I have a confession to make: I am an Olympics junkie. Despite the fact that I never owned a television in my adult life, every four (and later, two) years found me scrounging up a borrowed set to watch all my favorite sports.

My favorites are the ones that defy gravity, like gymnastics, diving, ice skating, and ski jumping. When I was little, I cared little for baseball, basketball, or football. My heroes were Dorothy Hamill, Mark Spitz, Nadia Commaneci, Greg Louganis. When Finland declared a national holiday because their ski jumper won the gold medal, I cheered — and wished fervently I was Finnish.

I love the pageantry of the Olympics, the way the whole world comes together for a short time and declares the “Olympic truce.” I love the fact that there are people devoting their entire lives to little-known sports, like curling or pentathlon, which most of us know nothing about. Can you even list the events that make up the pentathlon? I remember the Olympics before rhythm gymnastics, moguls, and skeleton, and I love the fact that there are new sports to discover.

So it’s probably no surprise to hear that while the XXVIII Olympics were getting under way in Athens, Barry and I were at Lake Placid, New York, home of the 1932 and 1980 Winter Olympics.

I’ve seen Olympic venues before — Montreal, Atlanta. Those were just facilities, where the tour guide’s narration echoed across an empty gym or swimming pool. Lake Placid is a live training venue, full of athletes, where even at the height of the summer, there is plenty to see. We sat in the ice rink until our lips turned blue from cold, watching tiny girls in short velvet dresses practicing their double axels. One fellow was doing triples, nearly spraying us with ice as he landed on the other side of the boards.

From there, we passed the rink where the USA upset the Soviet Union in hockey in 1980. Hockey fans stood in the doorway, gazing at the ice in wonder, as if they thought that one spectacular game won the Cold War for the USA and caused the fall of the USSR.

We took a drive to Whiteface Mountain, where a quiet gondola took us to the top. Only a handful of tourists wandered about, snapping pictures, a far cry from the armies of support people, camera crews, and athletes who were there for the 1980 Olympics.

The 1932 Olympics were on another mountain, and the spectacular Whiteface Mountain venue was developed just for the ’80 games. Seeing these places in the summer, with their naked infrastructure uncovered by snow, brings home the realization of just how much is built for the Olympics. In ’80, the Federal Government chipped in to build the Olympic Village that housed all the athletes, on the condition that it would be turned over to them afterwards for a minimum security prison. I’m not sure where they would house the athletes if they hosted another Olympics — perhaps move the prisoners elsewhere?

The combined track for bobsled, luge, and skeleton was on another mountain. We didn’t opt for the 60 mph wheeled bobsled ride down the old track, but took a bus tour to the top of the mountain. Without its snowy winter blanket, the track is ugly, miles of refrigeration pipes covered in orange insulation. In keeping with the desire for more challenges, the new run is an eighth of a mile longer than the old and has four more curves, one of them 23 feet high. It has a section known as “The Devil’s Highway,” where athletes get up to four G’s of centrifugal force, and the poor skeleton fellows can’t even pick up their heads from the ice.

But for me, lover of things that defy gravity, the best part of Lake Placid was the ski jumping complex. There, on the 90-meter tower, skiiers slide down high-tech tracks and launch themselves effortlessly into the air, landing 100 meters down the hill on Astro-turf. They held a competition the Saturday we were there. I can still hear it in my head: Skis whooshing down the hill, cheering crowds, and that distinctive clatter of cowbells. I’ve only heard that particular combination of sounds on TV — during the Winter Olympics.

After watching Jonathan Kling match the summer record for the 90-meter hill (104 meters), we spent a few hours sitting at poolside. Wearing skis, boots, helmets, swimsuits, and PFDs, the aerial skiiers slide down a hill, are launched into the sky, and perform amazing feats before landing in a deep aerated swimming pool. We first saw small children who were there for a four-day camp. After only a couple of days, they could all march up the hill, ski down, and do flips and helis and split jumps into the pool.

But my eyes were drawn to the steps beside the taller hills, where tiny figures marched up carrying their skis over their shoulders. Finally, someone took off down the big hill. Down, down, down, then up the ramp at the end. He flew over 50 feet into the air, performing a triple somersault with so many twists I couldn’t count them. The spectators roared in delight, and I was left breathless.

This was the gravity defiance I had watched on TV for years, right in front of (above, actually!) me. And the next time I have a chance to watch the Olympics on TV, I probably will. But I’ll get just as much pleasure out of watching my own little videos. Because I was there, and I saw it, and heard it — in person, at Lake Placid.

We made our meandering way out of Ohio a few days ago, driving northeast on state and county roads. Prussia was unsure where to find the best riding place, so she crawled into the covered litterbox and went to sleep there. Good thing we keep it clean, but I feel terrible when she crawls into the “toilet” for security.

Our first night was a campground at Beaver Creek State Park, lovely views, but nothing compared to what was to come. We continued east into Pennsylvania, which I’ve always thought of as one of those states you drive through on the way to someplace else. On this trip, we found out why people go to Pennsylvania.

We crossed the magnificent Allegheny river, then turned north towards the Allegheny National Forest. We crossed the river again, and again, and again. Each time over the course of two days, we kept crossing that same river, and it got smaller and smaller, until it ended up corralled in a concrete drainage ditch.

But as the river got smaller, the mountains grew larger, towering over us in green majesty. On the ground, we found our first free campsite in the Allegheny National Forest, nestled next to a burbling creek. The next night, the mountains were not the only big things: A HUGE thunderstorm passed right over us, making me cower when the lightning and thunder hit simultaneously. We’d found another free site along a creek, this one in Tioga State Forest. That name, Tioga State Forest, brought up a funny memory. Only a couple of months ago, when we were searching for RVs, we’d found a fun website chronicalling the adventures of “George and Ms. Tioga, the RV.” If you have free time, check it out. George is a real kick, and he’s into “boondocking,” or free camping.

These free nights in the forests are lovely, but we’re getting a little lonely and in need of a shower. Tonight, we’ll look for an “improved” campground. Adirondack Park has millions of miles of wilderness, and many campgrounds, so that’s the plan. Then east into Vermont!

After seven weeks of regrouping in (hot!) Florida, our departure from that state had an uncharacteristic element of stealth. No fanfare or weblog entries, just a long drive north in our new van, nicknamed the Squid Wagon.

The occasion that caused us to leave Dad’s without even a hint on this website was a surprise party planned for Barry’s sister, Julie, in Columbus, Ohio. Driving 18 hours from Florida, we were not the guests who traveled the farthest — that was Barry’s parents, Sharon and Dave, who flew all the way from Washington state. Needless to say, Julie was stunned (and pleasantly surprised, I think!) to have her whole family in town for the week.

At Julie’s party, Barry and I square-danced for the first time since we left Ohio about ten years ago. The dancing left us gasping for breath, we laughed so hard. Barry was not the only one who got his right and left confused!

Back in 1996, when Sharon and Dave were planning their move from Ohio to Washington, Julie went to China to teach English for a year. She’d had her eye on some fellow who just wasn’t responding. So, after her stint in China, she was going to give up on him and settle in the Pacific Northwest.

That wasn’t what happened at all. That fellow suddenly figured it out, and after Julie’s year in China, she and Cody got engaged, married, and now have two boys, Emanuel and Gabriel. At first, I was disappointed that Julie stayed in Columbus. But now, I am so glad! Because with Julie and her family here, plus my brother Hank, we have an excuse to visit almost every year. That means we’ve stayed in touch with our Columbus friends, some of whom we’ve known for almost 25 years. After Julie’s party, we contacted many of them and started a round robin of visits and activities.

Columbus has become incredibly diverse in the years since we left. Tuesday’s lunch was Korean bi-bim-bap and sushi with Lisa, who sold us our first sailboat in 1990. That evening, my old college roommate, Tara, introduced us to Somalian food and to Fatima, the dynamic former Somalian ambassador to the United Nations. At Schiller Park, in German Village, we mixed our metaphors by eating more sushi with our dear friend Carol while watching a performance of A Comedy of Errors staged to take place in a small Appalachian town. Evidently, Shakespeare’s Elizabethan English was closer to what we know as a “hillbilly” accent than to common American English. The director is from Ironton, Ohio, where the town name is pronounced “Arnt’n.”

The following day, nine of us went to the Ohio State Fair for the full midwest experience. We rode the ferris wheel, slid down the giant slide, watched a potbellied pig race, and saw horses, cows, sheep, chickens, goats, and lots of children. One of my favorite things was the full-sized Lewis and Clark — not to mention their campfire — carved from over a ton of butter. We eschewed cotton candy, deep-fried twinkies, and hot-dog-on-a-stick for a picnic of sandwiches and fruit under the trees.

There were also lunches and long evenings of talk and laughter with Mowgli, Linda, Dave and his two Maggies and Trip, and Georgia. And still there are people we didn’t have time to connect with. Next time, we’ll put them first on the list.

None of this visit would have been possible without the help of our special friends Carol and Steve. Back in 1994, we stayed with them while we prepared for our big bicycle trip. This visit, they opened their home to not just us, but to Prussia, too. Talk about kitty heaven! She had a whole two-story house to ramble around in, and “Auntie Carol and Uncle Stevie” lavished her with attention. In short, they spoiled her (and us)!

Our whole visit was so pleasant that Barry mused, “Wouldn’t it be fun to get a job and live here for a few months sometime?”

I was floored. “What’s this about getting a jay-oh-bee? I thought we were retired!”

“Well, just so we could hang out with our friends for longer than a week,” he explained.

Maybe someday. But not now. We’re headed for a September 8th rendezvous with my Dad in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. And then we’re going to start building our dream boat someplace near Seattle. But we’ll be back, I’m sure. We just can’t seem to stay away from this funny, flat, magical place.