 The Wilds Cumberland, Ohio After snapping yesterday's photo of the foggy river, we had a nice morning walk through Marietta and found Old Town Bakery that served up some really good decaf coffee by exceptionally friendly folks. On down the sidewalk, we visited Rossi Pasta (click here for the website) which was a very interesting small shop that sold many types of pastas and sauce. I picked up a Tomato Basil Garlic and also Spinach Basil Garlic Fettuccini. I wanted something different for the sauce and took the sales lady's recommendation for the Vodka Sauce and also a jar of the Sun-Dried Tomato Sauce. I'll let you know how it turns out. Marietta turned out to be a unique and friendly spot that I'm sure to return to. After leaving Marietta, we traveled to the north and arrived at The Wilds (photograph above) probably within about an hour. This is another unique spot that started out as 10,000 acres of woodland and farms then became a gigantic coal strip mine, and finally was donated for use as a non-profit conservation center where rare and endangered species from all over the world are kept. The Wilds bills themselves as 'one of the largest and most innovative wildlife conservation centers in the world.' I was totally surprised about what I found there. Never having been to Africa, I can't really compare The Wilds to it but I can say with certainty that you will feel that you are somewhere else other than Ohio. The animals are strictly controlled and kept behind double fences but the fields are so huge that the impression is that the animals are free roaming. We took the 2 1/2 hour open-sided bus tour that consisted of a driver with a microphone taking you down winding gravel roads through gorgeous lush fields and explaining nearly everything that you see. If you've ever been on the Kilimanjaro Safari ride at Disney World, this is nearly the same thing but done without a script and a good bit more 'in the wild'. I'm not a zoo fan at all and I enjoyed every minute of it. Here is the link to their website that will explain more of this in detail. This place is extremely interesting to anyone who loves animals and the environment. It's sort of like a zoo on steroids. When I was in high school, I became aware and concerned about what was happening to the hills and mountains by the (then) newer form of mining called surface or strip mining. I chose this subject for a required research paper then later expanded on it during college. Part of the paper focused on this area of Ohio and a gigantic earth moving machine called Big Muskie. Big Muskie was one of the biggest machines of this type in the world and during its operating life ended up moving dirt that would be the equivalent of digging 2 Panama Canals. Big Muskie was the machine that they used to dig up the land now found in the photograph above. So, after 35 years I finally was able to see that land that I once wrote about. As you can see, it's far from being a moonscape. If you know what you're looking at, though, you'll see that there's lots of foreign plant species such as Autumn Olive and the trees (on the old mining areas) are largely limited to species like locust that will grow on thin topsoil. There's not a lot of biodiversity there and even though the landscape is quite pretty I believe it'll be a long long time before you see an oak or hickory sprout up in one of the fields. The staff is fairly upfront about this and gave examples of how they combat the problem. I'm happy to see that some of their projects are ecological restoration, so hopefully some good research will come out of it that will help repair some of the damage done throughout the region. It's a touchy subject with the fact being that surface mined coal still powers the computer that I write this on, as well as providing a livelihood for many many families. Here's a link about Big Muskie. Comment (2) | Permalink |
4x6photo.com | The Wilds | 17 June, 2008
