Maine springTo prove that there is spring in Maine, here are a couple of recent photos.
Forsythia, skunk cabbage, and green grass. There will be more of the trip report to come. Road trip #7 Blue Ridge ParkwayAnd then it was time to return north. There was a little extra time so I again drove another stretch of the Blue Ridge Parkway. Little Switzerland. I detoured here to revisit a used bookstore. It is interesting to find this village and resort on the top of the ridge.
The tunnel just north of Little Switzerland, NC. There was a photographer posing some students along this stretch of the Parkway for prom photos.
Looks like some great hiking up there.
This looks to be my high point on the trip.
Looking eastward.
Then it was time to find the freeway to make time to Virginia. Road trip #6 GreenvilleGreenville, South Carolina is a very busy city. The large manufacturing companies in the surrounding area have drawn a lot of people. Downtown is changing with ongoing construction projects and everything feels very new. Finding parking is sometimes a challenge. For example, we saw one parking lot being turned into another building site. Downtown is filled with shops and restaurants. It is a very active place. Across from the town hall a large area was closed off for a barbecue and in the evening, one block of Main Street was shut down for a weekly street party. Locals crowd the space, live music plays, things for children to do: there is a lot going on for a spring Friday evening. My photos are from the Reedy Falls Park, a nice calm place in downtown. Down the Reedy River in the park you can even find foundations of old structures once built on the river. All photos take with the Fuji XF1.
The Liberty Bridge over the falls.
And last of all, a toy shop window.
Road trip #5 Blue Ridge ParkwayIt was still early spring, but the further south I traveled, the greener it got. Well, except at the higher elevations on the Blue Ridge Parkway.
Roadside redbud and dogwood near Natural Bridge in southern Virginia.
The Blue Ridge Parkway in southern Virginia not far from the North Carolina state line.
This is the sort of thing I was looking for on the Blue Ridge Parkway, the Brinegar homestead.
Someday I need to return when the house is open. A fascinating reminder of Blue Ridge family life.
A fun road for driving with the sweeping curves and open vistas. This time of year there were not many fellow-travellers.
Umm...
Here I parked my car off on the grass and walked back up the road a ways to try for a different perspective of this farmhouse. A local man traveling the parkway stopped because he saw my vehicle on the side of the road to see if I needed any assistance. We ended up talking about the beauty of the parkway and the spring season.
Back on the ridge again. After this it was time to descend into the eastern valley and continue on at a less leisurely pace to my destination outside Greenville, South Carolina. Did this post end up too long? Next will be Greenville, SC, but I returned to parts of the Blue Ridge Parkway later so there will be more to see.
Road trip #4 Skyline DriveThe next morning we were off to the mountains again. We drove around back streets of Elkton and found this interesting old place.
You can see that it was clouding up; there were a few minor sprinkles during the day, but not enough for cars with their tops down to put them up.
We took a side hike down to the Doyle's River Cabin, just off the Appalachian Trail. There was a family staying there, but they graciously let me check out the inside of the cabin. It would be a very nice place to stay and there is an old spring nearby.
The AT wandering along the ridgeline. This must be a great section for the thru-hikers.
Water from the rock. But Moses was more successful. The Park Service had not turned the water on yet. We hiked out to Chimney Rock on the Riprap Trail. Along the beginning section of the trail you could see the charred remains from a forest fire which must have happened not so long ago.
And then the setting sun as we got the Parkway at Rockfish Gap and headed back up the Valley.
The next day it was time to get on the road again and point south. So, Blueridge Parkway next. |
