The End Of A Mountain Vacation

I didn’t post anything after Friday morning because most of the time since was spent driving from place to place and then home…All with the beginnings of a nasty touch of a bug.

A Floyd Friday

Friday morning I relearned a lesson I learn every trip to the mountains. It always takes longer than you expect to get anywhere. Especially since where ever you are going, the local governments along the way have come up with the money from somewhere to repair the roads…For miles and miles.

We spent the morning getting from Valle Crucis to Floyd to visit a couple of my blogging buddies.

First was Fred First of Fragments From Floyd fame…My first nine word sentence made up of seven words starting with “F”.  Fred was out enjoying the warm fall day working on his firewood stack but he invited us in for a bit before we stepped back out to the porch swing to enjoy the weather. Here is Fred at his “command center”…

 

 

Both Sherry and I enjoyed our time with Fred. Though I’m sure my non-blogging wife could have done with a little less “tech” talk along the way.

Fred and I  spent a bit of our time discussing how the blogging world had changed since our last visit back in 2007. Both of us have watched our visitor counts decline as the number of blogs have multiplied by the millions. We discussed software and cameras. In other words we spent the time catching up…

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As we were getting ready to leave I snapped one last shot of Fred pointing out the flora to one of his ladies…

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From Goose Creek we headed in to Floyd where we had a meeting arranged with Colleen of Loose Leaf: Notes from a Writer’s Journal at the Loft across from the world famous Floyd Country Store about which she recently posted…

At The Floyd Country Store in downtown Floyd you can purchase penny candy, play checkers with a neighbor, or enjoy a lunch of beans and cornbread.  You can also pick up wireless on your laptop, buy eco-friendly products, or maybe catch a Virginia governor playing banjo on stage.

via Loose Leaf Notes » Blog Archive » The Floyd Country Store: Ya’ll Come Back.

 

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Colleen posted a full report of our visit on her blog here…Loose Leaf Notes » Blog Archive » My Imaginary Friend. Let me just add that I was sorry to have missed making the connection on our last trip through Floyd. Our hour of conversation at the bar in the Loft showed Sherry one of the reasons I have connected so much with the Floyd community on-line.

Since our day trip was already stretching into late afternoon and we needed to get back to Nettles Knob for our next to the last night in the mountains we didn’t stay for the Friday Night festivities. We headed out to the Parkway for a run down to Fancy Gap and the highway.

I couldn’t get out of Floyd County without one more stop for a picture though…

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Mabry Mill on a late autumns afternoon. Empty except for the ghosts of visitors past…Waiting for the return of spring.

Last Days In The Mountains

We spent Saturday making one last trip to the Mast Store, one last drive around the county, and eating one last meal in Boone before heading back up to the cabin to begin packing for the long trip home starting early Sunday morning.

On our drive I happened to catch a scene out of the side of my eye that had me pulling into someones drive to turn around and go back for a picture. Here is what caught my eye from the road as we flew past…

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And this is what my mind saw that caused me to go back…

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And so ended our vacation…But not the additional two days of driving to get home…With a touch of fever and a sore throat to accompany me the whole way home.

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