An eventless Fourth of July – The ghost town of Rausch Gap – Plans to complete hiking the Appalachian Trail in Pennsylvania – The bridge at Harpers Ferry – The British are thirsty – The prudence of Malawi’s new president – The virus in Africa at large – The case of New Zealand – Evening statistics
It’s the Fourth of July with no events to go to! Actually, that is not quite true: there was a modified procession in the late afternoon, with an assortment of motorcycles and two or three decorated floats. They meant well, but it was such a limited and melancholy affair that they would have done better to leave it alone.
The lack of festivities was a disappointment, of course, but I did the best I could by taking advantage of the lessened traffic on the roads to complete a hike I’ve been planning for several weeks. I went up to the Appalachian Trail via the Cold Spring Trail in the vicinity of Harrisburg, PA, and then went along a segment of the AT that runs through Rausch Gap, an abandoned mining town. Very little of it remains – mostly an old railroad bed and a cemetery (only a few of the gravestones are still standing). It was beautiful on the trail, however, and much less oppressive than in the valley below. Even though it was not very high in altitude, the temperature was below 80 degrees on the ridgeline. I have mentioned that summer is the most difficult hiking season but it does have its advantages. The foliage is at its densest, creating a myriad of gradations of mingled green and gold hues from the sunlight falling through the chinks between the variously shaded leaves. The ascent along the Cold Spring Trail requires some exertion but is not punishingly steep and the trail itself is in excellent condition. There were not many others on the trail, but I encountered one other hiker on the Cold Spring Trail going down as I was going up, another on the AT as I was going towards the mining town, and four trail-runners when I was returning.
With the completion of this hike I have now covered the southern half of the portion of the Appalachian Trail that runs through Pennsylvania, from Swatara Gap to PenMar. For the northern half I will have to stay at hotels on various trips to towns close to the trail, whenever that becomes feasible – probably at Wind Gap and Port Clinton. The drives back and forth to the trailheads would simply take up too much time if I started traveling from my house in Fairfax. Today’s drive was a little over 2½ hours each way, and that was with light traffic. Traffic has increased over the past several weeks as more businesses are becoming operative and the Beltway in particular is resuming its previous degree of congestion during certain hours. I am more tired by the end of the day on such excursions from the driving than from the hiking. In addition, the drives eat up too many hours of daylight. Today’s hike was only about three hours, enabling me to return to my home in good time and without feeling any need for haste; but I would like to have more time at my disposal for future explorations.
We have had some good news concerning another section of the AT. Some months ago the bridge over the Potomac adjoining Harpers Ferry was damaged by a train collision and the crossing was rendered unusable. The only way to continue was to go via Loudoun Heights to the Rte. 340 bridge to Sandy Hook. The road has a pedestrian walkway but walking along it is extremely unpleasant nonetheless, as well as forming a detour of several miles. But the bridge has now been repaired and the old route connecting Harpers Ferry with the C&O Towpath on the Maryland bank has been restored.
I have been critical of my countrymen for their disregard of common sense with respect to assembling in large groups, but it seems that we Americans are not alone in this respect. Today England allowed pubs and hair salons to re-open, and they lost no time in doing so – the pubs opening at 6:00 in the morning and salons on the stroke of midnight. Nigel Farage, the leader of the Brexit Party, posted a photo of himself as the first customer at his pub of choice, gleefully holding up a pint in his hand; and his compatriots have eagerly followed suit, crowding in the pubs and sitting just a few inches from one another, without any face masks. Medical experts and health care professionals have pleaded for people to wear masks in enclosed spaces, but for the most part these appeals have fallen on deaf ears. The U.K.’s mortality rate, it may be remarked in passing, is over 15% — one of the highest worldwide.
Lazarus Chekwera, the newly-elected president of Malawi, ordered his inauguration ceremony to be scaled down on account of the coronavirus. The national stadium will be filled to only half capacity, with people sitting well apart from each other, and 100,000 masks will be distributed to the citizens of Lilongwe, the country’s capital. Malawi has had less than 1,500 cases (a rate of about 78 per million, well below the international average) and 16 deaths (less than 1 per million), but Chekwera is taking no chances, and is thereby displaying a far greater sense of responsibility than the majority of European, North American, and South American leaders.
The African countries in general have been coping much better to date than those on other continents – the cases in all of them combined account for less than 3% of the world’s total, even though they contain about 15% of the world’s population. Nonetheless even there the virus has been accelerating. It took 98 days for the countries to reach their first 100,000 cases but just 18 days to bring the total up to 200,000. Many countries have released their lockdown restrictions; in addition, the increased rate of testing may have uncovered more people were who previously infected without being aware of it.
Even New Zealand, which has been such a bright spot for many weeks, is having difficulties. David Clark, the country’s Health Minister, was twice discovered violating the rules that he himself laid down for the rest of the country – once for going mountain biking and one for taking his family on a beach vacation 15 miles from his home. After many calls for his being fired, he took the initiative by voluntarily resigning. He was a key advisor among Jacinda Ardern’s aides, so this episode is a setback for her. The country currently has 18 active cases – not a large number, to be sure, but definitely a retrograde step after it had achieved a status of no active cases some weeks earlier.
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM — # of cases worldwide: 11,371,756; # of deaths worldwide: 532,856; # of cases U.S.: 2,935,185 # of deaths U.S.: 132,313. Today’s case increase was slightly less than 200,000, which – sadly – is an improvement over yesterday. Peru’s case count has overtaken Spain’s, and Chile will do the same in two or three days at the most. Mexico’s case count has overtaken Italy’s. Iran is likely to follow suit soon. Mexico, it may be noted, has insisted on keeping its borders with the U.S. closed for fear of admitting anyone infected with the disease.