Beaches, Baby! (6/4/25)

 

Living much of the year in the western half of the country, I really miss the ocean. I grew up swimming in the Atlantic, in MA and New Hampshire.  Hitting the beach was high on my list of things to do, and hitting the beaches further south than MA was even higher. The water felt toasty warm!

Our first beach stop was Emerald Isle North Carolina. We have never been here before, but it is now high on our list of places to return to…

The RV park we were in was walking distance to the beach, which is a huge deal.

Our first day we had to take care of some business in the morning, but spent the afternoon reading on the beach.

Our second day we combined the beach with hiking. We packed up towels, and lunch, in our beach chairs, which we can wear like backpacks.

We walked two miles down the beach, stopping whenever we felt like it. At the two mile mark we stopped for lunch,

and then meandered back, again, stopping to relax and enjoy the water.

That night we decided to go out to eat, and were delighted to learn that a seafood restaurant featuring live music was within walking distance.

We sat and enjoyed a drink while waiting for a table for dinner.

Our second beach stop was Virginia Beach, Virginia. Our RV park was not on the water this time, but it was a close second. There is a trolley that runs all day, until after 9 pm, every 20 minutes. You can get dropped off anywhere along the beach.  We packed a lunch and chairs and headed to the water.

The ocean here is a bit colder, and a bit rougher than North Carolina, but we still loved it. (that is not us, lol)

The trolley was so easy to use that we took it to the beach, then back to the campground to change for dinner, and back to the beach again.

Walking along the boardwalk, we looked for a souvenir to buy but came away with nothing. There had to be 20-30 beach volley ball courts all along the beach.

Again we couldn’t resist a restaurant with a view of the ocean, so we headed to Waterman’s for an early dinner.

We only had two nights in Virginia Beach before we needed to move on.

Skipping ahead, our third beach stop was Niantic Connecticut. It took a couple of days of driving to get this far because we were avoiding cities. We did stop a couple of museums along the way, but I will insert those posts after this one.

I lived in Connecticut for about 6 years but I had never been to Niantic. The RV park we stayed in here was also not on the beach, but has a free shuttle that will pick you up and drop you off wherever you want.

We didn’t have as much time here so we didn’t bother with chairs. The shuttle driver dropped us off at the far end of the 1 mile boardwalk, and we walked all along the beach towards town. Once there we had a late lunch at a restaurant before heading back to the campground. We are only an hour and a half from our destination in Massachusetts.

New House Update:

On  our way to the beaches we made a short stop in the small town of Hickory North Carolina, which has some fantastic furniture at fantastic prices. After shopping the huge furniture mall, we ordered our great room furniture from one of the stores. Since they are custom, it will take several months to get them.  Good timing- I hope.

Now that we have officially broken ground on the new house in Green Valley, we are receiving regular updates from the Supervisor:

Two Weeks in Laurel Springs, NC (5/30/25)

 

Meeting up with good friends Mike and Julie was one of the highlights of our trip east. We haven’t seen them in a couple of years but those hundreds of days melted away in about 2 minutes and then it felt like it was just yesterday- except that we realize how much we miss having them in our daily lives.

Our two weeks with them was busy, but not busy. We explored, we spent time with them, and with their friends, and we took time to just relax and enjoy.

We shared some meals, including a pot luck dinner…

and we shared campfires….

and we even shared meals around the campfire!

One of our adventures was to a local winery that had an event with live music and several vendors, and of course some wine tasting (cider for Paul)…

Being close to the Blue Ridge Parkway, there is tons of great hiking in this area.

One of our hiking days was spent at Grayson Highlands State Park… we first hiked the 1.5 mile  Rock house Ridge loop…

After which we took a break for a picnic lunch...

Our second trail of the day, to Big Pinnacle,  was a little more difficult with some rocky areas, but totally worth the views…

A few days later we combined hiking with music. We headed to the Blue Ridge Music Center where we hiked about 2 miles of the Fisher Peak Loop trail, without finishing the full loop.

As we returned to the music center we could hear the music starting up so we ate our lunch before heading to listen.

We managed to fit in one more day of hiking in our two week stay-

We walked about two miles along Bluff Mountain Trail, then called it done, and found a spot for lunch.

On our days off from hiking Paul and I did some exploring on our own- we found some pottery we liked at the winery and went to the potter’s  store to get more.

Mike and Julie (and other seasonal campers) have a pretty good garden that they tend to in the campground and Paul volunteered some time helping them do some planting.

I had promised myself I would get caught up on my blog ( I think we all know how well that went) but I had so many pictures to go through and organize- at least I got SOME done!

Memorial Day was quite gloomy so an impromptu party in the “barn” kept us all entertained.  Of course Paul and I helped with the quesadillas!

And then it was time to move on-

Heads, Carolina (10-08-22)

 As I debated the title for this post, I couldn’t get the words to a particular song out of my head, soooo….(google Cole Swindell- She Had Me At Heads Carolina)

I know I just wrote about going East but now we are going west- but I guess I should first write about what we did in North Carolina, since that’s probably a post in and of itself.

Our week with Mike and Julie was a whirlwind of activity…

During the day, we did several hikes, including two in Stone Mountain State Park (not to be confused with Stone Mountain in Georgia).

Our first hike the four of us took a 4.5 mile loop to visit Wolf Rock.

The other hike we did in the park was done differently. To hike the Stone Mountain Trail loop is 5.5 miles with 1000 ft of gain.  Paul and I hiked the loop, and Mike and Julie made it an out an back hike, and we met partway, at a waterfall, where we had lunch.

On our trail, it seemed like if it wasn’t stairs, it was a cable to help you keep your footing on the steep climb.

The views from Stone Mountain itself were pretty awesome.

Once we came off the mountain, we got some views of it from down below.

Eventually we had to descend 300 steps to get to the waterfall where we were meeting Mike and Julie.

…and the four of us finished the hike together!  It worked out very well.

When we weren’t hiking we were still adventuring.  Mike showed us the nearby cabin that used to belong to his parents, and we drove up to a lookout on the Blue Ridge Parkway to watch for migrating birds.

The evenings were full of Happy Hours and shared dinners.

Sometimes it was just the four of us and sometimes we met up with some of their friends- what a great group of people.

Our last night there, the four of us cooked a Mexican Feast for everyone.

Although we thought about extending our stay, we also need to get back west, and we have done the fast dash so many times, we wanted to be able to stop along the way and see some stuff- so, I looked online and snagged 3 nights in Great Smoky Mountain National Park.

We have only been to this park once and it rained the entire time we were there, so with good weather predicted, we were hoping to see what we couldn’t see last time-the main thing being the views from Clingmans Dome.

We waited our turn for a spot in the parking lot, and then we, along with thousands of other people, walked up the paved trail to the lookout. The views are pretty spectacular, and so, worth the crowds.

We were happy, however, that we knew about the “back trail” from the parking lot to the dome.

It had the advantage of being, longer, unpaved, and almost deserted. So that’s the way we went back.

We continued along the scenic road, stopping at lookouts whenever we saw a view we liked.

After one day in the park Paul made a decision. He was done with the crowds. 

We pulled out the park map and chose an area  to explore that seemed more off the beaten path for our second day in the park.  We chose a huge loop that took most of the day but we were fine with that.

We encountered very few people along this route- 4 wheel drive recommended. It wasn’t the most exciting drive, but that’s ok- I spent most of my time looking for bears. Nope, didn’t see one.

Most of the people we did see were at the small visitor center. We noticed a lot of people standing in a field, taking pictures of something. As we drove by, of course, we checked it out. Deer.  All I could think was that these people don’t get out of the city much.

We found a short hike to another lookout tower- this one called Look Rock.  The views were great and we saw just 3 people!

The main drag back into the park has the nickname “Tail of the Dragon”. This is one of those “bring it if ya got it” drives.

 It’s a dream drive for anyone in a sports car or on a motorcycle- Paul said it’s banked so well, he enjoyed driving it in the Jeep.  About every 1/4 mile there was someone with a camera and a website name plastered on their vehicle so you could log on and buy their pictures. 

We found a popular pull off and sat to watch the motorcycles and sports cars, many of which were sporting Go-Pros, zip by us, cruising along at a rate considerably over the speed limit. We were chatting with a guy who was driving an electric motorcycle, and this bike pulled up, which is also electric-and belongs to his brother. 

One of the things I did enjoy about Smoky Mountain, is that it reminded me of home (Massachusetts).  The trees are similar, and the rock is similar. I also enjoyed the crisp autumn air, particularly at our campsite, which was in the trees, mere feet from a stream. No matter how cold it gets in Arizona, we don’t get that crisp feeling you get back east. 

But that also means it is cold- and time to move.