Monday, July 20, 2009

Driving on the Parkway


It's the "end" of our little family summer back home in South Carolina and we decided to pull away for some time to ourselves before having to head back to obligations and excitement in New Mexico. We decided to take a lazy trip back west by heading up the Blue Ridge Parkway first, then deciding how we would get home from there.

The beauty of the trip is the spontaneity of it all. We started out by leaving charleston last Thursday and ended up at Lake Jocassee (Devil's Fork State Park) by nightfall...since then, it's been the Blue Ridge Parkway the whole way until today (Monday). We stayed at Mt. Pisgah, Doughton Park VA., Roanoke Mt. VA, and now a Holiday Inn express for a little break from the camping life.


There have been TONS of cool sights along the way, and we've definitely been taking advantage of the whole "drive awhile, stop awhile" mentality of the Blue Ridge Parkway. Most memorable stops so far have been Brinegar Cabin, Mabry Mill, and Roanoke Mt. park where we saw a surprise bluegrass concert on Sunday night.



We also had an unexpected reunion with our friends Tim Okeefe, his sons Devin and Colin, and his wife Heidi Mills when we stayed in Devil's Fork State Park. We haven't seen them in some time and it was so good to catch up! This is our little Moira posing with Heidi and the Okeefe boys.


So from here the plan is to spend a little time in Shenandoah National Park before heading west for sure. The only major places we want to hit on the way back are Mammoth Cave and the Laura Ingalls Wilder museum. If we hit those soon enough, we may head past our New Mexico home and go to the Grand Canyon and Canyon DeChelly before calling it quits on our road trip summer.

Happy Trails!

1 comment:

Danielle said...

Sounds like fun!! My dad's parents are from VA near Mabry Mill. We have several pictures from there since we go there every year for our family reunion. Wish we would have known you were there, because we were there this past weekend too. I hope you have safe travel the rest of the way.