B&T Sunshine Tour 2022 - Day 3 & 4

I had to steal another picture from the web ℅ The Luxury Columnist because the day was actually rather bleak and rain.

The Biltmore was constructed from 1889 to 1895. It was much farther from the Village Inn, where we were staying, than we expected. At every wooded curve, I anticipated that the land would open up to this most beautiful site known as the Biltmore. It wasn’t that dramatic but once in sight there it was the largest house in America (175,000 sq ft), #4 in the world, the grounds and home of George and Edith Vanderbilt and it was breathtaking to behold even on this gray day. George and Edith were great adventurers and they memorialized their adventures throughout this enormous house. What with the foyers, the sitting rooms with fireplaces almost as tall as me (5’4”), the Louis XVI room which actually seemed to extend to a wing, the kitchens and dining rooms, the staircase which you can see in the picture from the outside, corridors wide enough and high enough for horses and cars to pass through, down to the polished bowling lane in the basement..oh the stories these walls must hold!

After the grand tour, we were relaxing in our Village Inn room when word came in that Blake and Kate had made it to Maidens, VA. A video of a long wooded drive opened up to a huge house which would become their new home. (Finally the grand entrance I expected with the Biltmore.) Congrats to them and us for another great road trip excuse!

There is no doubt about it, B and I have totally different agendas when it comes to food. For breakfast B brought packaged muffins for the trip. Apparently I’m used to a bit more in the morning. I wanted to stick with his schedule but found myself snacking on chips and bites of sweets which never really satisfies long term. We also have different sleep schedules. I crash early and he sleeps in from a long night of personal party time. So, I was pleased to find a window of time this last morning on the Biltmore Estate to sneak away for a crab and pesto egg scramble at the Village Social dining room. Sigh…so lovely on the tongue! And once again the third out of four days, my soul was so satiated, I blinked back those tears of new experience, relaxing joy.

We left the Biltmore around 10:30 excited now for a glimpse of the beach. Folly Beach. I was reading a book by Bill Noel named Folly. Its the first in a series of I think 18 books centered at Folly Beach solving murder mysteries or maybe just mysteries in general. I hadn’t gotten far enough into the book to exclaim familiarity with too much but it appeared to be a light read well, as murders go.

Folly fun is contained within a few blocks of Center Street. We were able to visit Rita’s bar where I struck up a conversation with a woman my age who had moved there 4 years ago with her husband, who was managing the bar that night, and we suspected her son, who was bartending. They are set for retirement in a fabulous community and loving it even though they still have to work to maintain it. We also stopped at Snapper Jack’s for a beer. They  were serving up some fine looking sushi rolls but B said "No way Jose!". The WashOut was my favorite. Bought B a t-shirt there. He looks great in it.

We had dinner at Tides Hotel’s BLU restaurant. Too chilly to eat outside but I wanted to eat overlooking the ocean which turns out was hard to see. We did pop out into the salty air after and the night sky opened up to a perfect view of Orion! What a treat that was for me. I have studied Orion over the years including using it to find other closeby constellations and stars such as Taurus and Pleiades, the seven sisters, which is depicted on every Subaru vehicle as a reminder to look up and see the stars!

This picture is from our Tide’s room the next morning. Again a gray and stormy day. Even so, it was 50 degrees plus, a good 20 degrees or so above the Ohio weather we came from. Next stop, Amelia Beach where it will be another 10 degrees warmer!

B&T Sunshine Tour 2022 - Day 2

You never know how the day will go until well…the day goes. We started out looking for the Hatfield's in Pikeville but B was not really in the mood and we didn’t have a real plan so I didn’t complain. Later, in Tennessee though, we made a stop at a gas station and found a flier for a Hatfield-McCoy Self guided drive through that passes by grave yards and points of interest (killings?). If only we had had that the day before. It would have been a perfect tribute for a Pikeville visit. But we so loved the 23 South experience that we will be back and you gotta leave room to explore for the next time.

B was excited to get back on the road so off we went. Again taken by the beauty of 23 South, we traveled 3-½ hours to Ashville, NC. The cloudless blue skies were stunning against the Appalachian mountains. As I viewed the mountains to my right I kept seeing these stripes that waved along. I thought they were logs at first but turned out they were the tree’s shadows creating these flowing trails. It was gorgeous though trying to take pictures at 60 miles an hour wasn’t real successful.

I find that often I miss the best pictures because I’m in too much awe of what I see before me. This was particularly true of the blue ridge mountains so I downloaded a photo from the web taken by a Michael A Milton that does it justice.

Layers of blue shades lined the bright blue sky. The forests that cover these mountains are predominately made up of spruce and fir trees and they emit isoprene, a building block molecule for many compounds, into the atmosphere creating the blue hue! A moistness glistened my cheeks once again for the gorgeous sites of the world we have been blessed with to explore. I’ve missed it all for even longer than I thought. I flew from place to place for years to other wonderful places while missing so many glorious sites along the way. This trip was eyes open wide!

The Biltmore was a place we had hoped to hook up with B’s brother and his wife who live on their mountain in Vilas, NC. It didn’t work out this trip, but my husband was impressed by the estate layout so we planned to visit the house Day3. We shopped a bit and overheard a constant buzz of ‘You must come, We love to come for Christmas time at the Biltmore!” It was a full moon and a gorgeous night this night! I image it would be magical at Christmas.

Back in our room, we discovered that our nephew, Blake, and his wife, Kate, were only 90 minutes away. They were camping at a KOA in Blountville, TN off I-81. They had been traveling from upper California where they packed up their 6 cats, 1 dog and a snake in an RV to sojourn cross country to their new home in Maidens, VA! Unbeknownst to us, we must have crossed paths around Kingsport, TN earlier that day.

Smiles and sleep were coming much easier these days!

B&T 2022 Sunshine Tour - Day 1 

We had decided to break down our travel days into 4-5 hour drives. B, the driver, and I, the navigator, could have gone farther this day but when we stopped, we were happy not to continue. The number of trucks traveling 23 South from the south end of Columbus made us feel like we were joining a convoy! The truckers in Canada were protesting COVID-19 mandates and talk of a peaceful U.S. People’s Convoy from California to Washington DC was circulating. For now, we were all going in the wrong direction to participate in either. 

B and I were going south in February to find the heat of the sun and beauty of the land. It had been a long, long, long, long time since we had been on the road let alone on vacation by ourselves. Maybe 30 years. We are both now semi-retired and spend a lot of time together…apart. The excitement of spending quality time together has been highly anticipated. Day 1 of 17 and the excitement was holding its own. As the traffic leveled out, I was struck by the gentle rolling hay fields of Ohio and the continuous view of something other than my house, or my parent’s house, or the routes in between. I blinked back tears a few times from the joy of it all! The farther we got, the less traffic we saw on 23. In fact by the time we crossed over from OH approaching Greenup, KY, we were a bit surprised to be practically the only vehicle on the road. 

 

I was reminding B that my mom and I had driven down to Greenup with quilt tops we had worked on together to drop them off for quilting. My Mother-In-Law, Ethel, had sent her tops there and, with her being my mentor, I followed in her footsteps. It was indeed much cheaper than what you might pay in Columbus at the time and that included the shipping costs both ways. Mom, who is now in the Alzheimer Care Facility, Kemper House, uses that quilt to this day…say…20 years later. 

 

Gift cards were our topic of conversation while passing through Ashland, KY where Big Sandy Superstore originated. B had recently rediscovered an old Big Sandy gift card. I am a stickler about using these cards. I’m all for companies making money, but I refuse to be the one to leave gift cards on the table as a donation. For sure we will take a walk through a Big Sandy when we get back.

 

Traffic was still light as we approached signs for Louisa, KY. (I love the way that Louisa flows off the tongue!) When we entered Kentucky, there were signs declaring we were traveling the Country Music 23 Highway. I found this map showing where Tom T Hall, Randy Skaggs and many other country stars hailed from in Kentucky. We were on our way to Pikeville, home to Patty Loveless. Anyway, the map was across from the women’s bathroom inside the pictured tabernacle. A young, sweet southern drawl was ahead of me quietly waiting for maintenance to let her in. When I arrived, it was determined that he wasn’t about to leave until he painted over the walls, so she and I made a pact to keep an eye out as we took turns in the men’s room. Pretty disgusting…yep...pretty disgusting. It was a fun place overall though and so very out of place in the middle of nowhere. That’s just how I like it!

Our first night away and we actually were in a room with a view. It was spent at a Holiday Inn Express alongside the Levisa Fork River and a railroad track. When looking up which river this might be, I was amazed to find out that driving down 23 south around Pikeville was driving the second biggest engineering feat in the world! The river and the railroad used to run through Pikeville until a cut through Peach Orchard mountain rerouted them. Strategically constructed from 1973 well into 1989, it is second only to the engineering development of the Panama Canal and has been touted the 8th wonder of the world. WOW! And we haven’t even been to the Hatfield - McCoy museum yet.

Power Policy Gone Astray

Some shopping trips are smooth sailing. Others just don’t flow as expected from the start. I hit a local Kroger late yesterday afternoon to buy sub fixin’s for movie night. It started with no French bread. Or was there? I saw the empty shelves but asked anyway in case there was someplace else to look. The reply was no and confirmation was that there was no more coming out of the oven.  Finally I picked up a loaf of Italian and headed over to the deli.

My next quest was to find salami with the peppercorns imbedded throughout. The guy behind the counter said Genoa. He sliced me some but when I looked, there were no peppercorns. I inquired why that might be. He didn’t know that there weren’t any peppercorns because he wasn’t paying any attention. Startled at this response, I decided he had pulled his answer out of thin air, though I did look on-line later to find he was actually correct. Since his Genoa salami was without, I walked away wondering if this was what I really wanted for dinner tonight when, lo and behold, I came upon a random table with several loaves of French bread. Okay…back on the menu.

I wanted to be done and out of there but it turned out I picked up an item that was buy 5, get an even bigger savings off of each of the 5 items. Most of the time I rationalize that I’ll spend a lot more on the other 4 items than I will save, but I had already passed a few products that I could use with that same offer. That being the case there was no need to leave money on the table. Retracing my steps through the store I now found too many buy 5 items which meant I either needed to find more items or prioritize my top 5 needs. It turned out more loss time was not one of my needs so I chucked the overage.

Mission finally accomplished and I was ready to check out. I went through the self-check-out minding my own business when a bit of an argument ensued behind me. I looked and saw a woman, probably around 30-35 and a clerk 50 plus years telling her she couldn’t buy the wine in her hand because she did not have her driver’s license with her. After a short exchange, he conceded to check with his supervisor who was within hearing and viewing range. The supervisor glanced up and shook her head ‘no’. I had to do a double take thinking I was mistaken on my original assessment of the woman’s age. Seriously? This woman was well over 21. The man shrugged his shoulders and had the audacity to tell her he believed he had seen her in the store before. Without saying it, the implication in my mind was that he had sold her or seen her buy alcohol before.

That was it. I told her to give me the bottle. I have my license and would be happy to make the purchase. I rang it up and the clerk came over. He refused…refused to sell the wine to a 64 year old woman because he was suspicious that she might give it to a 35 year old. Honestly….am I wrong to still be shaking my head?

I considered sending a complaint to the store but the last thing I want is to be bored with how it is protective policy and their associate was right in assuming the woman wasn’t old enough to buy liquor because he is not allowed the use of his own mind. Plus, I would not want to be the one responsible for this clerk and his supervisor attaining associate of the year awards for saving the store from the criminal activities of two plotting, mischievous women who have been able to drink alcohol well within their rights for years.

Sigh….

A Groupon Experience

There always has to be a first in all you do. Here's my first YouTube video...

Groupon Mystery Package

Bingo!

Twelve years old in 1967 and we stood appalled at where the world might lead a body and its mind. Francine and I had worked with our Girl Scout troop for hours collecting baby food jars, soil, moss, tiny flowering herbs and ribbons to tie around the bottom of small, handcrafted terrariums. They were gifts of spring for a local home for the aged. We were excited to be selected as ambassadors for our troop and took the responsibility quite seriously.

Upon our arrival, friendly nurses asked if we wanted to take the gifts to the residents. Delighted, we started to go bed to bed along a corridor. Old, wrinkled people lay in the beds; some chipper, some not, some simply not there. Our gifts were greeted with joy though. It seemed even in this state of woe, their best faces met us as we came by. We smiled and chattered through emotions neither Fran nor I had ever experienced. Drama unfolded when handing the small terrarium to a woman who perked up and accepted it with bright eyes. Her elbow pulled the perceived treat to her wide open mouth. Fran and I both lunged to snatch the terrarium away as she went to bite into it like an apple. Our shuffling drew the attention of a nurse who realized these two little girls might be over their heads. She offered to distribute the rest of the gifts. Fran and I were only too grateful and took our leave.

Two indignant young girls flew up the stairs to my house. We talked through the events of the day over and over convinced that it was the fault of the nurses that these aged human beings lived in dire straits. My dad counseled if we were so passionate, we should send a letter to the local paper. We considered that; but, the information we had didn’t seem sufficient to justify our indignation formally to the whole town.

I’m glad now at 55 years old that we held off writing that letter. The experience may have been traumatic to Fran and me, but those nurses were caring for people, whether sick and dying or lying deserted and depressed. For myself, even though I lashed out against them, I did not really get a sense of cruelty from the nurses. I was shaken at the sights, sounds and smells of circumstances I did not know or understand.

My husband, B, and I have been calling Bingo at an assisted living facility for a couple years now. Each week provides a thought provoking reflective mixture of community drama, fun and sadness which I will begin to serialize here. It’s been in my heart for a long time. I’m looking forward to organizing and releasing my insights and emotions; be they right or wrong.

Losing at the Slots

Last night was too much fun! With only a couple days at Treasure Island in Vegas, I was excited to find a gambling buddy!

He was winning nicely on one of their quarter slot machines when I started hitting on mine just a couple away. He glanced over with dancing eyes. Obviously this nameless gentleman enjoyed watching others win as much as scoring for himself. His attitude was downright infectious!

A real estate broker, at least 60 years old, he visits Las Vegas monthly. It is quite apparent that he is aware of a gambling problem. This knowledge keeps him staying and playing the small ticket slots.

Our chatter was all about the thrill of the spin as much as the excitement of the win; the anticipation of the ‘almost’ and the groan of nothing at all.

I was up $100 when I realized I was expected with my group for dinner. It was a fabulous meal but the fever kept me restless!

Two hours later I'm back anxiously looking about for some sign of my compadre. The sulk ended as I heard, then saw him pop around the corner looking for me and coming back for more.

Alas though, Lady Luck had deserted me. With despair, I spun away my winnings and then some. A momentary burst of excitement ignited as my friend hit the biggest jackpot of the night - 809 quarters! We whooped and hollered! But, even his hit too quickly started dwindling and the evening was now late and it was time to part.

A pat on his back and a simple thanks sent me smiling on my way having enjoyed such delightful camaraderie during this crazy, fun night!

**This great picture (taken outside the Treasure Island Hotel where they presented "Sirens of TI") is from RoadsideAmerica.com. (A Siren in Greek mythology is a creature half bird and half woman who lures sailors by the sweetness of her song.)