No Whistle and a Wonderful Discovery

Hallelujah!  No whistle, the caulking did the trick!  Live and learn I guess.  

So before we left we had a few more things to accomplish, Jan got her final okay, finally after a whole year for her dental implant, thanks to Covid.  We met with friends John and Diane for a great get together.  Intense corn hole competition, great food, and a wonderful visit, and yes I forgot to take pictures:-)  Then it was time to get the truck tires rotated and balanced, and serendipity, they found a nail in one of the tires, so that saved us a bunch of hassle down the road.

We left Atlanta and headed north a bit, we wanted to go to a campground we have been trying to get to outside of Murphy, NC.  We had stayed there one time almost 20 years ago and remembered it as nice but a bit overgrown.  We arrived and it was wonderful, it is under new ownership and they have done a splendid job cleaning it up and making it like a beautiful park with a small creek running right through the campground and along side a larger river, the Valley River.  Our site backed right up on the small creek so we could listen to the song of babbling water, so peaceful.  North Georgia and western North Carolina are absolutely beautiful, especially in the spring, mountains are abundant and surprisingly tall, flowers, green everywhere, it is lush and gorgeous, couple that with incredible fishing opportunities makes it a very worthwhile visit.

Our awesome site!

Valley River right in the campground

The Nantahala River is nearby, which is home to the Nantahala Outdoor Center a rafting and kayaking center.  The upper end of the Nantahala is a fisherman's paradise, which unfortunately we did not partake of this visit as NC only sells a 10 day non-resident fishing license and the only warm day was our first day, so we will postpone that adventure until next year.  We have fished it before and had a great and productive experience.  But we did go and have lunch along the river.  Another huge plus for this time of year as there are almost no people here!

Nice lunch spot, huh?

Then just as we were finishing, along came the
Great Smoky Mountains Railroad

Then as an aside to those of you that have seen my efforts at fly tying, a mayfly, a Quill Gordon I believe, came by and I wanted to show the insect as well as a representation of the fly.  Mayflies are a huge part of the diet of trout.

We took advantage of the beautiful day to drive around and cook some shrimp on the barbie.  Come on, you knew there would have to be food pictures:-)

Cold weather moved in, 26df, although still clear and nice, and since I'm on a roll with food pics we went to one of our favorite BBQ places, Rib Country  Always good and always crowded.

I should mention one other thing, Jan and I are fully vaccinated, so are moving towards normalcy.  And what I wanted to say is that in FL, GA, NC, and now TN, we are seeing few masks except where mandated by a business, and even then not so much, gatherings of people all over, in fact here in Townsend, TN where we happen to be now, they are having a huge Bronco gathering, hundreds and hundreds of people and more Bronco II's than I have ever seen in one place!  We have seen only a sporadic few with masks on outdoors.  We have eaten inside for the first time and have continued to do it and will continue to do it.  I am not saying we are bulletproof, but we feel getting vaccinated gets you something tangible and real and allows a substantial return to normal.  I'll get off the soapbox now.

We took a nice 2 mile hike along the Valley River, and had coffee along that small part of the Nantahala that I mentioned fishing on.  We had a wonderful relaxing time in yet another beautiful area of our country.

Our hike

What a spot for coffee!

We had to bid farewell to head farther north to Townsend, TN, although we did make a reservation for 2 weeks next year:-)