#5: [21-Nov-10]

#4: [31-Jul-05]

#3: [28-Sep-03]

#2: [13-Sep-01]

#1: [10-Jun-00]

08-Jun-2024 -- As I had just completed the University consortium for Geographic Information Sciences symposium at The Ohio State University, and as the focus was on the Earth, climate, education, and geotechnologies, a confluence visit seemed like the perfect capstone. Plus, eastern Ohio is where the public land survey system for the USA began, as detailed in Linklater's book entitled The Measuring of America. I highly recommend that book.

Hence the day after the conference ended saw me aiming northwestward from eastern Ohio, toward 41 North 83 West, after having successfully visited 40 North 82 West and then to 40 North 81 West that same morning. I needed to eventually head southwest to the Geotech Center Community College GIS conference, down in Louisville Kentucky. However, heading to 41 North 83 West was, to a geographer, a slight detour, although in the exact opposite direction. But it was for a worthy cause: Meeting a friend and getting into the field!

After seeing many wonderful rural towns, fields, cemeteries, and rivers, I arrived in Tiffin and met my friend Wendy. En route to the confluence point we had a very nice tour of the town of Tiffin Ohio thanks to Wendy's extensive knowledge of and passion for the town. Wendy had done a reconnaissance of the confluence point the day before, so ably directed us down the correct roads as we stair-stepped to the southeast. The terrain here is quite flat, as we are on the edge of the Black Swamp region (a glacially fed wetland) of northwest Ohio. We drove east on E Township Road 44 and then south on Detweiler-Lenter Road. I was surprised these roads were all paved, unlike most section line roads, and they were also only a single lane wide. Another interesting geographic note is that the section lines here are slightly off-set from the true cardinal directions, but as I have observed in other essays I have written, one has to admire those 19th Century surveyors for coming so close and being so accurate, all without GPS or modern surveying equipment. They really knew their mathematics and geodesy and were diligent about accuracy.

We parked as far off the north-south 1 lane road as possible, even though there was nobody around, and set off hiking in the field to the west. We skirted its north side in case something was planted there. We walked south along the edge of the woods and took photos in case we had no GPS signal once we were in the trees. However, after taking the forest plunge, we found that the forest was thin enough that a short time later, we were able to zero out the GPS units.

The confluence lies on flat ground, marshy in places, with trees spaced about 10 feet apart in most places. It was mid-afternoon in late spring, temperature around 85 F under mild breezes and partly sunny skies. The view was relatively the same in all directions, so we took some additional photos of the field to the east, and the section line road.

As always, I thought about the indigenous population trekking through this area for centuries, and they along with settlers past and present that are the land's stewards. This area definitely experiences all four seasons, and today was a very pleasant day. Over the past quarter century, I have visited 41 North from Wyoming on the west to New Jersey on the east. I have also visited 83 West from this point in Ohio on the north end, to nearly getting stuck in the mud in Georgia on the south end. With this point, I have visited nearly all the points in Ohio: I am just missing a few including the one that requires permission to visit in the southern side of the state, two degrees south of here. Given the ease of accessing this point, it seemed amazing that this point had not been visited in 14 years, except by local squirrels, skunks, and perhaps the landowner. However, its ease of visiting does have an indication: That this was the 6th visit to the site. We took photos and I posted a video here: 41 North 83 West.

After feeling centered for about 15 minutes, we hiked out the way we came in, discussing all things geography and history. Afterwards, we had an another tour of Tiffin and its two beautiful college campuses. We parted ways and it was a great opportunity and field experience for two friends.