Camping night #2 Along the Blue Ridge Parkway

The Blue Ridge Parkway is...

Named “America’s Favorite Drive,” the Parkway offers:

• 469 miles connecting the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina to the Shenandoah National Park in Virginia
• Stunning views, abundant hiking trails, picnic areas, campsites, and interpretative exhibits
• Ample recreational opportunities for all ages and abilities
• Natural beauty featuring one of the world’s most diverse display of flora and fauna

Basically if you like to drive you'll absolutely love this route. The views are absolutely spectacular, there's not a stop sign or red light on the entire 469 miles and you can easily pull off at the Parkway's hundreds's of overlooks. Along the way you can see historic home sights and local Christmas Tree farms. I think that old things and anything related to Christmas are probably some of my two favorite things in life!

You can see the home of "Aunt Orlena Puckett" who died at the age of 102 in 1939. She's was well known in her community as a midwife who assisted in the delivery of 1000 babies the last of which she delivered in her 102nd year of life.

We also spent some time at an old Gristmill/Sawmill. The Park service had restored it to it's somewhat original working order and now the sight serves as a living museum, each of the little buildings in the "village" are occupied with people acting out the trades of the time. I throughly enjoyed the house where the ladies worked wool on spinning wheels and turned it into yarn, which they used to make blankets on a weaving loom.

Have I mentioned how much I like crafty stuff? Combine crafty and old stuff and look out because you've got my attention! :)

So getting to our second night of camping... we didn't have any reservations and we were getting pretty tired so we consulted the "Tom Tom" (gps) to help us find some lodging. We settled upon "Pop and Mom's" campground.

From first glance it was pretty sketchy to say the least, but at least it had a working toilet and shower. Once we settled in and applied a lot of insect repellent we retired to our tent and watched Forest Gump on Dustin's computer.

I forgot to mention that earlier before it got dark I noticed across the way a mother cat and about a half dozen kittens. From afar they looked so cute playing and pouncing and I thought awww...poor little guys I wonder how they are making it out here. But later as Dustin and I left the car, tent, and picnic table unattended to head to the restrooms I looked back to discover that the mother and all the kittens had completely covered our belongings. We had left the back window open on our jeep and two kittens had already jumped on the roof and were about to descend into the window when I ran back to the campsite clapping and shouting at them to get away. Those sneaky little kittens! I imagine now that they get along just fine!

Just before nightfall we were surrounded by lightning bugs, Dustin caught one for me and we took a little video of it lighting up in my hands. It was so cool! Unfortunately something went wrong with the camera and we lost the video, but I'm sure you can use your imagination. After the movie we were lulled to sleep by the very loud sounds of cicadas talking back and forth, no sound machine needed tonight! I swear that a couple of times in the night I could hear something brushing up against the tent, it was probably those little kittens trying to check us out. The next morning as Dustin picked up the tent and supplies I was determined to take a shower because when camping you never know when or if there will be another shower so you have to take advantage.

Anyway those of you ladies from Austin, imagine what the showers would look like at the "Broken Spoke" if they were to have showers, then add some more dirt and grime, dim lighting and a drain that doesn't drain and you have the shower facilities at the Pop and Mom campground. Needless to say I'm not sure who was more clean after the shower me or the shower! It was also kind of funny because we never packed any towels so there I am trying to dry myself off with paper towels and my t-shirt wrapped around my head to keep my hair from dripping...it actually worked pretty well though. Overall the Blue Ridge Parkway was definitely a highlight of the trip. I look forward to going back someday in the fall to see the leaves changing!

Aflac!

-Kim