Grassy Creek NC

Beautiful day, sunny, not too hot, topped out at 70° for a few minutes.  Although it was warm enough in the truck with the sun that we ran the AC most of the day.  The highway was noisy enough that opening the windows was a poor option.  

The first part of the day was wide flat country from SC into NC  beyond Charlotte.  Then it became more and more mountainous.   By the time we were off the interstate 77 we climbed up to the Blue Ridge Parkway, which is still closed from the hurricane.  That was a good climb!  The truck got a workout.  We hit 3100’ at the “Eastern Continental Divide. That must be between the Atlantic and Mississippi drainages.  My guess.  

We got to our camp at “The Old Store”  in Grassy Creek NC about 3:30, got parked and set up.  We are on a hillside with a great view of the valley.  The other business of the store is growing Christmas Trees and they are planted on the hillsides everywhere around us.  

We went down to the store to do our HH shopping. Fun place.  Around most of the store the top shelf and walls are covered with antique tools and goods.  A rotary phone, kerosene lamp, many old tools and store goods from our early memories.  I didn’t tell the young lady at the counter just how many things I’ve used back in the day!  We bought some baked goods, ice cream, BBQ sauce etc. that was all locally produced.  

Then a walk on this hill above the camper.  An old building still has some very old tobacco hanging in the window.   Apparently they didn’t always grow Christmas trees here. 

I hope I can get some photos posted.  The cell signal is poor.  As evening begins I’ve lost the indoor signal and have to go outdoors to try it there.  You’ll know how much luck I had by the presence of photos below.  😆

I am sure I can enough signal to post this narrative. 

We are here for 3 nights. That’ll give me a chance to post some tomorrow as we drive around. 

OK, it worked!  It did take a solid five minutes to upload the photos.  I had to stand 5’ east of the wellhead. 😆

Looking up at camp from the store

Looking down at camp

Cheraw Park 3

Another cool sunny morning, 45 overnight low.  Eventually we went for a walk over the bridge and lakeside boardwalk to the beach and up the other side until we got to a fairway.

Skye had a good swim session both going and coming back.  The park has some new benches near the beach and we made good use of them while Skye was in the water.

It wasn’t a very exciting hike, but we enjoyed being out and wandering around the lake.

Tomorrow heading up to northern North Carolina.  Fair warning, the HH says that cell signal may be poor.  In fact they advise calling ahead by a couple hours.  So if you don’t see anything for the next 3 days you’ll know it was really poor!  We’re going to Grassy Creek up near the Appalachian Trail.

The morning view

Trying to catch a big pine cone

Across the lake is yesterday’s first swim spot

Reuse of some railroad ties for posts; they still have rail joints on them.

                                                              Carlene’s Pitcher pictures:

Cheraw Park 2

Second day at the state park.  A nice leisurely start as we relaxed in camp doing whatever we felt like.  Such as catching up on 2 weeks worth of email.  I had continuously thrown out the major junk but that left a lot to open and sort.  Then trash when it still turned out to be junk!

Then we went down the camp road to the old group campground. It was a pretty nice place with several buildings some years ago.  But in deep disrepair today.  It does have a lake access that Skye loved!  Then farther down that road is the newer group campground.  Much better buildings and more of them.  They have a bigger lake access with amphitheater on the shore. Skye loved that one too!  We had lunch while watching the kid play in the water.  Back to our camp by 3:30 for some relaxation.  Got out the grill for some burgers.  It’s actually the first time we’ve used the grill all winter.  

Finally a sunset walk to the Eureka Lake dam.  

That all totaled to about 6.4 miles today.  I don’t think we have walked that much since we left Texas.  Feels great.   

Cheraw State Park

Cheraw State Park in Cheraw, SC.  On beautiful Eureka Lake.  We had a pleasant drive over today with only one traffic slowdown on the interstate for construction (as usual).  Naturally the google map and the GPS disagreed; 150 miles turned into 190.  But a lot of it was on scenic state roads.  Some of SC is flat as can be while other parts have some pretty good hills.

This state park is an old favorite.  I’d have to look back in this blog to see how many times we have been here.  I’m thinking it’s 6.  The campground is small with 16 campsites.  We arrived a bit after 2, parking was a breeze, setup quick, like we had been doing it all winter.

Carlene took Skye for a swim while I was finishing setup so she was all wet and happy.  By supper time she was dry again when we went out for another short walk around camp.  She wanted more water time but settled for meeting some people.  After supper we went on a longer walk down the park road.  We found a very small snake, about 4” long, a Worm Snake.  Never heard of it.  

Tomorrow we’ll go farther down that road.

Seen at a rest area today.

So you think you drive a big rig?

Skye spied this barrel with some flagging blowing in the breeze and was getting a bit defensive. 

Until she got closer

We had a visitor

Packing day

This was packing day for me, repack the camper and the truck for travel mode.  Put away all the cowboy gear, clothes, supplies and place it where it’ll ride home and not be in the way of things we need on the road. I was done with that about 11:00 and went for a long walk with Carlene and Skye.  The woods out behind the big pond have woods roads throughout.  

We met four young guys with air soft rifles playing some shooting games in the woods.  Everyone was having fun on a Sunday morning.  Skye found a dead box turtle.  And went swimming 23 times.  I didn’t actually count but it must be close.

Then a run into Belton for fuel and more groceries.  Tomorrow morning we head to Cheraw State Park in Cheraw SC for 3 nights.  Nice lake there.  It is not far to the store in Cheraw but it’s not a big store.  Only 150 miles.  Currently no plans after that.  Something to think about.  At this point we might be about 10 days from home.  Hard to believe.  Where did the time go?  

Sunrise

I defrosted the freezer

You have CHEESE!