Happy birthday to Christopher!
We left the hotel around 10 am to begin a day of exploring. We planned to drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway toward Asheville, but wanted to make a quick stop at the Mingus Mill just past the visitor center into the National Park.
We noticed a number of elk in the field next to the visitor center today.
Mingus Mill did not feature a water wheel but worked on water power to grind corn into meal.
Chris backtracked a little to get to the exit for the Blue Ridge Parkway and we were off for a day of sight seeing and leaf peeping with a hike or two along the way.
Chris was so good to pull off at the Overlook Pullouts, the side of the road, by a tunnel...anywhere that was safe.
As I was taking pictures at one of the overlooks, an older gentleman stopped and gave some suggestions for great places to go for some good Fall color in the area. Since we were just driving and enjoying the view today, we followed his advice and headed over to the Cataloochee Ski Resort above Maggie’s Village.
We followed a steep road up the side of the mountain until we topped off at the resort. Kristen had lots of homework to keep her busy, and dutifully worked on it throughout the day. I got a few shots at the ski resort and the lodge a short way down the hill.
We had hoped for a warmer day, but similar to yesterday, the clouds descended around us and obscured our view.
We stopped for a chilly lunch at Waterrock Knob and then took off on a hike on the Waterrock Knob Trail. Kristen opted out and stayed in the car to keep working on homework.
The hike took off immediately up and up and up. It was a workout. Chris and I hiked first to a lookout, though there wasn’t much to see as we were in the clouds.
From there, he wanted to go “off the beaten path” and find a plane crash he had read about online. I wasn’t thrilled about the muddy conditions nor the slippery roots we had to carefully climb over and around. After about a half an hour of descending into the forest, AND when people said it was just going to get muddier, I told Chris he could go on without me.
He kept on going to the crash site and got some cool pictures.
I hiked back to the lookout and was rewarded with the clouds receding and some pretty awesome photographs.
This is what puts the “Smoky” in Great Smoky Mountains!
I waited for Chris for a half an hour or so.
We hiked back down to the parking lot to find Kristen happy to see us. She would NOT have enjoyed that hike.
We continued on along the parkway until we arrived at Swannanoa, a small suburb outside of Asheville, North Carolina, where we would be staying. Chris had found a cute townhome in a cluster of four—Martin Valley Townhomes. Each unit was characterized by a color—red, blue, orange, and green. Ours was red and so tastefully decorated inside with black, white, and red colors.
We settled in for a two-night stay and then headed out to explore and find dinner.
Since it was Chris’ birthday, we gave him the option of choosing where to eat. We tried a couple of chain steak houses only to find that the wait was an hour and half long. Yikes! Too long. We drove around until we found a little Mexican place in a strip mall that looked good. We were hungry by then and ready to be done looking as well. Ay Caramba was the name.
We were seated next to a large group also celebrating a birthday. They were the twangiest bunch of people. We had fun listening to them. Chris opted not to tell the waiter it was his birthday after he watched them sing to a lady and then push the cake in her face.
Instead, we stopped at Ingles grocery chain and found him a piece of German chocolate cake. We needed groceries for the next couple of days as well.
We FaceTimed with Misha for a short time. Both she and Amy were at home being adults and working.