 - and an equivalent place outside the stigma of the city's boundaries (but less than a mile away geographically) would be around $400,000!  (This compares with the place I was staying where a three bedroom Victorian semi-detached would set you back about $30,000...). 

I picked up in the campaign office an attack leaflet critisising 'Mad Moron' (sic).  Although it wasn't explained, I assume this was directed at Matt Moroun (as above).  As well as consistently delaying redevelopment proposals for the Michigan Central Station Mr Moran is also the monopoly owner of the bridge and tunnel to and from Canada and also of all the Duty Free Shopping concessions.  When I was given a sample ballot (it's 4 pages) for the upcoming November election I was surprised to see a Referendum (called a 'Proposal' here) essentially designed to make it much more difficult for an additional international crossing to be created.  When I was in the UFCW offices I got the team to explain this.  Essentially it looks like Mr Moran has used his considerable personal wealth to get onto the ballot (and hopes to pass) a proposal to protect his monopoly on the international crossing business.  The fact that the Canadian government would have paid the costs of a proposed new bridge and it would bring additional revenue and business through Detroit doesn't seem to be a factor in his thinking.  An interesting local political dynamic. 

On my last day in Detroit I planned a quick visit to the Henry Ford complex out in Dearborn.  This comprises of several museums and exhibitions but the main focus for me was the Rouge Factory Tour - a chance to go round the actual Ford factory that's currently making the F150 Truck.  The Dearborn complex is vast - a whole town dedicated to Ford and all things car related.  It used to be much bigger and was on a significant decline until the mid-naughties when the current leader of the company, Bill Ford made a bold investment to tranform the plant into a green oriented and future facing operation - investing around $2bn in the site and its future.  The actual tour of the factory was incredible - you walk along a kind of gantry where you can see the trucks being made, production line station by production line station.  Some of the workers acknowledged our presence and gave us a little wave - some others just carried on doing the same repetitive work (as part of a 4 day, 10 hours a day work-week).  There was a real pride in the quality of the work and the combination of sophisticated robots and real people was interesting to see.  I also liked the fact that at various stations the sophisticated manufacturing process was reduced to a bloke picking up a lump of plastic and banging it into place with his fist - percussive maintenance is always a winner!

My final thoughts on Detroit: what I originally read about on my pre-trip research as a concept of 'Planned Shrinkage' came up time and time again here in even the most casual of conversations with people - "the city's too big we need to downside"; "the city needs to grow its tax base we're too big"; "we can't keep the city this size".  All of the people I met were passionate and committed advocates for the City and they all knew that it made sense to shrink and try to grow back.  This wasn't at all what I expect to find so glad to have had my assumptions challenged. 

Take Me Out To The Ballgame

I'm delayed by about three hours leaving Cincinnati to get to Detroit via Chicago so thought I'd do a few lines reflecting on the baseball game I went to the other night.  
(I make no apologies for the hackneyed blog title.  I entered into the whole baseball experience fully embodying all the cliches available to me...)

I'd pre-ordered my ticket from the UK so picked it up from the box office the day before.  It didn't look like I needed to as the ground was only about 10% full at the start of the game.  I spent some time before going into the seating area checking out the stadium - it is absolutely massive and very impressive.  

I was prepared for some of the ceremonial stuff and enjoyed the fact that there were two ceremonial "first" pitches...

It wouldn't be an authentic baseball experience without some terrible mass-produced beer so I wandered down to the concession stands to see what was available.  I've become used at this stage for being asked for my ID all the time when buying alcohol and the production of my UK driving license usually confuses people (and not just because the photo makes me look like an axe-murderer...).  However, the reaction I got from the guy at the bar in the ballpark was the best yet.  He looked at me with total amazement and then said in a voice of wonder and curiosity, "You're from another country!?".  I didn't really know what to say to that other than confirm it and again ask for my beer.  He seemed in a daze for the rest of the transaction. 


The team mascot for the Reds made an appearance at this stage -  have fallen in love a little bit with 'Mr Redlegs' so it was good to see him in person...

At this point the national anthem was about to be sung and played - I was a bit conflicted about this moment - it's obviously not my national anthem so didn't quite know what to do.  However, when 18,000 people all stand up, put their hand on their hearts and sing along you don't stay sitting.  I have to say I felt a bit moved by it - we're not very good at that sort of collective public experience (Olympics aside) in the UK so I like that other countries can do it so easily. 

The game now started proper and I was pleased that I actually understood a good 70% of what was going on.  All the stats left me a bit confused but I basically understood what was happening and even predicted that one of the Milwaukee players was going to try to steal a base (unfortunately so did the pitcher and he was quickly out).  

The rest of the evening was enjoyable enough - but given that people say that a day out at a cricket test match is boring (I totally disagree) I wasn't totally enthralled by the play all the way through.  There was however loads of stuff going on around the ground and on the big screens - including: virtual three-card-monte to win Skyline Chili; a standing ovation given to an army veteran who was attending the game; a live "kiss-cam" where if the big screen camera focused on you you were obliged to kiss your partner and the 'seventh-innings-stretch'. 

Cincinnati easily won the game and showed no mercy to Milwaukee - there was no sportsmanship on display - booing the opposing team getting a run is apparently totally acceptable...

An authentic America experience ticked off the list.  Later in the trip I'm going to the Rice Owls play football in Houston - can't wait!  A few final photos of the view from the stadium.  

City of Contrasts

I've been in Cincy now for a couple of days and I've gone through a range of emotions about it.  The Monday morning (after the Oktoberfest admittedly) I was surprised at how quiet the city was - there was almost nothing going on for a Monday morning rush-hour - certainly compared with New York of course but even for a comparable UK city it was eerily still.  My earlier post covers some of what I did the rest of the day which certainly give me a different physical and social angle on the city.  I could definitely live in the Mt Adams area of the city

For yesterday I decided against my original plan of going to an outlet mall - I've already brought far too many clothes so decided I didn't really need any more - and planned on exploring more of the city.  I first went up the Carew Tower - a hidden gem if ever I saw one!  It was hard to find out how to actually get up the tower and I was somewhat sceptical of the rickety lift and handmade signs directing me up to the 49th floor.  On arrival and once I had paid the extortionate entrance fee of $2 the views from the blustery observation deck were fantastic.  An attraction that in any other city would be hugely publicised and probably be five times more expensive.  A couple of sample pictures.

 

It looks like a prosperous and thriving city which at times it certainly feels like but as you see below at other times it definitely doesn't!  There is an exhibition in the lobby of Carew Tower which gives a really interesting context to the building. The design is classic 1930s French Deco - which was trendy in the US for about 18 months.  The speed that the building was constructed at meant that it was the height of fashion for a very brief period of time.  The building has gone through a series of different uses and fortunes over the years but retains pretty much all of its charm and style - including some excellent glazed porcelain decorative arches from Rookwood Pottery - a company established in the city in the 19th Century and still trading (albeit with a number of different locations and owners over the years). 

I then decided to walk up to Findlay's Market in the north of the city.  Again a historic organisation (and a good place to get lunch) but I was also interested in seeing how the neighbourhood would change as I moved north of the city centre.  I wasn't disappointed.  From is a socially and racially mixed and fairly vibrant city centre I quickly moved into an almost exclusively Black neighbourhood and one that obviously is struggling.  Some obvious signs of decay and also something of a renaissance but at times it didn't feel like the best of places to be. 

This old pool hall has obviously seen better days...

And there are a number of 'missing' houses where there were obviously so decayed that they've had to be knocked down. 

The interesting thing is that on the wooden picket fence you can see in the photo there is a sign for the Cincinnati City Centre Development Corporation who are evidently working hard to transform the area. 

From a strict economic point-of-view of course, reducing your building and housing stock (especially when they are dilapidated) increases property values and encourages use of the neighbourhood in new ways.  The Development Corporation is based directly in this neighbourhood and surrounding their (pretty plush) offices there already seems to be some gentrification going on.  Their website here directly talks about land-banking and assembling plots for redevelopment.  Ed Glaeser talks very helpfully about this kind of regeneration activity in his book, 'Triumph of the City' and I've covered 'Planned Shrinkage' before along with my thoughts on Nottingham's own areas of urban decay.

The area I walked through (which I think is known as 'Over-The-Rhine' - Cincinnati has a large German population, dontchyaknow) could be great: some historic (and huge) buildings and great access to the city centre.  And various bodies are putting a lot of effort into trying to transform it.  I hope they're succesful. 

The Market itself was a little disappointing - very quiet and not a huge range of food on offer.  I even managed to resist the Belgian waffle stall...

The walk back brought me through Washington Park and the frankly incredible Music Hall.  Again, a clear influence from the German population in its architecture. 

Just so my day wasn't all architecture and urban regeneration I popped into Nicholson's Scottish (!) pub in the afternoon - it claims to be Cincinnati's first gastro-pub: a dubious claim to fame if ever there was one!  Some reasonable beers however. 

A pretty packed day and I still had the baseball game at the Great American Ball Park to come - a report on that later today I hope.