It’s ironic to me that we call places with no cell service “dead zones.” Oftentimes, these places are rural or wild areas far away from blocks upon blocks of concrete, steel, and consumerism. If it’s a place full of nature, how can we call that place “dead” when in fact, more species can thrive there than in any city? If it’s a rural neighborhood, could we consider the fact that existing with less might make more room for life?
Sunrise on a mountainside.
I just loved how the warm light spilled over the forest floor.
The sun touching the trees for the first time that day.
I had never heard of Green Bank, West Virginia until a few months ago when my friend Rachel decided to move there. It’s located at the heart of a dead zone so large and important that it has an official name: the National Radio Quiet Zone (NQRZ). Against a gorgeous backdrop of Blue Ridge Mountains and Allegheny Highlands, 13,000 square miles sit quiet with hardly any cell phone service and limited areas of wi-fi. There are restrictions in place across the entire zone, but the strictest orders are observed at the NQRZ core where the Green Bank Observatory is located.
Rachel’s brother had sent her flowers for Valentine’s Day.
Look out from Rachel’s living room and you’ll see her neighbor’s house.
The Green Bank Observatory (GBO), an astronomy research hub, is home to seven large radio frequency telescopes - one of which is the world’s largest fully-steerable radio telescope. They look kind of like huge satellite dishes, except they can receive information from nearly the other side of the universe. Within a 20-mile radius of the GBO, there is zero cell phone service, no wi-fi networks, no bluetooth, or even any microwaves allowed. All of the restrictions are in place to prevent errant signals from contaminating the telescope’s data readings. In fact, the telescopes are so sensitive to digital frequencies that if you are near enough to take a close-up photos, you can only do so with a film camera.
Rachel had landed an apprenticeship position at the GBO, and would be moving there for at least a three-month period. She and I share a love of the outdoors, and having never explored the mountains of West Virginia, I knew I had to visit her to see the trails and learn more about the GBO.
Ice patterns on a hike in Dolly Sods.
So, there’s no such thing as time travel. Fair enough. But, I am now convinced that it’s possible to travel to a place today that exists in the past. Green Bank is a tiny town with a population of 143. Operating pay phones get frequent use there. Rachel’s house, a two-minute drive from the GBO, had ethernet cables all over the place. She took me on a tour of the cryogenics lab where she worked and there were landline telephones at each station and piles of old keyboards that make those satisfying clickety-clack noises when you type. Many of the facilities had been build decades ago, and I felt like I’d stepped back into the eighties.
I was there only for a weekend, but not being able to scroll through Instagram or text my friends and family really helped me soak up the experience more than I believe I would have with those distractions. We visited a farm to see a maple syrup demonstration, drove miles and miles to tiny nearby towns for coffee and burritos, and stayed out in the cold to stare at the night sky crowded with stars. I feel lucky to have been born early enough to have a childhood without smartphones and tablets, and I kept wondering what it would be like to step back into that life.
Aside from seeing what few sights were available, we spent most of our time outside on the trails. I absolutely loved the available hikes in Pocahontas County. I visited in February, and since many of the places we explored were thousands of feet above sea level, there was still some snow and ice. The creeks were delightfully frigid and we marveled at the interesting patterns the ice had created. We walked through tunnels of evergreen trees, and it was a comforting reminder of the pines that blanket my home state of Maine. More than anything though, the radio silence combined with the low population to amplify the space that abides there. It was so peaceful. So still. That tiny, tiny glimpse of a simpler life made me feel lighter and heavier all at once.