Essentially the Only One

Joe Page Bridge.

Some photographs from my weekend trips over the past few weeks.

Silt collecting on farmland.



Washed up by this muddy river, the Illinois in Calhoun County, Illinois.



Below, the confluence of the Missouri River, to the front, with the Mississippi River, to the back beyond the point.

Such a peaceful looking mating of two massive rivers. Not so peaceful during time of flood - this whole region would be underwater.

The Missouri River at sunset.




Below, enjoying the Missouri!

Our journey up to Chigaco last Tuesday took us up Route 100 following the line of the Illinois River valley.
One of the towns we passed through was Kampsville.

Situated on the western bank of the river, Kampsville exemplifies all the charms and idiosyncrasies of a small town in the American Midwest.

Like many river villages, it looks like it was built yesterday. This is probably because much of it was; as you can see from the photographs this area is subject to flooding. So the houses tend to be utilitarian in design, often prefabricated or mobile homes. Some are built high on steel stilts.

There are exceptions, like this restaurant where we stopped for home-made pie (peach and blackberry).

We arrived late in the afternoon, so the place was deserted except for us, three staff members and a worn-looking retiree sitting at the bar. A quiet Wednesday afternoon in Kampsville.

The only activity was the gentle back and forth of the ferry carrying a handful of cars across the river to Route 108.

I watched as a Volkswagen Beetle (the old series - still far more classier than the newer and less-than-satisfactory remodel) waited for the boat.

A small ramp in the road led up the ferry entrance. Cars coming to Kampsville would drive down past this village sign.

Buried in a hollow and shaded by the afternoon sun, it struck me as a modest and uninspiring welcome. Suited, though, to this unprepossessing town.

It really should be so much more. The countryside around is beautiful. There are a number of riverside parks and reservations close by. In another part of the world, I could imagine this town as a tourist trap, not a sleepy backwater.

The ferry headed off with the Volkswagen. It didn't look at all exciting on the other side of the Illinois so we did not follow it.

Time was pressing though. We had to reach Chicago at least a reasonable hour.

So we walked back to the gas station where we had left the car.
Past the stained shacks and pools of flood water, past the riverboats tied to the bank.

All looked like they has seen grander days. Some even looked as if they had been floating restaurants or even small casinos, but there were no signs or lights to advertise their trade.

Perhaps they come to life at the weekends or later in the season. I hoped so.
But I doubt it, or even if that does happen, it is hardly a moneymaker. Like so many rural towns in this area, the prevailing impression is of a gritty poverty. Not desperate, but barely getting by, and the antithesis of any sense of America as country of abundant wealth. I find such places to be real and honest. I feel at home in them in a way that I never feel in the glitzy McMansions of the big city suburbs.

I would be happy to see the poverty overcome and prosperity established for all the people, but not at the cost of turning these towns into little bastions of affluence, all show and no substance. There is a middle way.

Perhaps now, in these days of economic disturbance and the growing realisation that the disparities and expectations of wealth between the rich and poor have grown too great, this country can return to the ways of real worth, compassion and caring.Finally, into the car and further on up the road.

I revisited this spot on the Illinois River in the Glades/12 Mile Island Wildlife Management Area yesterday. The same trip that gave me these photographs of the ALton Bridge.

I find this spot, with its flood-damaged waterside homes and mud-caked ground, to have a evocative resonance with me that I can't quite pin down but seems very meaningful.

Here the river stamped its presence very emphatically on the surrounding land - perhaps that gives the area a sense of wildness and unpredictability that I like.

Yesterday, little had changed since my last summer visit. The mud looked undisturbed and the same condemned signs were still pasted on the buildings. No work had been done to either renovate or demolish. The season had moved on, but not man's activity. I liked that.

More shots from the Illinois River at the Glades/12 Mile Island Wildlife Management Area.

Essentially the same shot as here, except with tilt on the horizontal plane instead of the vertical.




This is all that remains of a wooden dock; this whole area was under about 2.5 meters of water during the spring floods and all the horizontal planks were ripped off by the current. The ground is silt, drying out in that distinctive cracked pattern.







The riverside damage was extensive, and those houses that had not been built high on stilts were flooded.

The whole area had something of the feel of a ghost town, except people were slowly returning and repairing their damaged property. Add to that the active river traffic with ski and pleasure boats passing every few minutes, and the green vegetation springing out of the rich silt and any sense of desolation was dispersed. Nonetheless, the very obvious marks of flood damage were a reminder of the power of these great rivers.

Here's a clear example of the floodline on the side of this wrecked house. A sticker on the front door from the Illinois housing dept. marked this building as unsafe until inspected; it certainly looked like a muddy mess from what I could see through the windows. I felt for the owners.

A couple more photographs from my trip to Pere Marquette State Park on Saturday afternoon.

This is the view from one of the lookout points just off the scenic drive that follows the top line of the bluffs that overlook the Illinois River valley.


It illustrates that there are only two types of color on a clear Missouri/Illinois winter's day - blue and brown! I love these subtle colors; not for me the super saturated primaries that seem to be in vogue for a lot of digital photography. Far in the distance to the right of the photograph you can see the silver strip of the Illinois River and beyond that Calhoun County.

And here's a close up of some Calhoun County farmhouses, beyond that strip of water with the evening mist rising from the valleys


The focal length (35mm equivalent) of the top picture is 10mm, that of the bottom is 560mm. Different lenses, it goes without saying. I was using a 1.4x extender on my long 400mm zoom for the long shot - I wanted to see how well it resolved at that magnification. I found the result pleasing.

I can never shake from my mind the wildness of America. Doesn't matter that I live in a nicely ordered suburb close to a big city. All it takes is a short drive out of town, and I find myself cast back into thinking of this as the land of canoes and natives, quite free of Europeans. Nothing aids this feeling more than a visit to the Mississippi River or its tributary, the Illinois River.

The Illinois riverside at the Pere Marquette State Park is easily accesible, and you can walk out onto the long levee that divides the river itself from a series of backwaters that now form a wildfowl sanctuary.
Late in the evening, with the setting sun, amd little heard beyond the lapping of the water and birdsong, it is very easy to think of this as an ancient land. Despite walking on a very obviously man and machine-made levee.

But every now and then a sound like a freight-train comes surging up through the trees shielding the river's edge. Stumbling and ducking through the growth, you can then find yourself gazing at the river and its cargo, a glorious barge tugboat. A wonderful sight even as it shatters illusions of the past.