Highpoint #17: Campbell Hill, OH (1549')

I spent the night of the 17th in a motel in Dayton, just across the Indiana-Ohio line. I’d driven over 400 miles to get there from Missouri, and I had another 500 still to go to reach Virginia—a long day’s drive, even for me. If I’d hit the road first thing in the morning, I might have made it home in time for dinner. But I had one more stop: the high point of Ohio.

I pulled off I-70 once again at Springfield and shot up US-68 to Bellefontaine. Under clear morning skies, the town lived up to the charm of its name. I passed a lively business district and climbed through neat neighborhoods, ascending the gradient to the Hi-Point Career Center. No, I wasn’t planning to renounce my peripatetic, writerly life in exchange for technical education and a 9-to-5; this vocational school was the pinnacle of Ohio.

I drove straight through their gates and followed my eyes to the tallest rise on campus: Campbell Hill. There was a bus lot right below the hill. I parked to the side of it, then hopped out into a lovely alpine meadow…

...of a sort.