Flight of 5

We had made the decision to jog south to Atlanta after our time in the Great Smoky Mountains based on two main draws.  First, we have several friends from our Navy days who live in the greater Atlanta’s area and, second, the busy airport makes a commute for Flight fairly reasonable. After deciding we’d be in Atlanta, we took a look at all we could do there and our schedules were immediately packed.

Because Flight had a work trip starting only two days after we arrived and the weather threatened thunderstorms (and wicked heat) the rest of our visit time, our first day at the Holiday Harbor RV Park in Acworth, GA, centered on being on Lake Allatoona.  Flight rented a pontoon boat, suitable for towing our gaggle about on a tube, and beached it right at our campsite so we could load our gear before getting out on the water in earnest.

Surprisingly, although maybe it wouldn’t have been so had I spent any time looking at a map, Lake Allatoona is relatively enormous.  We spent the first stretch of our boat rental period checking out the nearby nooks and inlets of this expansive waterway.  And then the kids got serious about tubing.

Not at all surprisingly, Keeper and WoodSprite were the first to volunteer to get on The Big Shot tube. Firebolt wanted no part of it. After watching her brother and sister have so much fun, they convinced her to give it a shot.  Her counteroffer was she’d get in the tube and make the call to actually tube from there.  Flight, unaware of Firebolt’s ongoing negotiation tactics thought she was all in and let the tube drift behind the boat to resume tubing operations. Firebolt panicked and, despite her siblings’ gracious attempts to assuage her concerns, rallied to near hysterics.

Flight pulled the tube back in so Firebolt could frantically disembark.  I gathered a shaken and tear-stained Firebolt onto my lap and immediately did some Chinese Medicine triage.  Suspecting there was an energetic block between Firebolt’s kidney and pericardium systems (you can learn more about what that means in my Acupuncture 101 summary here), which tends to manifest as excessive fear, I helped her clear this block with a short breathing exercise and within two minutes she was calm and willing to entertain going tubing for real.  Meanwhile, Keeper and WoodSprite got another turn.

All three kids rode together for a stretch.

Then the girls went without Keeper, because he wanted to do some boat yoga.

Impressed by his subconscious gentle bow, I asked Keeper what he was doing and he said, “I don’t really know.”

We anchored and enjoyed a swim call and some snacks before we got back to the serious business of tubing.

And for the final event, Firebolt went all by herself.

A few things struck me about our day on the water.  First, I was delighted to see that Firebolt totally rallied.  For a child as stubborn as her parents, she was able to accept some direction and move through her fear to take advantage of a great time. Second, I was most impressed by the behavior of Keeper and WoodSprite.  Clearly, they had no issues getting into a small, round, plastic, bottomed donut and being slingshot about Allatoona Lake. In fact, they thought it was great fun.  What was particularly heartwarming was their compassion for their sister as her initial trepidation ramped up to near debilitating.  They were both kind and empathetic, telling Firebolt how much fun they had tubing and how much more they’d enjoy it if she came along.  Never did our kids express any heckling, ribbing, or mockery (I’m not sure how they’re the offspring of two naval aviators who eat, sleep, and breathe accompanied by such antics…). Instead, they gently and lovingly encouraged their sister to participate in some good fun.   Our lovely afternoon on the water came to a close and Flight made some of his famous Sausage and Kale Pasta.  All in all, it was a glorious day.

After an exciting (simulated) day of laundry and homeschool tasks, we got ready to head to our former squadron mate and friends’ house.  We hadn’t seen them in ages and were stoked to carve out some visit time. The kids disappeared to a local park shortly after we arrived and we were able to catch up with Inigo and his lovely bride uninterrupted by children.  One of the things both Flight and I observed was that in the years since we last saw Inigo and his crew, we have grown to walk paths very similar to theirs. Sadly, we were too busy catching up that we neglected to take a picture, but vowed we wouldn’t let another 18 years lapse before our next get together.

The next day was more of the same with homeschool activities and torrential downpours, but I took advantage of Flight’s being in town and made the opportunity to meet up with another dear friend whom I have known for more years than I’d prefer to count.  To give you an idea on our friendship’s vintage, we first bonded in French class at the Naval Academy and have been fast friends ever since.  A remarkable woman, she was first a Surface Warfare Officer upon graduation and commissioning and has since completed a joint program at Emery where she earned both her Law Degree and a Master of Divinity in only five years.  No slouch, that one…

In addition to practicing law, she has recently become an Episcopal Priest and is very active in her church’s outreach to those impacted by the current administration’s take on immigration law, especially those affected through no choice of their own. Although we had only a short visit sandwiched in between work and parenting obligations, it was incredibly uplifting and I remain hopeful that our professional paths may converge in the future.  I returned to our family refreshed, my soul nourished, and the Subaru full of goods hailing from Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods.  And Flight welcomed me back with a new InstantPot creation of pork ragout – he totally rocks.

We dropped Flight off at the airport the following morning and focused our studies on a day heavy on Human and Civil Rights.  You can read more about that awesome and powerful outing here.

We had a weekend without Flight and I looked to the weather forecast to help us decide how we would schedule our remaining time in Hotlanta.  High on my list of priorities was to see nearby Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield.  As I explained to our kids, on our travels thus far we’ve had a great opportunity to learn about the colonization of our country by various nations that ultimately led to our declaring our independence from England and establishing our own identity.  We had also learned a considerable amount about the Civil War, evaluating the significance of places like Fort Pickens and Fort Sumter in that conflict, yet we hadn’t seen any of the National Battlefields.  Before we made our way west again, I thought it important for us to see a couple of these sites to better understand the nitty-gritty details of life in the trenches of that particular war.

Nearby to the Holiday Harbor RV Park is the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield.  Sunday threatened more reasonable weather, so we took Saturday to chill after the previous day’s heavy topics.  After lunch on Sunday, we trundled into the Subaru and headed for Kennesaw Mountain.

Just as we arrived, we learned there was a firing demonstration getting underway outside. As we zipped through the Visitor Center, we slowed momentarily to collect Junior Ranger Books for WoodSprite and Firebolt before vectoring outside to get a good seat.  A lone Confederate Soldier (he assured us he switched to wearing Blue on alternating days) walked us through standard riffle drill for that time period.  He then demonstrated firing, reloading, and firing again.  Holy cow did that take an inordinately long time – I can’t imagine having to rely on that painstaking ritual to separate me from an untimely death.

After heading watching the demonstration, which I hope Keeper will blog about as he got some great footage, we headed into the Museum and learned what it was like to be a soldier on both sides, some fibbing about their ages and enlisting as young as 8 to be drummers (11 was the recommended age).  I couldn’t imagine sending Keeper off to war and belatedly realized that such a practice has been done as long as humans have been in conflict, which is pretty much since we starting walking upright.  But I digress…

After the Museum, our Junior Ranger hopefuls needed to accomplish one of the local hikes and make some observations along their trek before they could hand in there booklets. We picked the least lengthy hike because we would turn into pumpkins in short order.  The Visitor Center was closing at 5 pm, which meant we had 49 minutes or less to complete the hike.  The girls took their tasking seriously and stopped along the way only to write answers to their questions.

 

I took this picture for our niece who develops a reaction to Poison Oak if she walks by and sees it. Yikes.

She wasn’t terribly appreciative…

After reading about the battle raging through in these woods, it was easy to envision young men hunkering down amidst the haphazard boulders, courage outpacing fear, as they exchanged volleys in the brutal heat.  While I was escorting the girls through the museum, Keeper had been tasked with watching the NPS film.  He rejoined us to report what he had learned.  It had been so hot in late June and early July of 1864 that both the Union and Confederate Forces agreed to hit pause on the war fighting and take time out to bury their respective dead as the stench of decomposing bodies was too overpowering.  Gross. But good on them for making warfare less offensive (?!).

When the Junior Rangers were sworn in, the Rangers really surprised us.

We had let them know we were dashing out to do a hike and would be back with completed booklets just shy of 5 pm.  They went over the top and, after swearing in the girls, gave them each a swag bag of NPS goodies to include a stuffed bison, pencils, tattoos, and, of course, their new badges.  They’re running a great outfit there – totally over the top!

Equally over the top was our family’s very own reenactment, titled “Fire in the HOLE!”

Flight joined us late that night (gotta love Uber!) and we made preparations to get underway, bound for the Land Between the Lakes, which is a little peninsula spanning Southeastern Kentucky and Tennessee between, you guessed it, two lakes.  Never heard of it?  Me neither – can’t wait to check it out…

She was lookin’ for a soul to…

Nah, gonna punt on that one, there’s nothing devilish about Davista.  Yet.

Unfortunately for me, Atlanta was one of those destinations that I didn’t see much of, due to its easily commutable airport which allowed me to fly a relatively long trip.  I need to remind myself on occasion, when I’m becoming frustrated by the fact that I miss a significant chunk of this adventure due to needing to work, that my having this job is basically THE thing that has allowed us even to consider traveling in the first place.  Short of extreme telecommuting or being independently wealthy, it’s difficult to imagine a profession more suited to this lifestyle, where I’m able to “go to work” from pretty much anywhere, as long as there is an airport with some scheduled service nearby.  So yeah, I missed most of Atlanta, and in fact never made it into the city proper (save for the airport, which is its own city in a way).

The drive down from Great Smoky Mountain National Park was another stunner though.  It passes through Nantahala Forest, which is essentially the far western tip of North Carolina.  Our road followed the Nantahala River, which cuts a fairly deep gorge through the hills, and is a white water rafting paradise.  I would return in a heartbeat.  In fact, despite my fairly lukewarm assessment of Great Smoky Mountain National Park in my last post, I’m realizing that this entire area of the country – by which I mean basically the southern Appalachians, to include parts of Tennessee, Georgia, and North Carolina – is pretty amazing and worth more exploration.

Atlanta is not the best place to park a motor home, at least not within the city limits.  We did find a military base in Marietta, northwest of the city, but they were full.  And there really wasn’t much of anything nearer to downtown, at least not where I felt comfortable leaving my family for almost a week.  Which led us to Lake Allatoona up in the northwest, about 45 minutes out of town.

This is another fairly unique feature of that part of the country – massive lakes (reservoirs, actually) which are quite narrow, but long and winding, extending thousands of watery fingers into the little valleys.  There are dozens of these lakes (probably more like hundreds), and the houseboating opportunities are endless.  Pontoon boats, too.  You don’t really see pontoon boats in the West, but out there they are the water conveyance of choice, and for good reason.

Our Lake Allatoona campsite was lakeside (and incidentally, we had at least a dozen campgrounds from which to choose up there), and we decided that a day on the lake in a rental pontoon boat would be the best use of our time, at least for a day.

Great call, despite the weather only marginally cooperating.  Hot and sticky with thunderstorms is the summer pattern in the South, and it’s just beginning to take hold.  But the rain managed to hold off for most of the day, and frequent jumps into the comfortably cool water took the edge off of any heat.  I had never previously imagined being able to tow a tube with a pontoon boat, but I was assured by the folks at the marina that it’s SOP.   I was also told that the boat would do 50 mph over the water, even towing a tuber.  That claim I regarded with deep skepticism, but nodded and smiled anyway.  It turned out that by “50” she meant “about 15-20.”  Which was a bit slow for the really fun kind of tubing where you bounce off waves and flop around like a rag doll, but probably just about right for our kids, or at least the younger ones.  Actually what she (the marina worker) did was confuse RPMs for MPH, which I clarified with her afterwards.  All good, we had a blast and got to explore a gorgeous piece of Georgia from the water.

Check out this guy…

He was one of quite a few unique ducks/ducklings/geese/goslings who inhabited our campground.  I guess technically it’s theirs, and we’re the interlopers.  Anyway, he liked to hang out underneath Davista and then waddle over near my feet when I would sit down.  I wasn’t sure why until I brought my breakfast bar and coffee with me outside to sit and enjoy the morning with.  Seeing what he had evidently been waiting for, he made an aggressive play for the breakfast bar, which I was only able to narrowly keep out of his beak.  He almost ended up in my lap in his attempt to take what he clearly thought was his rightful breakfast.

The other highlight, and really my only experience in Georgia, was a visit with some old squadron friends whom we hadn’t seen since we left the squadron back in 1999 (2000 for TACCO).  They live in a lovely suburb and have two brilliant sons, one of whom is nearing college application time and likely Ivy League or Stanford-bound.  He (my squadron bud) and I, when we first met, had squadron jobs that required us to spend far too much time in a windowless, secure, vault-like room with not much to do other than verbally spar, an undertaking in which he excelled.  We would argue politics (squadron, national, and world) and fiscal policy, quote movies, but mostly we would just talk smack.  He was both better at it than I was and more inclined to just sit and chat, whereas I tended to be engrossed in studying for my progress through the squadron’s plane commander syllabus.  It was fun, though, and I wish I would’ve engaged more, because we had quite a few non-obvious things in common and could’ve become much closer friends through the process, rather than the kind who have a great mutual respect but don’t see each other for 19 years.  I think this is something we both recognize, and we have found it interesting to watch, aided by the tangential contact of social media, our worldviews converge as we grow older.  We’ve become very like-minded and share a somewhat unique combination of introversion and extroversion.  Though being an avid runner, mountain biker, and vegan, he’s in far better physical shape than I, despite having a few years on me.

It really is a shame we can’t hang out more.

Despite his dietary habits, he smoked an absolutely mouthwatering (and enormous) filet of salmon, which he informed us had been termed “My Magic Fish” for our family dinner.  We even had leftovers, which we ate for a few days.  The kids played together in a nearby park and the four of us got to spend a bit of time catching up and reminiscing.  It was over far too quickly, as those types of things always are, but having almost missed Atlanta altogether, I was incredibly grateful that we carved out the time to see them, and hope we’re able to do so again, maybe out West.  We have some mountain biking to do!

From here we head west in earnest, and there are several options on the table for how to do so.  Essentially we need to get to Colorado in time for my next trip, and can take several routes to get there, all of which have much to offer.  We’ve been debating a southern route that takes us through Hot Springs, AR.  And then there’s a northern route that involves a stop in St. Louis to see the Gateway Arch.  But the front runner has us more or less splitting the difference and heading to visit more old squadron friends in Cuba, Missouri, at the northern edge of the Ozarks, which is an area of the country I’ve never seen but would very much like to.  Unfortunately that will require blowing through Tennessee, which was not my initial intent – much to see there as well.  But we have to pick and choose.

My sciatica is becoming more of a factor as well.  Driving more than a few hours is getting excruciating, and only laying down affords me relief.  Ibuprofen keeps it palatable if I know I’ll need to sit, but I really don’t like to ride painkillers if I can avoid it.  Flying (for work) is a concern as well, but I found on my last trip that I could keep it at bay by moving around more and standing up on occasion, options that driving Davista doesn’t give me.  My hope is that I’ll be able to get ahead of it before long – we still have quite a bit of road ahead of us.

I had the privilege of attending most of Elementary School and Junior High at the Martin Luther King, Junior, Experimental Laboratory School (King Lab for short) and it was extraordinary.  The picture below is from last June when my sister and I took a trip down amnesia lane.

The school has gone through several name changes since I was a pupil there, but the focus remains the same.  “Experimental” in the title meant this school was one that cultivated an environment of learning outside the proverbial box, however you wanted to define that.  As Dr. King had promoted, it was an educational experience that encouraged such thinking and centered on celebrating the character of a person as opposed to any physical characteristic she or he might have.  My school routinely celebrated its namesake’s powerful legacy and Dr. King has since been one of my heroes.   King Lab made a huge impression on the woman I am still becoming and it was a timely opportunity to allow me to revisit that which I learned so young, but can now better evaluate with an additional 30+ years of living.

After dropping Flight off at the airport for another work trip, the kids and I headed to the heart of downtown Atlanta to pay homage to this incredible man, although our discussions about Dr. King’s contributions started long before our current pilgrimage. Most recently while we were overwintering in Maryland and before the girls resumed school at the local Elementary School, I took the kids to see Ford’s Theater and the Petersen House across the street where President Lincoln died.  Unfortunately, the theater was closed to visitors, as a play was opening a few days later, and the Petersen House was being refurbished.  Bummer.

 

We still made the most of the visit and spent a good bit of time in the two museums on site as our Junior Rangers tackled their work.  The first museum is situated beneath Ford’s Theater and has a robust series of exhibits on the Civil War, President Lincoln’s role in the War of Northern Aggression (Sorry, I’m writing this post while still in the deep south), and the conspiracy to eliminate not just the Commander in Chief, but several others who sought to preserve the Union at all costs.

 

The second museum is next to the Petersen House on the second and third floors above the site’s gift shop.  On that brisk January day next to the Petersen House, we watched a short film on the Lincoln Memorial. I hadn’t realized how many influential talks, ones that have specifically served to mold our nation’s evolving identity, first echoed from the steps of this monument to freedom.  My favorite of these is Dr. King’s I Have a Dream speech and the film showed several clips of his powerful words, which, to the surprise (but not yet embarrassment) of each of my children, reduced me to tears.

Every January at King Lab, we honored Dr. King’s work in an assembly near his birthday, the center point of which was a classmate’s (a fellow who, hardly incidentally, is now a successful stage actor in Chicago) brilliant delivery of that very speech.  Every time I heard this rendition, usually as a precursor to the 3^rdand 4^thgraders singing, “We Shall Overcome,” I was overcome.  My compelling reaction to Dr. King’s exceptional words has only grown in response to what I have experienced along my own journey, combined with the realization of how much more similar work there is left to do in the world.

Fast forward to yesterday. When we decided we were going to spend a stretch in Atlanta, I was eager to take in both the Martin Luther King, Junior, National Historic Site and, only minutes away, the Center for Civil and Human Rights.  Flight’s early departure meant we were available to start our field trip day just after 9 am.  Since the Center didn’t open until 10, we started at the National Park Service Visitor Center.

Even before picking up the Junior Ranger books for the girls, we went into the theater to see a 30-minute film on Dr. King’s contributions.  There were a few things about Dr. King that really stuck with me this go around, now that I have a few decades more perspective.  First, I hadn’t realized that Dr. King, at 35, was the youngest Nobel Peace Prize winner.  Ever.  I momentarily reflected on what I had managed by that age (never mind having passed that milestone by more than a couple years) and realized I’d better get busy. I also remember reading at some point that Dr. King had studied Mahatma Gandhi’s nonviolent approach to solving problems, but I didn’t know that he and his wife, Mrs. Coretta Scott King (a dynamo in her own right), went to India for a month to study Gandhi’s unconventional methods so they could return to the United States to implement and affect similar sweeping changes.  Finally, I had somehow forgotten that Dr. King was only 39 when he was assassinated in Memphis. After being so reminded, I was momentarily caught up imagining how much faster our society might have evolved had his life not been cut so short – and how might Dr. King have helped us to better navigate today?

Ignoring my preoccupation with my musings, our Junior Rangers wasted no time at getting to work and meandered their way through the museum to complete their activities.  My favorite page of their activity book first gave more history on the newer properties that have been added to commemorate the Civil Rights Movement of the ‘50s and ‘60s (one of which we’ll see next week when we drive through Topeka) and then moved to open Junior Ranger awareness about other civil rights struggles in our nation.  The five follow on questions asked about different parks that honor some of these trials: the Mormon Pioneer National Historic Trail ranging from Illinois to Utah in the 1800s; Independence Hall in Philadelphia; the Women’s Rights National Historical Park; Manzanar National Historic Site to teach about the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII; and the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail to educate on the relocation of the Cherokee people from the Appalachians to Oklahoma in the late 1830s.  This activity provided a great opening for a discussion on the unfortunate habit humans have of turning everything into “us vs. them” posturing (the sociology term is “othering”) and how a lot of heartache and suffering here and across the globe has followed in its wake.

From the Visitor’s Center we went to the bookstore located next to Dr. King’s birth home.  It was only a block away from the Ebenezer Baptist Church where both he and his father had preached.  As we walked over to the church, we passed The Martin Luther King, Junior, Center for Nonviolent Change (often referred to as “The King Center”), which holds the greatest collection of his written works, houses the crypt where Dr. King and his wife are interred above a reflecting pool, and endeavors to remind the world of his legacy.  Sensing our children were short on attention and long on grumbling bellies, we opted not to go inside The King Center and stayed only a few minutes in the church before swearing in our Junior Rangers and heading to the car.

 

I thought we should drive to the Center for Civil and Human Rights, park (should be easy, right?), and find a nearby place to grab some grub.  My game plan was good in theory and, unlike other brilliant plans I have had along this journey, this one, despite my best efforts to almost unsuccessfully navigate a honeycomb of one-way streets, did not go horribly wrong. We found a parking garage common to the Aquarium, the World of Coca Cola, and our destination.  Perfect!  And, wait for it, a fabulous brunch place was right across the street. I was so hungry I didn’t manage to take a picture, but found this one online.

At the Atlanta Breakfast Club, Keeper ordered the Peach Cobbler French Toast, Firebolt the Buttermilk Pancakes and bacon (the older two were going to share both dishes, although Keeper almost backed out of the agreement when caught sight of his order), and WoodSprite jumped on some French Toast and a side of bacon.  I was the only one who ordered something that didn’t resemble dessert breakfast and happily scarfed down my seafood gumbo on a bed of grits, as I knew this flight of Yanks would be heading west next week and that variety of hominy goodness would soon be scarce.

Delightfully full, but thankfully nowhere near food coma, we walked over to the Center for Civil and Human Rights.

The Center’s space is divided into three main areas that are housed on separate floors. Although it was just a 33% chance, we started on the top floor and worked our way down to the basement, which was absolutely the way to go.  The second floor houses the exhibit on global human rights and it is brilliantly done. The entry passageway is lined with mirrored panels, each of which is an interactive touch screen allowing the viewer to see and hear the stories of people who have escaped persecution for being different.  Along one wall of the exhibit’s main room is a collection of the most notorious mass murderers in humankind’s recent history, some of whom are dead, some serving sentences, and some are still at large.  When I saw those chosen for the gallery, I couldn’t help but think of Eddie Izzard’s assessment of these heinous characters in Dress to Kill.  If you haven’t seen his show, he’s a genius.

The ground floor of the Center focused on the civil rights struggles in our nation, much of which was focused on Dr. King’s work.  The most impactful exhibit we saw was along a mock-up of a 1950s diner countertop. There were four barstools at the counter and one lower space that could accommodate a wheel chair.  At each barstool’s place setting was  a pair of handprints, an accompanying headset, and a digital clock timer on the wall behind the counter.  For the full experience, you don the headset, place your hands on the handprints in front of you, close your eyes, and see how long you can withstand the vicious hateful voices calling you names, taunting and threatening you.  The whole experience goes no longer than three minutes, which I made it through, yet it made me sick to my stomach.  The gentlemen who participated in the famed sit-ins simulated by this exhibit were subjected to that abuse and far worse for eight hours a day, everyday, as they so nonviolently protested.  Although the girls really wanted to listen to the headsets, Keeper was the only one I allowed to try this experience on and he made it to 1:07 before taking off his headset and saying, “I am so angry with humankind right now.”   Amen, my son.

Feeling that we were nearing the end of our collective attention tether, we quickly passed through the basement floor, which housed only a small collection of Dr. King’s written works.  While I would have enjoyed staying longer to read every page, I didn’t need the escalating game of tag around me to tell me we were only moments away from a meltdown of some variety and hastily shuffled everyone out the door and back to the car. It took over an hour to drive the 33 miles back to Davista in Atlanta’s famed rush hour traffic, so we broke up our commute through gridlock with a stop at a Redbox to procure some light-hearted fun and a grocery store for some cheese cloth (Stay tuned, we’ll be making goat cheese this weekend!).

I was rather subdued after we left the Center, consumed by the mostly self-induced plight of the world weighing heavily on me.  I could not get my brain wrapped around how humankind can be so cruel to one another. I just don’t get it.  Fortunately the kids were entertaining themselves on the stop-and-go drive back as I was preoccupied by processing all that I had taken in. Yes, humans are flawed and are capable of unspeakable atrocities, many of which result from and perpetuate the cycle of fear and abuse, yet we are also capable of profound love and selfless action.  I remembered the portrait wall at the Center showcasing such models of character, hanging on the wall opposite mass murderers row, and how each worked tirelessly to better the human condition.

Dr. King’s portrait hangs near that of Mahatma Gandhi, another of my heroes.  I stole a glance at Keeper in the passenger seat, now engrossed in yet another youtube science video, but who had earlier been outraged at the sit-in counter experience.  I then caught sight of the girls in the rear view mirror, giggling with heads bent close over the only functional Kindle in the car, both of whom had expressed great indignation upon learning of the unkind treatment of fellow human beings just for being different.  Gandhi’s quote, “Be the change you wish to see in the world” kept echoing in my thoughts and after again surveying our future, cautiously optimistic, I wondered, “But will it be enough?”

Overcome by this heavy day, I was thankful to escape to the light-hearted kindness of Paddington 2 for our movie night.  When I crawled into bed, I silently prayed that the seeds that we have planted and are nurturing will grow to make a stand against whatever inequalities our children encounter, and may those be far fewer as we progress to become truly free at last.

Had you asked me before our trip which was the most visited national park in the country, I would have stalled with “that’s a really good question,” and then mentally shuffled through about a half dozen parks, trying to figure out which one would be the most popular and why.  Yellowstone and Yosemite would be in there, probably the Grand Canyon too.  And eventually I would’ve given the wrong answer, because I hadn’t even considered the actual most visited park, which is Great Smoky Mountains, spanning the border of eastern North Carolina and western Tennessee.

And here I thought I was pretty good with geography and stuff.

I can tell you that this surprised me, for several reasons, most of which I’ll hopefully flesh out in this post.  It also created some high and likely unfair expectations for our visit.  Having grown up with Yosemite, Sequoia, and the Grand Canyon, and having recently visited Yellowstone, Grand Teton, and Zion, I guess I subconsciously expected that sort of grandeur out of a park that was “number one” above those others.  When in truth I now suspect that its number one status has much more to do with ratio of people to national parks in that part of the country, combined with accessibility.

To be clear, it is a beautiful place.  The Appalachians in that region reach 6,000’-plus, and combined with the lushness of that area of the county, you get an incredible variety of biomes within a very small area, with the attendant diversity of flora and fauna.  Crystal clear streams are abundant, and seeing black bear wandering through the trees and lazily gnawing on berries is almost a certainty.  We saw and greatly appreciated all these things.  And yet after a few days, we decided that we’d seen much of what the park had to offer, and rejiggered our schedule to leave a day early for Atlanta.

First, though, the drive.  The Blue Ridge Parkway’s southern terminus is in the park, and it passes just south of Asheville, about two miles from where we camped.  We could easily have simply taken the Blue Ridge all the way from Asheville to GSM, and I was tempted to, just to say we had.  Fortunately I resisted that temptation though, as it would have at least doubled the driving time, and “easy” is not the proper adjective for driving a fully loaded motorhome towing a car though narrow, winding mountain roads for four hours.  I think the novelty would’ve worn off after about 45 minutes, and I’d have been left with four carsick family members and some shot nerves from all the precarious curves, drop-offs, and tunnels.  We took the highway instead, followed by a secondary road that brought us to the town of Cherokee, at the park’s southern border. 

While Cherokee is reservation land and has the bilingual signage to prove it (side note: have you ever seen written Cherokee??

It’s somehow more confusing than Chinese or Arabic or Hindi because at first glance it looks just close enough to something familiar to make you believe that you can, or should, be able to understand it.  But you can’t.  You definitely can’t.), the vast majority of the Cherokee people were driven out of the area in the early to mid 1800s.  The story of the Trail of Tears, which I had heretofore only had a vague knowledge of, was both heartbreaking and fascinating.  I was encouraged by Firebolt sharing both my view and my interest in the subject.  She has become an even more voracious reader on this trip, and one of her favorite stories of late tells about a fictional Native American girl who is separated from her friends and family but is able to, over many years, make her way back to them.  So reading tidbits of some actual stories really struck home with her.

I had tried to make reservations at the Smokemont campground, which is the main campground within the park on the North Carolina side.  Surprised to find that sites were not reservable until the week after we would be there, I steeled myself to scrap over the first-come-first-served sites with the throngs of visitors.  Wrong once again – as it turns out, there really is a significant off season in GSM and even with mid-May’s perfect weather, we had the campground more or less to ourselves.  We chose a site right across from the gurgling stream, in hopes that we’d be able to leave some of the windows open and have its sound lull us to sleep. 

The stream bed also made for a perfect wandering area, with the best skipping rocks I had ever seen.

The girls were less happy about the millipedes, but I thought they were cool.

We opted to drive up to the top of the park on our first full day, figuring we could do some hiking and see a bit more of what’s around.  It was my first real exposure to Appalachian terminology for some of the mountain features I had thought I was already familiar with.  “Balds” for instance.  There are quite a few “balds” on the tops of the mountains in GSM.  What I assumed they were were areas above the tree line.  Not so – they are treeless areas covered in grass, but they’re not technically too high to support tree growth.  I’ve read that there’s actually no consensus on why trees grow on some Appalachian peaks and not others, which is interesting.  I’d have thought that question would have a pretty straightforward answer.  “Domes” are another.  When we heard that we should visit Clingmans Dome, which is the highest point in the park, I pictured Yosemite’s granite behemoths.  At 6,643’ it’s pretty impressive, elevation-wise, at least for the eastern half of the country, but there was no granite to be seen up there, and not much to distinguish it from the other peaks in the area, other than a vaguely Jetsons-looking concrete observation tower at the top.

The view was nice, if not breathtaking, [Late edit: I just re-read Tacco’s post and saw that she did indeed call the view “breathtaking.”  I guess some breath was taken away, just not mine] with the interpretive signs describing what you’re seeing also devoting significant verbiage to air pollution and the likelihood that you wouldn’t be able to see things too far away because of it. 

We did, however, see a few black bears during the hike up and on the drive down.  Not quite as imposing (and traffic-clogging) as Yellowstone’s bison, but cool to see.

As the Appalachian Trail follows the spine of the mountains in GSM, which is incidentally also the Tennessee / North Carolina border, we figured we would hike a bit of it in search of a suitable picnic lunch area, just to say we did.  Again, not the most impressive trail we had seen.  It just sort of meandered through the trees a bit, with the occasional view of the other mountains.  It was a nice picnic though, and off we went back to our site.

The following day was also Mother’s Day, so Tacco had her choice of activities after the kiddos presented her with the gifts they had bought / made for her.

The weather took a turn toward summer heat as well, which is tricky when you’re dry camping (i.e. no hookups), since you need the generator running to fire up the air conditioner, and national parks in particular are quite strict on their generator policies.  Having just written that it strikes me as sounding ridiculously soft – “The horror!  We’re camping and we can’t run our a/c!” – but I have to remind you, and we often need to remind ourselves, that this is our home, not a weekend campsite, so we tend to cut ourselves a little slack when it comes to wanting some creature comforts.  Where I was going with that, though, is that with the hot and sticky creeping up, we decided to try to get into a river at some point during the day.

That translated to a waterfall hike just outside of nearby Bryson City (which is a very cool little town, incidentally), followed hopefully by a float down the Tuckasegee or Oconaluftee river.  Love those names.

The hike was short but sweet, other than Woodsprite’s getting stung by a bee.  Lots of flowers.  Tacco mentioned the wild boar stampede, that was an eye-opener, and a new experience for all of us.  We also got to see Juney Whank falls.  Juney Whank??  Hm.  OK.

Our floating plans began to morph as the hours of remaining daylight shrank and the now-familiar logistical challenges of river floating with only one small car reared their heads again.  We just weren’t familiar enough with the area to choose a good put-in and take-out, and I didn’t trust myself to hitchhike again.  Renting tubes and floating the creek below the waterfalls we had hiked to was another option, with several takers from among the locals… it appeared to be quite the popular weekend activity.  But once again the logistics proved daunting, at very best.  No good way to get 5 innertubes from a rental site to a creek put-in with only a fully loaded Subaru and no pump.  What we could use is a pickup truck.  Ah well.  So we settled for dipping our heads in the cool water and watching the tubers enjoy themselves instead, followed by some playtime in the stream just across from our campsite upon our return.

So yes, mixed feelings about Great Smoky Mountains NP, likely colored by high expectations brought on by the discovery of its extreme popularity.  We had a thoroughly pleasant visit.  And I bet it would be stunning in the Fall.  But it wasn’t enough to bring us back, I don’t think.  The kids seemed to agree.  It struck me as an excellent, and quite easy, long-weekend getaway for the millions and millions of folks in the South and on the Eastern Seaboard, but not the kind of place you would necessarily travel across the country to visit.

Unless, of course, you were living in a motorhome, in which case game on.

I had never been this deep into Appalachia before, nor had I ever seen The Great Smoky Mountains.  In fact, I had never even contemplated why these gentle (gentile?) mountains have this name. It turns out “Smoky” has nothing to do with the ever-vigilant bear who encourages us to prevent forest fires (that particular cub lived in New Mexico) as only the uninitiated might assume. Instead, the name comes from ubiquitous blue vapor that continuously escapes the thick layer of lush vegetation on these mountains.  Before the native Cherokee were forced to relocate to Oklahoma along the devastating Trail of Tears, they called this range “Shaconage” or “place of blue smoke.”

As we were driving about the countryside, I became very aware of the heavy influence of the Cherokee Nation along the North Carolina boundary of Great Smoky Mountain National Park. I have traveled far and wide through North Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, and Southeast Asia, and nowhere have I been so intrigued by a written language.  At first glance, I could not even establish a rhythm to the language and it was no surprise to learn that in WWI the Cherokee were enlisted to serve as our nations first “Code Talkers,” just as the Navajo had done so successfully in WWII.

Although it may seem entirely out of place, I think it’s important to give a quick homeschool update before I can get to a more extensive summary of that enterprise. While the girls have been ardently earning Junior Ranger Badges at all the National Park Service (NPS) sites we have visited, these exercises were well beneath Keeper’s attention and interest level.  To help him get the most out of our visits, I delved into the extensive curricula offerings on the NPS website that has by location and subject matter a wide array of options for “Teaching With Historic Places.”

Entirely applicable to our visit to the Great Smoky Mountains, Keeper spent a week doing readings and answering questions about the Trail of Tears.  In putting together this assignment, I learned that most but not all the Cherokee were forced to relocate west of the Mississippi.  The vibrant community in this neck of North Carolina is made up of either the descendants of those forced out to Oklahoma who then walked back to their homeland or those who were able to hang onto their property despite the land grab of the early 1800s.  I would have liked to spend more time exploring the nearby town of Cherokee, but our short stay didn’t allow for such an excursion. Next time.

The only real time I have spent along the Appalachian Trail was about a week over 20 years ago and I was entirely distracted by other goings on.  I had the privilege of attending SERE School in Brunswick, Maine, before reporting to my squadron in Whidbey Island, Washington.  Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape training teaches you to do exactly that.  After a few days of all-day lectures, you spend your first stretch of training learning how to live off the land.  Next you practice evading capture in hostile territory.  Then, even if you were able to stealthily avoid capture, they call “Ollie Ollie Oxen Free” (actually they ring a bell) and you have to report for capture.  Finally comes the trickiest part – learning how to resist interrogation as a prisoner of war (POW), all the while trying to plan an effective escape.

I had the privilege of doing SERE School in February.  Have you been to Maine?  It is absolutely beautiful.  Have you been to Maine in February?  It is still absolutely beautiful in February – it looks like an Ansel Adams winter wonderland – but the weather is very unforgiving.

It was 22^obelow zero our first night on the mountain and I remember crawling into my little self-made snow cave and praying that I might still be alive in the morning.  SERE School was, by far, the most valuable training I have ever had, I just pray I never have to use it.

While in the classroom portion of SERE School, we were instructed how to harvest berries, none of which would be in season until June (if memory serves, most of the red ones and all of the white ones will kill you), and to not eat snow, yellow or otherwise (you need to heat it up and turn it into water first or it will kill you). During training breaks we also heard some pretty entertaining stories of previous classes’ shenanigans and learned that, on occasion, hikers either finishing up or starting their long trek along the Appalachian Trail will stumble into the mock-up POW camp.  Having been deeply entrenched in that military experience, I cannot imagine what a rude awakening that might be for the average hiker.

It was these reminiscent thoughts that were keeping me entertained as we crisscrossed the Appalachian Trail during our first hike to Clingmans Dome and back.

On our trek to the observation tower we saw a sleuth of bears (betcha didn’t know that’s what more than one is called – I had to look it up), which you have to take my word for their presence in the brush.

The walk to the top of the observation tower was crowded (note to self, avoid the weekend crowds in the future…), but led to some breathtaking views.

I was surprised to see Cold Mountain listed among the peaks, a location made famous by a heart-wrenching movie made based on Charles Frazier’s historical novel.

After the 360^oview offered at the top of the tower, we ducked into the forest proper to follow the Appalachian Trail for a very modest distance to find a picnic spot.

As we meandered through the woods, I realized we were on a “Clingmans Dome Bypass” for folks who are hiking the Appalachian Trail in earnest and don’t want to be bothered by the throng of tourists.  We ran into a few such hikers looking none the worse for their travels and I thought of my cousin who has hiked both the Appalachian and the Pacific Crest Trails in their entirety, leaving only the Continental Divide to go before she earns the coveted Triple Crown title.  !!!  After a short stretch, we were happy to come across this beautiful setting for our lunch.

We returned to the car and were rewarded with another sleuth sighting when we wound our way down the mountain.

One last stop before returning to Davista was to check out Mingus Mill, a historic and still active grist mill.  Instead of using a water wheel to do the work, Mingus Mill uses a water-powered turbine that had diverted the flow of the river to harness its energy to grind grains.  At first glance, I had originally thought this was a rather inefficient planter outside, but quickly realized it was one of the original millstones.  !!!

With two of the major sites seen, we settled into Davista to enjoy dinner by the river.

The next morning dawned on Mother’s Day.  My family made a wonderful breakfast and we set out to explore another of the local hikes, and possibly float the falls’ source, Deep Creek.

Although we had our share of inertia getting away from Davista, the kids settled into the hike after minimal grumbling (it was Mother’s Day, after all) and we hit a potential snag in our plans.  WoodSprite was bitten by a nasty bug that left a ghastly welt in its wake.

As we loaded up the backpack departing the car, I had heard the Angel’s recommendation to be sure to bring our stash of lavender oil, which, shamefully, I disregarded.  Lavender oil is our go to for any bug bites as it immediately takes the sting away.   All I had on hand was Band-Aids and homemade lip balm.  After convincing a tear-stained WoodSprite that lip balm was merely peppermint salve for the lips, I was able to apply it to the sting site and, much to everyone’s relief, it mitigated the pain shortly thereafter.

While I was carrying and soothing a crying WoodSprite along the waterfall path, Flight told us all to stop and back up.  I had heard nothing but the shedding of tears, but when we paused heard several somethings stumbling through the nearby brush.  With yesterday’s sleuth sightings in mind, I had expected Papa, Mama, and Baby Bear to come lumbering into view.  Instead we were favored with a drove of wild boar dashing across the trail no more than ten yards ahead of us, including three wee piglets.

Distracted by the cute factor of wild piglets and the sting’s hold fading by the moment, WoodSprite was happy to walk on her own power.  Big brother, Keeper, took WoodSprite by the hand and helped her navigate the way ahead.  Almost as sweet as seeing wild squealing piglets dashing through the woods…

At last we found what Flight had been seeking throughout our waterfall hike, a suitable place from which he could dunk his head in the stream.

I don’t get it, but Keeper and WoodSprite do, as they usually join in…

Following our hike, we reposed for a moment by Deep Creek and weighed the options for the afternoon’s water activities.  We first contemplated renting some tubes at one of the many nearby shops to float, but, even after witnessing some very creative logistics of other tubing enthusiasts, we couldn’t envision a safe configuration that might allow us to get five tubes (and us) from shop to parking lot in the Subaru and then on foot to the put in place. Instead, we opted to return to the campground and play in the river.

Keeper was stoked to engage in varsity waterplay with his sisters and Dad and I stayed outside the spray radius to document it all.

Another delightful day nestled in the Great Smoky Mountains came to a satisfying conclusion with s’mores around the campfire.

Before we left the next morning, WoodSprite and I went for a short hike along a nearby nature trail. Throughout our travels, Flight and I have made it a point to carve out one-on-one time with each of the kids and I was delighted to have the opportunity to hike with WoodSprite, just the two of us.  We had to cross three modified planks to get started and found a wee turtle on our way around the loop.

The last activity before we scooted on to Atlanta was returning to the Oconaluftee (that’s pretty fun to say) Visitor Center so our newest Junior Rangers could be sworn in.

Sadly, we didn’t make it around back to see the living farm museum, but we were okay with that omission. Having seen many of the spectacular National Parks out West, I was surprised to learn that the Great Smoky Mountains is the most visited NP in the nation, boasting over 10 million visitors annually, but then discovered that it’s within a day and half’s drive for over half the American population.  I also realized that these gentile mountain slopes are far more accommodating for people who may not be avid outdoor enthusiasts.  After hearing all the rave reviews of this particular National Park, I was very glad we made the opportunity to check it out.  Although it was lovely to see, and I can certainly see its appeal, my heart yearns to return to the west to view the newer crags and sharper peaks of the Cascades.  They are calling me home.

Asheville, NC, holds a dear place in my heart for many reasons.  First and foremost, it was one our first “destinations” after we acquired Davista in Cincinnati last April and will always serve as the backdrop for my fond memories of getting to know our rig as we started this crazy adventure. Prior to visiting Asheville, everyone I knew thought my crunchy self would be right at home there and told me I probably wouldn’t want to leave.  Apparently I exude granola.

Actually, early in our marriage, I tentatively confided to Flight (after doing a clearing turn to see who might be listening), “I think I might be a little crunchy.”  With an incredulous look, he laughed and simply said, “You’ve been in granola denial for a very long time – you just need to embrace it.”  “Really?!” “Yes, really.”

And so I have.

Strangely, despite embracing this latent aspect of being, I did not readily find my peeps during our first visit to Asheville. Instead it seemed I found my granola limit, which I didn’t even know I had.  Now, I am all about living a life being mindful about the rest of my fellow creatures on this planet and our collective home.  In fact, that philosophy informs many of our family’s decisions, be they existential or mundane.  What I’m not particularly fond of is those who use something akin to this mindfulness as an excuse to abstain from being contributing members of society. “I can’t get a job because it will interfere with my ability to commune with….” That mentality makes me crazy and Asheville seemed thick with it.  Flight was surprised at my reaction to Asheville and thought I might start yelling, “Hippie, take a bath!” at the many such folks I saw loitering while we were out and about. Interesting.  I couldn’t help but wonder – am I getting old?!

Nope.  Not happening.  I refuse.  Crotchety, maybe.  Old? Never. Actually, that reminds me of another pretty funny conversation Flight and I had, this one while still living in Maryland.  While I was still teaching at the Naval Academy, Flight would patiently listen to any of my rants about the current episode of “Midshipmen Behaving Badly” I was witnessing at work,  and wait until I was done before grinning and saying, “And while you’re at it, GET OFF OF MY LAWN!”  I enjoy returning the favor when he relates any reality show-worthy shenanigans from 36,000’.  After one such particular venting, I impishly observed, “You know, I think we’re both getting a little crotchety, but in different ways.”  Not missing a beat, Flight fired back, “Yeah, we are, but that’s because we have different crotches.”

So there ya go.

With all that said, I was a little apprehensive about what hippy factions we might encounter on our return to Asheville, not so much for their fanciful existence but for the potential of my crotchety reaction thereto.  Fortunately (?), I was distracted by the repercussions of our crew’s inability to follow checklists, which made our time in Asheville proper virtually nonexistent.

Despite being limited by self-induced mechanical failures and the consequent repairs, we did manage to return to two highlights from our first visit.   Sliding Rock was one of our family’s favorite activities last year.  River water has sculpted the smooth rock into a long slide that has become a local draw for generations.  Since we were there again early in the season, pre-season if you will, the public restrooms were closed and the water was rather, um, brisk.  Content with my memories from last year, I abstained from the sliding activities but caught some decent shots of the family.

 

 

From Sliding Rock we then went to the Sierra Nevada Brewery to spend an early evening enjoying some “Corn in the Hole” (WoodSprite’s title for the game) and walking the extensive garden before we dined within.

 

It was a lovely day.

Just before we collected the car from the miracle mechanic, we drove out to Black Mountain to see what that not-so-booming metropolis was all about. I was curious about this particular town as it was the setting for two very different series of books that I have thoroughly enjoyed.  The first of these is Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series, which is now a series on Starz.  The last part of the fourth book (The Drums of Autumn) and the first part of the fifth book (The Fiery Cross), which I happened to be rereading now, is a Scottish clan gathering set in Black Mountain.

The other series is a trilogy by William Forstchen that explores what might happen in the event a nuclear device (or several) is detonated in space specifically to generate a massive electromagnetic pulse (EMP) to fry electronics across a sizable footprint.  For those of you not associated with the Space Cadre, this is actually a big deal. The ramifications of detonating such a device are not what you (and Stephen Colbert) might think (radiation fall out, scorched earth, etc.).  Instead of nuclear holocaust unfolding on Earth, everything dependent on 1s and 0s would cease to function, becoming only conversation pieces and paperweights, to include the satellite network that informs most of the developed world’s communications and defense networks.  In a word, YIKES.  The series is set in Black Mountain and is a solid contemplation on how all might unfold should such an event occur.   After finishing Forstchen’s books, I again gave thanks that I know how to grow my own food and have at least one skill I can barter.

As excited as I was to leisurely stroll about Black Mountain and reconstruct scenes from these books in my mind’s eye, I was also acutely aware that additional time in the Subaru never serves our flight well.  We opted to dine at Louise’s Kitchen (which is well known for its enormous breakfast dishes) before seeking out Montreat College (which, sadly, we only caught a glimpse of), do a 180^oand head back to Davista.  We made it in plenty of time to get a serious fire going, and followed up with S’Mores.

Safety Standdown complete and no hippy sightings, I was eager to get to our next destination (with the Subaru parking brake appropriately released) and explore the Great Smoky Mountains.  I have never seen this neck of the Appalachians and can’t wait to see what they’re all about…

I first heard that term from a salty Flight Engineer in my first squadron, in response to “where are you from?”  He was (is) deeply Southern and sharp as a tack, with a thick accent that tended to belie, or at least distract you from, his depth of knowledge and skill.  I’m pretty sure he did it on purpose; he liked to keep people off guard.

“South Cackalacky” sounded to me like a deliberate play on the redneck thing.  Owning it and throwing it back at you with pride.  Or something like that.  It wasn’t his invention of course, I’ve heard it used by many people in various contexts.  On the other hand, it’s not that old a term either, probably no older than the ‘70s/’80s.  A brief internet search on the term didn’t net much, other than the fact than older North/South Carolinans aren’t familiar with it, and no one’s sure where it came from, but there’s at least one hip hop reference from the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, and a hot sauce named “Cackalacky,” whose owner said something to the effect of “there’s no single word that conveys the nature of the South better.”

Does it though?  I’m not sure.

In my mid-twenties and largely ignorant of the South other than my relatively brief stint in Florida, I didn’t know exactly how to take it at the time.  Brimming with my own West Coast quirks, northwest Florida (which is really southern Alabama) was essentially foreign to me.  Frankly I’m still not sure I have a handle on the South as a region, but I can tell you that the impression I refined on this trip is heavily positive.  Both Carolinas, especially, strike me as places I’d like to spend more time exploring, and that most everyone would find a way to fall in love with if they visited with an open mind and didn’t mind a bit of humidity.  Unfortunately we DO mind a bit of humidity, so other than an hour or so we spent entertaining the prospect of setting up shop in Asheville or Raleigh, this part of the county is off the where-do-we-settle list.

Anyway, the Carolinas didn’t seem very “Cackalacky” to me.  But I’m from Southern California and spent most of my adult life in the Pacific Northwest, so I’m not to be trusted.

Here’s an image you may have seen before.  Maybe not.  I can tell you that it was new to me, but I happened to see it on a pilot colleague’s luggage about 2 weeks before we entered South Carolina.

When I saw it, I asked him what it meant, because it looked somewhat mystical.  Like a secret society type of thing.  “uhhh, the South Carolina flag?” he answered, with more than a little befuddlement.

Of course it is.  And we saw it EVERYWHERE once we entered South Carolina.  There are states (most of them) whose flags aren’t particularly distinctive, and whose residents likely don’t have much knowledge of it.  Growing up in California, I knew vaguely that there was a bear somewhere on it, and I’m pretty sure the background is white.  Living in Washington I had no clue what my state flag looked like.  In fact I still don’t.  And then there are a few states who go absolutely nuts with their flags.  In my very limited experience (i.e. this trip), here they are, in decreasing order of hysteria:

•    Maryland.  (No kidding, the Maryland flag is everywhere there, and people wear Maryland flag socks, shorts, shirts, etc. and don’t seem to know that this is outlier behavior)

•    Texas.  (This is probably unsurprising.)

•    Colorado.  (This did surprise me. Coloradans, much like Canadians, seem very much to want others to know where they’re from.)

• South Carolina (see above)

There may be more.  I’m just saying that these four have stood out heavily.  I could also speculate that these states’ residents don’t realize that all the other states’ residents aren’t particularly state-flag-centric.  Coloradans might.  Actually, Texans might too, but don’t care.

Our drive up to Charleston from Savannah was pleasant, and not too long.  We ended up at a state park just outside downtown that was exceptionally well appointed, though the on-site water park was either not open yet, or just not open.  The kids loved it though, as did we.

We didn’t have much time there, so opted for a distilled schedule.   On night one we headed into town for a Ghost Tour, which seems to be a common draw for tourists, though the quality thereof, we’ve discovered, varies pretty widely by both city and tour guide.

First impressions:  Charleston is gorgeous.  Wow.  They call it “the Holy City” due to the concentration of impressive churches there, but that’s only a very small part of the story.  Most of the downtown is lit by gaslamps, and has an almost European feel to it.  It’s hard to come up with a comparison because I’m not sure I’ve ever been somewhere similar.  It’s entirely unique.  Great food scene too.

The Ghost Tour was not the best.  In fact it might have been the Ghost Tour that stops us from doing any more Ghost Tours.  But we did get to stroll through downtown at night and see some interesting sights; it’s a great way to see a downtown, if nothing else.

On the next day, after a slow morning, we headed to town in order to catch a ferry out to Fort Sumter in order to continue our Civil War education.  I hadn’t known much about it, frankly, before our visit, and the stories about how the Civil War began are enthralling.

Fort Sumter is actually quite a distance from Charleston, protecting the bay entrance from a small island between the long barrier islands on either side.  It’s tenuously connected to the barrier island to the south at low tide, which was another strategic stronghold, but it’s otherwise isolated.  It was commanded at the time of the Civil War’s start by a Major, which blew my mind a little, particularly when I read about the negotiations that went on before and during the active fighting.  While I certainly had some great responsibilities when I held the Navy’s equivalent of his rank, they pale in comparison to what he had to deal with on his tiny island in the Bay.  Interestingly, no one in the fort was killed during the 34 hour shelling.

What was most fascinating for me was to read about the extent of the tensions at the time, while trying to relate it to the present day.  It’s one thing to live in a time of dramatic political divisiveness, and (hopefully) quite another to live in a time when those divisions erupt easily into violence and outright warfare.  It’s difficult to imagine what would drive you to that, but I can certainly understand the “slowly boiling frog” aspect to it, where each step leads pretty naturally to the next and only very rarely does anyone step back to look at the big picture and ask the tough questions.

The girls powered through the Junior Ranger program, with a bit of help from one of the on-site Rangers.  Keeper, on the other hand, took notes for his History course, which Tacco recently discovered as part of the National Park Systems’ websites.

We also took a little detour to check out the dead horseshoe crabs on the sand bar.  I’ve only ever seen those on East Coast beaches – they’re downright prehistoric looking things and I wouldn’t want to have one crawl up my leg.

We opted for a Low Country dinner that evening, at a restaurant on the water.  Wow was it dense.  One staple is “She Crab Soup,” which takes its name from the fact that crab roe is mixed into the soup, which has a cream/sherry base to which crabmeat is added.  It was delicious.  No doubt.  We all agreed.  But it’s hard to imagine eating more than a “cup” of it.  In fact none of us was inclined to have more than a few spoons full.  That’s how rich it was.  Kinda like [spoon 1] “That’s GREAT!”  [spoon 2] “hm, still good, but man that’s heavy.”  [spoon 3] “uhhh…  I like that still, but I’m done.”

We enjoyed the dinner greatly, but it was one of the only times when not one of us suggested looking at the dessert menu, and we hadn’t even finished the food on our plates.  That’s telling.  If you’re going to live in the Low Country you probably need to ensure you’ve got a solid exercise program.

After another short stroll through Charleston’s quaint downtown in order to shake off some of our dinner-induced lethargy, we headed back to our campsite for our last evening.

Charleston, as it turns out, is another inflection point for us.  Though it’s not our furthest east point (that honor is reserved for our starting point in Annapolis), it is the point at which we turn west for the last time, which is somewhat poignant.  For so long this adventure has seemed more or less endless given how much more travel time we had ahead of us, but suddenly we have an indication that we’re approaching something resembling a final stretch.

Our next stop is Asheville, NC, which is only the second destination we will have found impressive enough to visit twice.  Technically our first visit was part of our “shakedown” trip and not the actual year’s journey, but it left quite an impression.  Tacco’s was different than the rest of ours (and is fascinating in its own right) but we all left Asheville the first time with a desire to return.

First, though, we stopped at Congaree National Park, southeast of Columbia, SC.  Never heard of it?  Neither had we.  This was another target of opportunity foisted upon me somewhat last-minute-ish by Tacco.  Remembering what I had resolved after our last minute agenda changes in Florida, I did my best to suppress my “BUT OUR PLAN WAS TO KEEP DRIVING…” instincts and assented to the stop.  And I’m glad I did.

Though it wasn’t the most impressive National Park we’ve seen (I get the impression it’s most effectively explored via canoe), we took a thoroughly pleasant hike on a raised, wooden path through the tidelands.  Amusingly, there is a “mosquito meter” at the trailhead which gives you an idea what to expect from blood-sucking pests along the way. 

Fortunately we hit it at the right time – the dial had been set to “Mild” for our hike.  I’m not sure we’d have gone through with it had it been higher.

It was an excellent way to break up our drive and spend an early afternoon, and we learned about skinks (one of whom is pictured below), crawfish chimneys, and cypress knees.  Entirely worth it.

Another factor is creeping into our travel decision-making, however, and it’s not a welcome one.

I suffered from a bout of sciatica a few years back that quickly turned me from feeling 100% fit and healthy to staring down the barrel of partial disability.  It was disconcerting, to say the least.  I began to notice a pain in the back of my leg that was exacerbated by getting into certain positions that I wasn’t always able to reproduce.  That wasn’t overly concerning, but it devolved relatively quickly into a searing pain down my leg and up into my lower back, which sitting for long periods (i.e. flying, driving) made significantly worse.  I was able to function, but I couldn’t really exercise, and once it got to the point where part of my foot began to get numb and a sneeze or a cough would just about bring me to my knees in agony, I took action.  My primary care doctor’s first response was “well ok, let’s get you on pain killers then.”  Um, what?!? That was not what I expected.  I wanted to fix it, not mask it, and I certainly wasn’t ready to be the old guy with the bad back yet.  I appreciated her desire to help me feel better, but no, that didn’t jibe with my plans.  An MRI revealed my L5-S1 disc bulging out to the right side (which was likely the cause of my pain, but not certainly), as well as considerable asymmetrical core muscle atrophy tied to the car accident that had nearly taken our (Tacco and my) lives back in 1999.  So I saw a different doctor, a D.O. this time, and opted to attack it from multiple angles, including diet, hydration, physical therapy, acupuncture, and rolfing.

And it worked!  I was only out of work for about 6 weeks, and the improvement came pretty quickly.  I was never certain whether one of the angles worked better than the others, but was thrilled with the results.  Never got the pain killers.

It did rear its head again once more about a year after the first time, but not nearly as severely, and with a few visits to the rolfer and some renewed attention to my posture and gait, it disappeared quite quickly.

Well, it’s back.  The good news is that it’s not as severe as the first time, and is only in my leg (not my back), so exercise and activity are still very much on the table.  In fact being active seems to be the thing that makes it feel the best.  The bad news is that sitting for long periods seems to be what’s bringing it back and making it worse, and this lifestyle doesn’t really provide me any way around that.  About 5 or 6 hours driving is all I’m beginning to be able to manage without undue agony.  Flying is better, as I’m able to adjust my position often and don’t need to use my feet except when on the ground or takeoff/landing.  But driving hurts.  Plus I can’t just make an appointment with my rolfer this time unless I want to fly back to Maryland.  I do have Tacco and her acupuncture needles and healing skill, however, which is a blessing.

We’re both watching this closely and hoping it’s something we’ll be able to beat back.

Now it’s back to the other Cackalacky, and cheery, beery Asheville in the hills.  Or the mountains, depending on who you’re asking.  We’ll see how Cackalacky they are.  I’m ready!