minor detours

Since we were driving yesterday anywhere most of the day, we decided why not, we should drive more!

The previous night after leaving Charleston, which is not south Carolina as previously stated. We passed by the real capital, Colombia, if we had known that fat then, we would have probably stopped, but Ignorant Americans such as us didn’t know that and we drove further and stopped for the night at charlotte (not the north Carolina capital).

 

We passed to Virginia in about an hour and started our tiny detour east. Close to 2 hours later we reached the natural bridge; this area is a tiny attraction area with a Wax museum, scary maze, dinosaur park, a zoo, toy museum, likely a tiny mountain Disney, too bad it was all closed!. The only thing that was open was the natural bridge itself. The bridge is what it sounds, a connection between two ridges that was not yet eroded by the stream below. The day was as good as a winter day can get, no clouds, blue skies and cold, so we assumed we could enjoy a nice walk. Too bad, nature was in the way. Icicles! The bridge forms an arch from below, but icicles are stuck on top and you cannot cross from fear of icicle decapitation. So we could only approach it. The structure is kind of impressive but I didn’t think it was as they hyped it to be (perhaps if we would stand under it we would, or see the restricted Indian village on the other side). They also had the oldest and largest Arbor Vitae tree (the tree dies 30 years ago, but it is still here), the tree was not impressive since compared to other big trees it is not that big. On the souvenir shop they displayed a sign saying that this was one of the seven natural wonders of the world, which immediately caught my attention, since this fact is blog worthy, but I doubted this fact since I have not heard of this place before. I asked them if this site was chosen on the international vote they had a few years ago, they nodded yes, but didn’t look convinced.  The way to the bridge was a stair case 137 stairs long, and they had a bus waiting for those not wanting to climb up. The bus driver\ guide was very enthusiastic about the place and all its attractions (closed for the season) and that we should come in the summer with all our friends and families.  He told about the Dino park so when we asked what’s there he admitted he never been there, it’s good that you recommend something you never seen, makes you seem very reliable. We walked up the stairs.

 

We kept going east and started looking at the list of natural attractions, I was not surprised not to see this bridge on the list, so we looked at the north America attractions, it wasn’t mentioned. I think someone said “it should be one of the seven natural wonders of the world” and they omitted a few words of the quote.

Btw – the seven wonders are the aurora borealis, the grand canyon, the great barrier reef, mount Everest , the port of Rio (not sure why, need to investigate), a volcano in Mexico. Forgot the 7^th, but you see what I mean, the caliber of these items , the bridge cannot be one of them. I have only been\seen to 2 of the above list.

 

2 hours later we reached the largest more impressive cavern in the east (there is a larger one in Kentucky, which is the east as well, but they refer to a more eastern east. This Luray cave is quite spectacular, with a lot of stalagmites and stalactites.   I visited other caves of this type before, this one is packed with them, but I had a short time (had a meeting) so I chose to pass, and let Alla go alone,  since they wouldn’t let us to a quick solo tour (u need a guide in the winter). In the end they allowed me to take a quick 20 minutes with short cuts and I got to see a large portion of the cave; alla saw the whole thing, just her and a guide (there is a plus in coming off season, no lines) and loved it. I got out in time for the meeting.

 

We found a little Grill café and were told by the waitress that they were voted as the best burger in the state (Virginia) , so I decided to explore and went with it. Decent burger, best in Virginia , I hope not. It was already dark when we left Luray, crossed mountain roads to west Virginia where a deputy canine unit Sherriff decided to hit on alla at a gas station (do you come here often?, you look familiar) , we left the place quickly, not wanted to annoy the local sheriff ,and later  spent 3 minutes in Maryland  (it has a very strange narrow border in this area) and crossed again to Pennsylvania. Few hours later we stopped for the night, this morning we are finishing the drive.

 

Btw – seeing a false 7 wonder, largest caves and best burger- that’s a tipple check for Virginia. We didn’t do enough (or anything in North Carolina and west Virginia to make it count) , well there is always another trip.

 

 

 

 

 

on living oaks , attacking pastas, freaky knees and a closed state

It’s weird to try to go back to everyday living after the death of a loved one, I guess you just have to do it.

 

We just passed by a cemetery which is called ‘Living Oaks’, crazy sense of humor in south Carolina.

Six months since the last state was reached, it’s getting harder now.

We left Israel on a Sunday night, arrived Monday noon in Cleveland, did a couple of interviews and 4 hours later we headed south by car to Savannah. Why Car and not fly, lots of reasons of little importance, but  we had a 12 hour drive ahead of us while already dead tired and jet legged. I planned on at least leave Ohio, but we drove an hour and a half and crashed (to sleep in some motel).

 

We woke early and drove most of the day, each state we passed we stopped at the travel center looking for attractions to keep us awake and interested, but when you ask the guide in these centers what is there to do this time of year, most of them smiled awkwardly and said there is little to do. Ski was one but that’s it.

 

We stopped in a little gas station somewhere in the wild West Virginia (each state has various nick names) and had a Deliverance flash back from the locals, we wanted to stop at the West Virginia museum of something (forgot what it was) so we took a little detour to a little nowhere place and found the place closed and replaced with another museum, so we went back on the road and soon reached Virginia, here too there is nothing to do in the area we were, they have large caves but not close to our road , so we went on few more hours till we reached North Carolina, we noticed a very unique mountain and gave it a nickname, the camel mountain, since it is shaped that way, but a few miles later in a welcome center, we found it’s a famous mountain here but I didn’t know it existed, Pilot mountain, looks amazing in the fall photos, perhaps next year. A dude overheard me looking for attractions and pointed me to a national park in south Carolina so we kept going, we passed Charlotte and entered south Carolina and stopped at the welcome center, which was CLOSED. How can a welcome center be closed, its whole purpose is to be open!, this closed trend would continue.

We wanted to stop at the outback for lunch (a kind or ordinary restaurant I recently revisited and really enjoyed, but the 2 places we found were closed… so we took another detour and headed for the unknown Congaree national park. We left the motel at 5 am that morning and it was 5 PM where we reached the park. The visitor center was open for 10 minutes more (unexpected break) but they told us to be quick with the tour since darkness was creeping in fast. In Ranger as I came in mistook me with someone and introduced me as that someone to another ranger, who was impressed with my coming plans, I corrected them that I was only myself and headed out for the park.

This park is a swamp, and the hike is on a boardwalk above the swamp. This was quite remarkable since you get to fill like you are in the swamp without threading knee deep in water and mud. This was a 4k hike and we hurried to beat the dark. As I said this park was interesting. They had a ton of squirrels, not the animal you expect to be in a swamp, but they not afraid and you could get close and see them run around. The interesting things were Knees. Knees are growths from the roots of the many cypress trees, they grow up from the ground, just like small barks structures and reach about knee high, perhaps it was the ambiance , perhaps the jet leg, but there was something strange and freaky about these knees in the swamp at dusk. We kept walking and ignored they ranger’s advice to go back, and chose to complete the tour, glad we did. We stopped by a swampy lake, and later saw an opossum. Usually Opossum are better known as road kill, and I have never seen one in the wild (not on or near the road), so it was a nice surprise. We also seen some kind of flightless bird, the unique Palmetto palms, lots of vines and over all enjoyed the unique swamp. We made it back just before it was too dark and drove on. We reached savannah around 9 PM and crashed for an hour, then went to the site for a project that would end the next night after 10 AM, not sure how I stayed awake after driving most of the way, next night I went to sleep early.

It’s kind of nice here in Georgia, because it is not as but freezing as Cleveland. It’s my 4^th visit to this site in Springfield and I never visited nearby savannah , and my mind was set to correct this injustice. So on night 3 my co driver and I went down town to the historic district. Savannah’s down town has many old 2 or 3 story houses which are well maintained but the city feels to dark. I guess it’s more lively in the summer. We stopped at the cotton exchange, a bustling place on the river board walk and ate a lot of grease and oil with food around it, then walked the huge cargo ships pass in the river, an impressive site. We walked for an hour in the old streets and gardens. A nice place but needs more light. In the week to follow we visited the city 3 more times (to make up for previous visits) and tried some better places.

On one night Alla checked the city and search top 10 places for sea food and found a place somewhere low on the list so we checked out the place, the place had 2 areas of seating, we went to the diner area and quickly swapped from the strong smell of oil. The other area is more of a restaurant looking place and was interesting. The booths looked like train booths, and the ceiling had moon and stars, and lights that resembled more stars, a very friendly informative waitress informed us that this was the 1^st Savannah restaurant with an air conditioner and the older restaurant in town that still exists, so we were seating in a place of local history. We told them we came for the sea food and they looked at us like we just came from south Carolina, they had sea food, but very little, the place is known for fried chicken. In this area you have 3 kinds of food, fried food, sea food or fried sea food. This place was about fried food, not bad fried food. In the end we received a copy of the original 1936 menu (not sure what to do with it, but it’s an original souvenir).

 

On one night we walked on the river boardwalk and stock at a local arts store that had photos, sculptures, some jewelry and interesting items. Alla liked the place and walked around and saw Earrings she liked with matching necklace that looked nice, she Is not the type to make such impulsive purchases, however I am, but I wanted to surprise her, so the next few minutes were a special Ops mission to buy them without Alla noticing… (after all 8 months anniversary comes only twice) while she was walking around I made silent request for the clerks to get the set out from a locked glass display case, to wrap and pay, I had to make contact a few times to complete the mission, all the time watching that alla is not watching and that the clerks are not ruining my surprise. Mission accomplished.

 

After over a week of too much fried food we left Savannah and started making the long way north (which is now covered in a lot of snow L), we are not in a hurry (see previous brackets to find out why). We stopped in historic Walterboro,  a little town I have no clue why it is historic. We stopped there by chance since when we came to the welcome center on this end of the state, guess what , it was closed. What is wrong with south Carolina, the whole state is closed. After short lunch we checked an option of kayaking in the longest black water river in the world. If you didn’t know (like me a few hours ago) black water river is a river with no rapids (no white water), and this is the longest kind of boring river (since white water is where the fun is), but we didn’t have 5 hours, it was already late afternoon, so we decided to detour again and headed for Charleston (S.C Capital city). We located a plantation )a place the planted and grew slaves…and also some crops) , which now makes money by showing people about slaves, but it was closed, we tried another plantation and it was closed too, so we headed to an impressive looking Navel &Maritime museum and arrived there 30 minutes before closing time, and it was closed (they close the ticket booth 90 minutes before closing time. We took some far away photos of the Air craft carrier, read some civil war facts (did you know it started in Charleston?) and went down town, after passing many closed galleries (I think this city had more art galleries then the whole of Ohio) we finally found a few opened ones and stopped at a little coffee shop, which is owned by the Gill and Grill bar (love the name, didn’t try the grill).

Alla like Charleston more than I did, she really loved it, I enjoyed it, but not as much, we both decided we need to check this place in the summer, but a visit to a state capitol + a national park + material for a long blog counts as a check for South Carolina  as state# 34( left to go Hawaii, New Mexico, Vermont, Delaware, North Carolina, West Virginia, Montana, Alabama, Wisconsin, south Dakota, north Dakota, Minnesota, Main, Virginia, Kentucky, Idaho) the other stets I am passing through so far do not count. Vermont is coming up in 2 months so this will be will be a travel filled year.

Few weeks ago, I took a short drive to south Tennessee (only 10 hours each way) and the only item of mild interest was a pasta that decided to fight back. This was in Columbus, 2 hours from home on the way back and I ordered some pasta somewhere. The pasta came with a lot of sauce, and as I slurped the spaghetti, It sprayed everywhere including a very direct spray right in my eye. Cream an oil affect the eye more then I  assumed it would, half blinding me for a minute , but worry not, I took my revenge on the rest of its family…

 

Cheers from somewhere before the north Carolina border (I hope that state is open)