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Trip back - page 2
I have always enjoyed these sorts of rustic looking cement bridges surrounded by thick forest. This was somewhere around the Virginia/N. Carolina border.
I stopped for the night at Stations Inn, in the tiny community of Laurel Springs NC. This was a decent place to stay, and the lack of phones in the room and no cell phone coverage, gave it a feeling of isolation. Laurel Springs was one of the smallest places I stayed on my entire trip. It is just a handful of buildings, with the motel/restaurant I stayed at apparently being the biggest business in town.
And just in case you had any doubts about just where downtown Laurel Springs is – there was a strategically placed sign to let you know.
Day 3 – Laurel Springs NC to Cherokee NC Here we are just outside of downtown Laurel Springs, a few minutes before sunrise. It was a very colorful morning, with a slight mist still clinging to the lowlands.
This was another case where split neutral density filters came in handy, since the sky was much brighter than the landscape.
I took a walk around, and noticed these cows galloping down the hill and rushing over to me. Apparently this must be the time of the day they are fed, and they must have thought I was their feed guy. I was sorry to disappoint them.
Across from the cows was a picturesque scene involving round bales of hay. I always like the round hay. For some reason in California, all you ever see is rectangular bales.
I got back on the road for my third day on the Parkway. The weather that morning was such that it was hard to see any distance through all the foggy haze, but this common condition is what gives the “Blue Ridge” Parkway its name.
Zooming in, we notice seemingly endless blue ridges fading away in the haze.
I can make out maybe 18 or more ridges, before they congeal into a mass of indistinguishable white.
Beside the road, I came across this old building juxtaposed against an intensely red tree.
That little old building might have been somebody’s home a hundred years ago.
Along the way was this pleasant little reflective pond. This was Price Lake, not too far south from the town of Blowing Rock.
I like the multi-hued leaves that swirl around on the surface.
There are a number of rustic looking car tunnels along the Parkway.
Later in the afternoon as the sun came out for a while, I went through a few pockets of more complete color. These areas reminded me of the White Mountains of New Hampshire a year ago, when it was fully peaking in bright color.
This is where a polarizer filter really helps to bring out the best in that great sky. It would be photographic malpractice not to use a polarizer here.
A little later on, once again, the mist took over and became the dominant atmospheric condition.
One final look at the blue ridges of the Parkway.
I was down around by Asheville NC by now, and I had already spent the best of 3 days, and almost 500 miles on Shenandoah’s Skyline Drive and the Blue Ridge Parkway … so I figured I had done my duty. I bypassed the last 75 miles or so of the Parkway, and went in for a look at Asheville, and then took the faster highway on into the town of Cherokee for the night. The town, which is on a Cherokee Indian reservation and therefore teeming with casinos, is located at the doorstep of Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
Day 4 – Cherokee NC to Nashville TN The day started out with a drizzling rain, and turned to very thick fog by the time I got to the summit of the Smoky Mountains. This must have been that “smoke” of the Smoky Mountains, which I had heard about.
I always like these rocky leafy creek beds.
The weather was rather awful in eastern Tennessee, so I pretty much spent the day just driving to Nashville.
When I got to Nashville, I could not resist taking a peek at the Grand Ole Opry, seeing that it was right on the way. The Opry building is just one feature of the much larger Opryland, which has large hotels, and sporting rinks, and actually used to have a theme park.
I don’t know just what I was expecting to see here… maybe Grandpa Jones and Minnie Pearl out there cracking “Hee Haw” type jokes while the ghosts of Hank Williams and Patsy Cline croon away with lovesick songs? But I should point out that the Grand Ole Opry gift store did indeed sell DVD’s of the old “Hee Haw” series .. if anyone was interested. Anyway, it is just a building. And it has only been at this current location since 1974.
I stayed at the Super 8 in the north end of Nashville. Super 8's do have wireless internet, so that is a good thing. I have noticed that the bigger cities have the poorest quality motels, and this was no exception. The ants scampering around the continental breakfast area was probably the most memorable characteristic of this motel.
Day 5 – Nashville TN to Poplar Bluff MO The first photo op of the day was at Land Between the Lakes. This is a National Recreation area between two long narrow lakes that cross the Tennessee/Kentucky border. Along the road known as “The Trace” is Cedar Pond. The sun was hitting it just right for a bright reflection.
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