Reminiscing with the Mothman

Winter has settled in with its icy temperatures here on Long Island. There hasn’t been any riding for me in many, many weeks now. For the most part, I haven’t missed it. I suppose the love for it is a state of mind more than anything else. I’ve been keeping myself occupied with other things instead.

While I haven’t done much exploring lately, I do have a million photos and 10’s of thousands of miles in exploration to fall back on. I figure maybe it’s time to blow the dust off of some of them.

The Mothman of Point Pleasant, West Virginia

This afternoon, I found myself watching The Mothman Prophecies for the millionth time. It was never well received critically, but nevertheless l love the movie. It has some conceptual thread that runs through it which makes me unable to turn away when I come across it.

Maybe it’s the idea of a harbinger of news; that there is something that “knows” more that we do. But when it comes down to it, would I want to know the future? If it were only the good stuff? Maybe.

John Klein: “What do you look like?”
Indrid Cold: “It depends who’s looking.”

Seeing the Mothman would likely make me shit my pants.

Alexander Leek:
“The nocturnal butterfly. In ancient cultures, the moth represents a form of the psyche, or the soul immortally trapped in the hellish death realms”. Mothman. Well, that’s what the Ukrainians called him. Rough translation of course. There were a hundred sightings in Chernobyl when the nuclear pump went down. Galveston, nineteen sixty-nine, just before the hurricane. They saw it. But seeing isn’t always believing.

The Mothman – Point Pleasant Legend

In the last decade I found myself in the town of Point Pleasant, West Virginia – the real life town on which the move was centered – a couple of times. In the 1960s, there were many sightings on the Mothman in the area preceding the collapse of the Silver Bridge. Legend has it that the Mothman was a harbinger of that tragedy.

Point Pleasant has embraced their most popular cryptid with not only a museum and statue, but also a festival celebrating all thing Mothman.

The Avalon Motor Inn

If you’ve ever watched the movie The Mothman Prophecies, then you will recall how the Avalon Motor Inn featured prominently. Though the plot was a fictionalized version of real events, it still may be a surprise for you to find that the motel is nearly 200 miles away from the town of Point Pleasant, West Virginia.

The Avalon Motor Inn sits along the I-70 in the town of Eighty Four, Pennsylvania. Google Maps currently shows the location as permanently closed. This piece of movie history with its distinctive blue sign may not be long for this world.

Being able to explore on a motorcycle has been such a blessing in my life. Finding myself in small town, taking in unusual sights and sipping at a cup of Americana has been an incredible education about people and life.