Day 37: Great Smokey Mountains, TN to Nashville, TN 238 miles

We wanted to get an early start this morning to get to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennesse. It was so peaceful at our Boondockers welcome, that we slept in. I wanted to make a good breakfast and use some of he food we have been bringing along. Tad managed to squish our raisin bread so I made Squished Raisin Bread French Toast. We used eggs from our Twinholm hosts in Canada and ate the rest of the cantaloupe from our hosts a few days ago. A great cup of coffee and Kasey was ready to go in his bright floral shirt. So I had to wear mine. 

Gatlinburg is near one of the entrances to the Great Smokey Mountains NP. Don't go that way. It is like an amusement park with a road down the middle. We found out later that Dollywood is not far. 

We checked out the visitor center. It had some displays and a movie we watched about the park. The Park is an international biosphere due to its diversity of flora and fauna.

 The movie explained colonial settlement and the devastating effect that the demand for lumber had on the park. Trees as old as 150 years were becoming rare. There were people that rallied to help save the area and establish the national park. The effects from logging washed vital soil away before the park was preserved. About 25% of the park is undisturbed old growth.

 In the western US, we are raising the same concerns. Interesting how the same battles for our environment occur across our country. 

We took the tour route through some settlement areas. I had to chase a butterfly around the field to get a picture.

It was a Pipeline Swallowtail. We took the dogs for a quick swim to cool off and get a drink. 

They are not allowed in many places in the park so they stayed in the car. They were good sports. We headed back to the motorhome and thought we would just scoot through Gatlinburg since it was not too bad earlier.

The traffic was horrible. We should have taken the slow windy route out of the park to the west of Gatlinburg. There was a car show in town and gear heads were everywhere. Slowly, we made it out. Headed for Nashville and my nephew Charlie (Chris's brother that we visited in Michigan a few weeks ago) and his wife Amy's house. They just moved to Nashville in July from San Francisco.

We had to get gas as both vehicles were very low. 

One thing we found in the northern states is very few garbage cans. You must pick up after your dog, but there is no garbage collection in some places. A pack in pack out mentality. But we are travelling and need to unload our trash every so often. And poop bags are no fun to pack around in the motorhome. Or empty dog food cans. We did a lot of recycling at the Treman State Park in Ithaca, NY but have accumulated more items with no convenient place to recycle. Usually, we get rid of trash when we get gas but we forgot so we are "still packing." Correction, we were still packing. 

We stopped at a rest area just past Cookesville TN to give the dogs a break and us. We got stuck in traffic again.There must have been an accident as traffic was at a stand still. Since we were just before a exit, we road the shoulder to exit and wound our way to the next freeway entrance where the traffic was so much lighter. 

We arrived at Charlie and Amy's at 8 pm and ate dinner, sampled a few beers, and had great conversation. Their next door neighbor, Christian, came over. He is a brewer and owns his own brewing business. How serendipitous for Charlie and Amy. 

We got the tour of their house

 It is a gazillion times bigger than their San Francisco apartment. Charlie has enough room to give the "kids" their own room.

 Overall, a big win for them even though they are now much further from us.We couldn't be happier for them. 

We look forward to being a tourist in Nashville with them for a few days.

Day 36: Goodview, Virginia to Cosby, Tennessee - 265 miles

We are camping tonight in the Smoky Mountains at another Boondocking spot. Our hosts, Debbie and Scott communicated with us on the way, met us on arrival and helped get us parked on their beautiful property.   Again, we are overwhelmed by the kindness and hospitality of our hosts. Like everyone else we have met, they are active RV'ers and Boondockers.

We took about 5 hours to get here, stopping for lunch at the halfway mark. It was smooth sailing as far as driving as it has been the whole trip. We didn't stop at a National Park or other attraction but will be going to the Smoky Mountains National Park tomorrow. We noticed a lot of trees covered in Kudzu (Pueraria montana) one of the most invasive plants. The trees look like they have morphed into strange creatures.

We have been on the road for 5 weeks now and, if everything goes as planned, we will be home 2 weeks from today. It has been such a great adventure, better than we could ever imagined. We have had a wonderful time with Family and Friends and are excited to see Janice's Nephew, Charlie and his wife Amy for three nights starting tomorrow.  It has been amazing making new friends along the way and staying with them.

We are sitting under on beautiful patio Scott and Debbie made available for their Boondocking guests. Large acorns are dropping all around us from the Chestnut Oaks. It's definitely a sign that Fall is here. 

Traveling has been so easy and stress free. We only will be driving 3-4 hours each day going forward. Several of our Boondocking hosts have invited us to stay additional nights and wish we could have made adjustments to our schedule but have already made arrangements for the next stop and also need to be back by September 28-29 to help with the Blocktober/ Umpqua Brew Fest on October 7th.

We have also enjoyed our time together. We are great travel partners as are the Boys. We have had so much fun talking, reading, playing games and adventuring together. The weather has been nearly perfect. We've enjoyed some evening thunderstorms but have avoided any rainouts. 

We left home the day after our 9th anniversary and it seems like a honeymoon. We're already talking about our next Grand Adventure in March and April with dear friends. 

The simple pleasures are the best. Before we left home we made a huge pot of chili and grilled a lot of chicken and then froze them in two-meal containers and brought them with us. We ate out a lot with Friends and Family but are now "eating down the freezer". Last night we had Janice's famous chicken burritos and tonight we are having spaghetti. 

We're looking forward to being home and be with our Friends and our sweet kitty Comet. We are incredibly grateful to Liz and Jarrod for housesitting and giving her lots of love. We talked to Liz last night and could hear Comet purring and heard her meow. 

Day 35: Korgemae Farm, MD to Goodview, VA-224 miles

Today we left Korgemae Farm in MD where we stayed last night. It was near Harpers Ferry, WV. 

It was a remote farm. The hosts were not present.

We enjoyed their space for the night and packed up early to get a reasonable start to Antietam National Battlefield so we could learn more about the senseless slaughter of Americans over the right of people to be free. I hated it.

I guess I should also consider the senseless nature of colonialism itself. So much guilt, so much sadness, so much death. Yet here we are still fighting for segments of society to be equal and able to determine their own path in life. Women are the target for reproductive rights, black Americans are being denied representation in the democracy, and LGBTQ are fighting for the right to just be who they are and who they marry. I probably missed a few things but you get the point. We have moved forward and now we face the opposition from others who feel our freedoms limit theirs. How absurd. Self determination is a key part of our democracy. I can't see the other side of this. It makes no sense. But that is who I am and I firmly believe in my assessment of the situation. 

Apparently, Robert E. Lee was a conflicted individual. First a member on the Union Army but then fearing that the war itself was bad regardless of the cause, he was more interested in ending the war than he was in supporting the cause. So he joined the Confederates to fight. I don't understand how a man of his stature could reduce his sensibilities to a limited part of the outcome. A gamble it was and he lost. 

We are supposed to believe that there were good people on both sides, but how can anyone be on the good side if they forcibly subjugate their will on the freedoms of others?

Much has been made about the movement to remove confederate monuments in public places and I feel the place to put those is where we have visited recently. It is not erasing history, but making sure the full history is told. Let them be in the Monuments and National Parks as part of the full history, not in public places where those that feel offended have to endure their presence, every day when they shop, stroll, or dine.

The visitor center was recently opened after a major remodelling so it was sparkling clean. Listening to the Park guide at Antietam brought emotions that made me want to leave. This is not a history for the faint of heart. Hopefully we will not repeat the carnage of the past. It was a bloody war, but the outcome was necessary. In Sharpsville, the town closest to the battle, Abraham Lincoln received one vote. The local perspective was clouded by the smoke and the big picture escaped them. I hate to think of what the country would be like if the Confederates had won, Lincoln had lost, and people continued to be locked in servitude.

We drove an hour from Antietam without a word. What can you say? Words cannot capture this and pleasantries would not be genuine.

The stay for the night is Pelican's Roost, near Goodview, VA just SE of Roanoke, VA. A very peaceful and secluded spot. Perfect for what we needed to decompress. 

We had a few virtual meetings to catch up on Umpqua Watersheds events and talked with our friend Liz who is housesitting to keep our precious cat, Comet, company. 

Our host, Robert came by just before dark to say hi and ask if we needed anything. He told us about the area and how he came to own it. He is from San Diego and bought the land, cleared it, and put in a modular house. The view is idealic. He loves to boondock and that is how he came to offer his place to other travellers.

Day 34: Not enough time! Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to Harpers Ferry, West Virginia 55 miles

We left our new friends, Sharon and Ed at Willows Grove near Gettysburg and headed toward Harpers Ferry, WV. We had such a wonderful time at Willows Grove. I will never forget sitting by a campfire next to the creek that runs by their property. In 1864, Confederate soldiers camped at that spot, only 3 miles from the headquarters of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. I wondered how many soldiers camped there the night before they were killed, wounded or captured at Gettysburg the next day. 

So many emotions. Willows Grove was magical, listening to  the creek and the owls next to the campfire. Janice wrote her blog and I just soaked everything in.

We arrived at our next boondocking spot at 2pm. It is a large farm that is being restored. Sadly, we didn't connect with our hosts. We were all on our own but everything was set up for us although we didn't need water or electricity that was available.

We loaded the Boys in the Honda and headed into Harpers Ferry only to find out a detour was in place starting today which added 40 minutes to our trip so instead of 15-20 minutes it was closer to an hour. While we were disappointed it took longer to get there and back, the detour took us on some backroads and some topsy turvy roads.

Harpers Ferry was interesting but the layout of the National Park is confusing. The parking lot and information center is on a hill above the town of Harpers Ferry near where the Appalacian Trail information center is located. Busses are available to take visitor to town and there is also a trail. Given dogs aren't allowed on the bus we started to take the trail, walked half a mile and discovered the trail was steep, it was also 88 degrees with high humidity so we went back and got in the Honda and drove to the train station where we were told there was free parking. After getting lost several times we found the lot and toured the park and the ground.

We discovered Harpers Ferry was not o ly the place where Abolitionist John Brown had tried to raid the armory in hopes of arming black people and others to begin  revolution against slavery it was also where Meriweather Lewis came to get guns and ammunition for the Corps of Discoverey Expedition.

It was very interesting but by the end of the day Janice and I were "toured out" after we got back to our camping spot around 6:30. We took the Boys for a couple walks and heard a Great Horned Owl and saw several fireflys. It was still hot and humid but a thunderstorm moved in and a breeze picked up so it should be good sleeping weather tonight.

We plan on driving 3-4 hours a day going forward and spending only a night when we stop, except when we spend 3 nights in Nashville at Janice's nephew, Charlie and his wife Amy's home.

It is fun to see so many places and it would be nice to stay longer and see more at some places. Our new friends, Ed and Sharon at Willow Grove last night encouraged us to spend another night with them and Janice and I wish we had because it was so relaxing and fun to be with these special people. We will be back!

I have a lot to think about after touring the battlefields and historic places we have seen over the last two days. It is sobering to think how two armies with nearly 100,000 soldiers fought and died or were critically wounded. It was a chess game with human pieces and so much was sacrificed for democracy and freedom. Hopefully it will never be taken for granted.

Day 33: Trout Run, PA to Gettysburg, PA: 141 miles

It rained most of the night and the spot we chose was not ideal. It turns out that on the other side of the freeway, the convenience store was closed for remodeling. So, we could have had less traffic during the night, but our walk in the morning with the dogs was nicer on the side we chose. 

The cemetery at Trout Run was perfect for a quick stroll to have the dogs and us stretch our legs. We thought we could get coffee and gas across the highway and hit the road. But we got gas and no coffee because of the remodeling. We were only a few miles from Williamsport, PA so we got off the freeway early so we could find a place to get coffee. Why does Williamsport sound so familiar? Anyway, right on the way and convenient to get back on the highway was the Backhouse Cafe and Coffee house. 

A house converted into a gathering place where people could have coffee and visit. The place was very quaint and historic as is most places in the eastern US. It turns out that the building was built by Henry Johnson, a Pennsylvania legislature that was instrumental in getting the voting age lowered to 18 and the right for soldiers on the battlefield to vote. Without it, Lincoln may have lost Pennsylvania and his re-election. There were lots of historical brick and stone buildings. West coasters are not used to these kinds of regular sitings. 

As we were driving through town, a few mentions of Little League Baseball and it dawned on Kasey that we were in the place were Little League Baseball Championships are played. There were bronze statues along the streets of Little Leaguers. 

Back on our way to Gettysburg, PA our first stop was the visitor center and museum of the Gettysburg National Military Park. We stopped in for information, pictures of museum displays, and a few souvenirs. Mostly books and refrigerator magnets. We were able to get a few pictures with Abe himself. 

We decided to do the auto tour. It is across the area of Gettysburg and has 16 stops. Statues, monuments, and replicas of canons dot the landscape each telling a part of the story of that event that can only be described as carnage. Total casualties of both the Union and Confederates was over 51,000 and over 7000 people were killed in this area. The Union fighting for the right to make policy in support of individual rights and the Confederates fighting for the right to keep policies that allow wealthy individuals to enslave those with darker skin. A sort of status quo mentality. 

Our tour took us to the spot where President Abraham Lincoln gave his famous Gettysburg Address. It was a speech that lasted 3 minutes and talked of our nation and democracy. There was no gloating, no partisanship. 

Lincoln sought to bring the country together because he knew that the nation was changing; changing for the good.

The whole experience was numbing and gut wrenching. I found myself feeling sick to my stomach and also sad and frustrated. Frustrated that we are still fighting for the right to set policy that moves this nation forward, all while the forces of evil are eroding those same gains that were won on the battlefield. Among us are those that seek to return us to the days before civil rights and equality. Frustrated because if we truly had a voting democracy, the rights of individuals would be secured in the constitution and the right to to set policy for this nation would not be so easily undermined by those that seek to win by cheating, or force.

(This young, shirtless man we saw visiting the memorials is packing a revolver and sporting a tattoo of an AK47 on the upper part of his back.)

Our nation could have been completely different if the battle outcomes had not been in the Union's favor. The forces of evil are still among us. I have never missed a vote since I was legally able and I never will. We must constantly secure our liberties by remembering history, voting, and not giving up on the quest for a more perfect union.

Nearby is Eisenhower's home and we got there late but was able to get the Bark Ranger badges for the boys. A little badge indicating that they were good dogs while visiting the park.

The day ended perfectly at our host's place, Willow Grove just 10 miles from Gettysburg. Sharon and Ed enthusiastically greeted us, let us have firewood for a fire by the babbling brook, let the dogs romp and play in their yard and stream, and brought us fresh fruit and produce. They love to travel as we do and gave us tips on good places to stay.  

We sat by the fire into the evening. Sharon joined us for a while. Before turning in for the evening, I apparently was not going to get away from these parts without hearing a barred owl. Oh, well, at least they belong here.

Day 32: A Momentous Occasion - Ithaca to Victor, New York to Trout Run Pennsylvania 230 miles

We celebrated the wedding of Ryan Kincaid and Ryan Heller this afternoon after traveling from Ithaca to Victor NY. It was a beautiful wedding and everything couldn't have gone better for the Newlyweds. The forecast called for rain but nary a drop fell during the wedding or during the reception. The "Ryans" did a marvelous job on their vows. They put so much thought and creativity into them. They are a perfect match for each other and we're so glad we had the opportunity to meet their friends and family and be with them on their wedding.

The wedding and reception was at the Ganondagon State Historic Site  It is a perfect setting. It is built on the former site of a Seneca Village and has a very informative museum about what life was like in a Seneca Village. We highly recommend visiting here if you are in the area and wish we could have spent more time there.

Before the wedding Janice and I took the Boys for a hike for an hour on the Ganondagon trails. I ate an apple and some plums from trees on the trail. There were lots of informative signs about how the Seneca people used various plants and trees. There was a replica Long House. I thought about how many young people got married in the Village and what the customs were. Again, I wish we had more time there. I will definitely be researcing more of their history when we return home.

We decided to drive a bit to cut in half what would have been a 5 hour drive to Gettysburg National Military Park.  It rained really hard in spots along the way. I am so glad it didn't rain on the wedding.

We are now on the homeward side of our trip. Except for a Friday through Sunday stay in Nashville it will all be 1 night stands near places of interest. Tonight we are pulled off the highway on a lot in what appeared to be a low-traffic area.

 Unfortunately there must be an ultra secret UFO base nearby because lots of trucks keep pulling off the road and then coming back every 20-30 minutes. I will try to take a Selfie if we come across any aliens.

I left our itinary at our Twinholm Lane hosts house in Canada. Ross was kind enough to send me a picture of it. I will update it when I get a chance as there have been a few changes but the timeline remains the same. Much Love, K&J

Day 31: More adventures in Ithaca, NY

And in another episode of how things sometimes go wrong....We aren't sure what happened but we ran out of power this morning and had to use the backup power to recharge. Kasey mentioned that he left the motorhome in reverse and turned the engine off but did not remove the key. The coach battery shouldn't have anything to do with the house battery, except to charge it when we run the engine. It is not supposed to pull battery power from the house battery. We had full power after the recharge from the backup and so far it is holding. Hopefully it is nothing serious.

This morning we wanted to get to the Ithaca Farmers Market early because we heard about the difficulty of finding a parking spot. It was cloudy and a few sprinkles, but tolerable. We had a big hike yesterday so we are being cautious with Lincoln and his back legs, but he was as good as normal. We arrived a little before it opened and had no trouble with parking. Dogs aren't allowed in the pavillion so we made our rounds to check out the wares. You could tell the popular booths by the lines already forming: fresh bread, breakfast burritos, and organic fresh meat and poultry. 

This is the 50th Anniversary of the market.

We looked for Jeri and Woody in the pictures, but could not find them.

Not knowing our power situation back at the motorhome, we opted to get some breakfast bakery items. We started strolling around the waterfront, watching the Cornell Crew team, the boats, and talking to a resident, Katie with her Golden Retriever, Mooky. 

That got us thinking about our pups and so we went and got them for a stroll. We soon had to get going to our next activity at Gourdlandia. 

The wedding couple, Ryan K. and Ryan H., met us there. Ryan H's mom and her husband Rick also were there. A few other people were not there because their plane was delayed. 

Our goal was to drill little holes in a small gourd that was preprepared for a nightlight. Fearful of anything that requires artistic talent, I chuckled nervously at what I might create. Some exquisite examples were shown to us for ideas. Now, I am even more sure that this could end poorly. But, I turned to Google for help. It was an interesting learning experience. 

Kasey, Ryan K. and Ryan H. had wonderful final products. We got a nice tour of the gourd garden (under the watchful eyes 2 Irish Setters who heard our voices) which is located on the Ithaca Ecovillage grounds, on Rachel Carson Way. I am guessing that the grounds are pesticide free.

From there we headed to Moosewood Cafe, a very famous vegetarian restaurant in downtown Ithaca. When I was in college, back in my vegetarian days, the Moosewood Cookbook was a favorite. We were meeting Cindy Haws and her high school friend Karen for lunch. We had a great visit and will see them at the wedding. Cindy is a dear friend from the

Umpqua Valley in Oregon who is also a biologist. She is Chair of the Umpqua Watersheds Education Committee and former Forest Service Forest Biologist on the Umpqua National Forest. We have known her for a long time due to these connections. When Ryan K. was the AmeriCorps for Umpqua Watersheds a few years ago, she rented a room from Cindy in Myrtle Creek. They became great friends.

After lunch, we decided to visit Cornell. Mostly because I wanted to be able to say that I went to Cornell. We went to the welcome center. So now I can say that I was welcomed when I went to Cornell. The welcome center has an impressive botanical garden. The Nevin Center is amazing and I wish we had more time to visit it, but we need to save something for next time.  We saw a very big Dawn Redwood. Impressive.

Another must see according to Ryan, is Wegman Grocery Store. Again, not knowing what our power situation was, we opted to just pick up a few non-perishable items. That was the last stop before heading back to the motorhome at Treman State Park. Upon arriving, we found that our power situation was normal so the mystery continues. We sat outside listening to birds and apparently other noises coming from the direction of our neighboring campers tent. I can't say for sure what the noise was but he got out and smoked a cigarette while she went off to the showers. Ah, I just love campgrounds....Not!

Day 30: Ithaca, NY "Some Kind of Wonderful!"

Today was going to be a slow day to catch up on a few things and take some hikes in the Robert H. "don't forget the H." Treman State Park. Janice and I aren't fond of campgrounds because we prefer not to be in crowded campgrounds when we are used to quiet spaces. In campgrounds we share the space with tent campers, who sometimes give us the stinkeye as we roll into the campground with our RV. "That's not REAL camping!" We imagine them saying because we used to say it when we were tent campers. We soothe our guilt by saying "It's so we can take the dogs" but in actuality it's because we love traveling, hate hotels and air travel, and love our "rolling cabin."  On the other spectrum of campground guests are the ones in RV's who have no respect for anyone, run their generators for hours on end and basically give us RV'ers a worse reputation with the tenting community. But there are also nice people here like the guy 40 yards away who said "bless you" when I sneezed when we were sitting outside tonight. Did I mention we like privacy?

Where are you going with this pointless monologue you may be asking. Well... we thought we would have some downtime in this campground, walk a few trails, take a shower in the Big Shower (ours is very small and I have invaded my own space when I've dropped the soap on a number of occasions. No pictures, I promise, but it's not very pretty), use the campground dump station, fill up with water and move on down the road. ANYWAY... we ended up having a wonderful time at this park because of the incredible trails they have here.

We found out our dear friends, Jesse and Zoe got married here and we found out why they chose this place. There are several miles of hiking trails and 12 waterfalls! We hiked over 8 miles with the Boys and had such a memorable time.

We took numerous selfies to cement our (Kasey's) reputation as the Selfie King " Long live the King!

The Boys had so much fun and we met a few people on the trail who seemed nice (except for the fellow on the bridge who reminded me of one of the characters in the movie "Deliverence". Banjo music still makes me clentch in all the wrong places but we won't go there).

We decided to stay another night here so we can explore Ithaca tomorrow. We got back from our hike, drank some water (yes, we drink water), fed the Boys and took showers. We had chili I made and froze when we left 4 weeks ago. It was delicious. Janice beat me in a card game called "Spite and Malice". She usually wins because I am much nicer than she is. 😉

It was a wonderful day.