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explore everywhere

Sometimes I go places, this is where you can read about my adventures. Road trips, cemeteries, abandoned places – they’re all here.

abandoned amusement park

by Kaylah Stroup July 17, 2014

Hidden behind some homes in a sleepy little town remains the skeleton of once booming amusement park. The park was open for one hundred years, opening in 1878, and eventually closing in 1978. Since then mother nature has been doing her best to take the park back over. There isn’t much left still standing in the park, and according to a list I found online it seems something else is getting demolished (or burnt down!!?) every few years. I feel pretty lucky to have been able to see what was left at this point even though most of the larger things are now gone forever.

After we left the park I text my mom a photo of the ferris wheel. When I told her where it was she said she recalled going there when as she was younger. I asked if she had any photos to which her response was that she was “14 or 15, and more interested in boys at the park than taking pictures.” I also asked if she rode the ferris wheel, she said she didn’t remember but I could say she did if that made my blog post more interesting. Haha. I suppose there’s a great possibility that she did ride if even if she was too distracted by cute boys to remember. That’s a really neat thought to me, that my mom probably rode that ferris wheel or one of the roller coasters that’s since been demolished. I enjoy this hobby for a multitude of reasons but one of my favorite things is definitely hearing from people who had a personal connection to a place. I’m not quite old enough to have places that I’ve really spent any amount of time in become neglected to the point where they’re just abandoned. But I hope that someday when a building or place I have some connection to is in complete disrepair that someone will take photos to share.
xoxo

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Abandoned in the desert

by Kaylah Stroup July 7, 2014

While on our road trip out West we saw so many abandoned buildings. I mean, just tons of them! It was crazy, and it was so hard not to stop at every single one. We literally could have spent weeks hitting up every one. Here’s a little bit of what we did stop and check out…

We actually started the trip with a ghost town in Utah. We arrived in Denver in the evening, drove into the night, and finally stopped to take a quick snooze in the middle of the night. We started driving again right before sunrise, at that time I checked the Roadside America app and discovered we were only 15 minutes away from a ghost town. It was the absolute perfect way to kick off the week. I sadly didn’t really get too many photos I was super pleased with but the memory is so much more important than photos. Plus who knows, maybe the photos really aren’t that bad but are kind of overshadowed by the photos I am really pleased with from the trip. That kind of thing seems to happen to me a lot which is why I really enjoy shooting film so I can’t just delete the photos. I’m sure I’ll end up eventually loving my ghost town photos.

The bus covered in graffiti was kind of a strange find. Driving to Colorado Springs, alongside the highway, we were spotting incredible building after incredible building that were just left to rot. The bus was the final straw, we hopped off the highway and went down a little side road to get to it. We were both exhausted and ready to get to the hotel room that we had booked for our last night but the bus had to be shot. As we approached I heard the strangest noise, like music was being played. The thing was though this bus is in the middle of nowhere. There is nothing around it, no other buildings, no people, nothing! I suspect it was the wind hitting something, like a jug, to create a whistling/humming noise. It was eerie, to say the least.
xoxo

All of the photos above were taken with a pentax k1000 and Fujifilm 35mm Superia X-TRA 400.

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Noah’s Art

by Kaylah Stroup July 2, 2014

While we were on the road, someone on Instagram mentioned that if we were going to go to Joshua Tree, California that we should check out Noah’s Art. We just so happened to be around an hour away, it was in the direction we were already heading, and the few photos I was able to quickly find looked amazing so we decided to stop by.

From 1989 until his death in 2004, Noah Purifoy devoted his time to making sculptures from found objects. His outdoor museum is open to the public, free of charge. It’s absolutely amazing. Quite a sight to see in the middle of the lonely desert! We were the only people there at the time, other than the woman who takes care of the place and her pup who went inside right after we got there, so we had the place to ourselves.

It was SO hot while we were there that I feel like I kind of rushed through it. There is so much to take in. Definitely worth a stop if you’re ever making your way through Joshua Tree!
xoxo

All of the photos above were taken with a pentax k1000 and Fujifilm 35mm Superia X-TRA 400.

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Polaroids from out West

by Kaylah Stroup June 16, 2014

Well hey there! If you don’t follow me on instagram you might have missed my most recent little adventure. I mentioned it briefly last week on the blog but other wise kept things running smoothly over here. Jeff and I took a liiiittle trip out West. By “little trip” I mean we flew to Denver, Colorado, rented a car and drove around six states including Colorado, Utah, Nevada, California, Arizona, and New Mexico. We spent two nights in a hotel, one night in a wigwam, and the other three in the car. In the six days we were on the road we racked up a whopping 3,204 miles. It was the most incredible trip of my life. I could have never imagined it would be that much fun.

I took so many photos. 18 rolls of 35mm film, quite a few packs of instant film, and a handful of digital photos. The 35mm I haven’t gotten developed yet. I’m trying to compare prices a bit because that’s a lot of film. There will definitely be a plethora of blog posts about this trip. I seriously can’t even remember all the things we did off the top of my head, it takes looking back through my photos to help me remember because we just did SO MUCH. To start off the posts from my big trip, here are some random photos I took with my polaroid 600 and some Impossible Project color frame film.

I have photos of almost all of these things taken with my other camera as well. I’m sure there will lots more dinosaurs and kitschy roadside things on the blog shortly since the desert just seems to be full of them, it’s kind of crazy!

I can’t wait to share more soon!
xoxo

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South of the Border

by Kaylah Stroup February 25, 2014

While in Georgia, Mickey and I decided to get road trip tattoos. We got matching peaches that ended up being even cuter than either of us had imagined. During our short visit to Anonymous Tattoo we told the artist all about our trip and how we were obsessed with silly roadside attractions. He asked if we had stopped at South of the Border and suggested if we hadn’t already stopped we make it a priority. We looked it up and decided to hit it on the way home since it would only take us a little bit out of the way.

It didn’t take long before we started seeing signs for South of the Border. I have literally never seen so many billboards for one thing in my life. I don’t even understand how they could possibly make enough money to cover the advertising costs. The closer we got the more there were and the more excited we grew.

South of the Border is a strange, strange place. There are over a dozen large animals, at least two restaurants, an ice cream parlor, a bunch of souvenir shops, a motel, and even an indoor reptile exhibit. It’s all so wildly colorful too!

According to their website “Our trademark has always been a value-oriented service ~ we provide a clean, safe & fun environment for travelers of all types to visit on their way to or from the southeast.” I’m not so sure about that. Mickey and I used one of the bathrooms while we were there. As we walked in the attendant scowled at us and then sat down in a rusty old chair. Needless to say, she didn’t get tipped.

It’s apparent the place seen better days. It’s a bit sketchy and I probably wouldn’t want to be there at night but it sure was awesome. Running around from animal to animal taking pictures was a blast. I’m not sure any roadside attraction could ever top this but you best believe I’m gonna look.
xoxo

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Freed Cemetery // on film

by Kaylah Stroup December 3, 2013

I’m a month late sharing these but better late than never, right? So, back to that trip to West Virginia with my mom and grandparents! One of the main things the trip was about was visiting the family cemetery. I’d never been there and of course, it absolutely appealed to me for a variety of reasons. My grandfather hadn’t been in a few years and may never get to visit again due to declining health since getting to the cemetery is a bit of a trip.The cemetery is on the top of a large hill that’s home to a herd of cattle. But before conquering the hill you have to cross a stream. It’s not really a long hike from the car to the cemetery (maybe fifteen or twenty minutes) but I can definitely see how it would be a tough one for the bad knees that seem to run on this side of the family.

It was gorgeous up there. Not to mention the cemetery was immaculate, I can’t believe someone takes such great care of it considering the location. It’s a fairly small cemetery but packed full of relatives. I got to see where my grandpa’s parents and siblings were buried among many other relatives (and some people who we didn’t quite know who they were.)

The cemetery alone was well worth the trip to West Virginia. It was an amazing experience, to say the least.
xoxo

All of the photos above were taken with a Canon T2 and Fuji 35mm Superia X-TRA 400.

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Girl in Blue

by Kaylah Stroup July 12, 2012

For as long as I can remember I’ve been interested in cemeteries, ghosts and all things macabre. In middle school I remember pouring over Haunted Ohio books, and day dreaming about visiting all the spooky places Ohio has. Many years later I’m still interested in these types things except with a little (okay, a lot) less emphasis on the haunted, I’m a big fraidy cat. But I still love cemeteries. I love looking at all the old headstones, figuring out how old people were and pondering what they were like.

I found Ace’s blog Mortuary Report a little while ago when she commented on a photo of my mine on instagram. I was instantly smitten with her blog and read through a lot of it. While browsing I found a post about the girl in blue.

“For sixty years, the young lady who had been hit by a train near aboarding house in Willoughby was simply known as “The Girl in Blue.” No one knew who she was, where she was going or who to contact about her death on Christmas Eve 1933. She carried no identification, only 90cents and a ticket to Corry, Pennsylvania. She wore a blue dress andblue shoes.

McMahon Funeral Home adopted this young lady’s funeral arrangements. Local donations paid for a headstone and flowers. More than 3,000 local residents went to McMahon Funeral Home to bid farewell to a girl they never knew.

Her identity remained amystery of national interest until a local newspaper story commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of her death sparked a reader to contact a title agency that researched records from the sale of properties in Warren County, Pennsylvania. State authorities determined that Josephine Klimczak was The Girl in Blue. Lake County records, however, have not changed the death certificate; she is still listed as The Girl in Blue” -from findagrave.com

When I read where this headstone was – I had to visit! Willoughby, Ohio is only a short jaunt away from my house! I set out that week to find the girl in blue. It was so stinken hot that day! I had read on some review site (yep, people review cemeteries!) that the headstone was in one of the far corners of the cemetery. I hunted and hunted for it until finally realizing I couldn’t spend all day out in that heat looking. I got on my phone and found a photo of the headstone and picked some identifying features around it so I could try and spot those. After a few minutes I found a tree with three trunks and sure enough right under it – there she was!

Judging by the pennies, and mint I’d say she’s well visited! I see in other pictures of her headstone that there used to be flowers but when I visited there were none. I’d like to go plant some soon!

I wonder how I went so long without knowing how close I was to something so neat! I went to the book store afterwards and grabbed a big stack of books about strange things in Ohio to plot some trips to make in the future. I’m so excited to visit all the other awesome things I didn’t even know that my state housed.
xoxo

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I'm Kaylah! Renovating a 150-year-old home in Northeast Ohio. Likely found in my garden.

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THE DAINTY SQUID
  • blog
    • all the posts!
    • stroup mansion
    • some of my favorite posts
    • plants + gardening
    • beauty, fashion + hair
    • reviews
    • window shopping
    • explore everywhere
  • about me
  • contact
  • shop