You Must Forgive Me, If I'm Up and Gone to Carolina in My Mind

Our first day on Hilton Head Island was just as it should be.  Pool passes in hand, bikes rented, fridge stocked, yoga classes paid for, geocaches found, kayaks reserved, sailing classes registered, beer cold...  Life Is Good.

Our little "hobbit hole" sits right over wooded marsh land

Sundowners on our private stretch of beach 

with little sand crabs keeping us company while we ate our dinner 

Cooling our feet in the Atlantic 

Heading home along our little marshy trail

Farewell North Carolina

We had a wonderful time hiking and camping in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Western North Carolina.  It was so great to stay with Chad and Jodi and Bonnie and Barley.  We've listed a few of our favorite things...

Hiking with in Bonnie and Barley (in the rain)

Camping in the yard (in the rain) 

Chasing the dogs when they got out of the yard (in the rain)

Playing Settlers of Catan with Chad and Jodi

Eating tapas in downtown Asheville (then running to the car in the rain)

Gorging ourselves on all things Mexican at Papas and Beer

Driving through the mountains (in the rain)

Catching up with our wonderful friends, Sandy and Paddy

Geocaching (in the rain)

Riding in Sandy's Model T

Yoga with Jodi

It took us five plus hours to go from the High Country in North Carolina to the Low Country in South Carolina.  For your pleasure, we've posted the best of our Mad Libs written on that LONG drive :)

Afraid of the Dark 

by Alex, Connor, Eddie and Erica

I was home alone and scared out of my horses.  I could hear the wind driving and off in the distance, a bag was howling!  I crossed the room, locked the house and climbed into bed, pulling the kittens over my testicles.  Then it happened!  I could hear a fish frolicking up the stairs.  My head started to chatter.  My knees began skiing.  The blanket was thrust open and there was a huge bucket with hair all over its breast!  It was my father.  "Hi.  We're home," he said patiently.  "Hope you weren't afraid of staying home alone."  "No," I said, lying through my eyes.  

Geocaching in Western North Carolina

Our first geocache of the day - here we are running to find it....  

for the second time (we couldn't find it the other day)!

Searching in the wet woods - all the rain made the ground slippery. 

Finally found it - it was buried deep in the woods - we felt great when we found it!  

This picture is from our second geocache find of the day.  

Hint:  crook of a holly tree.  

The crook of a holly tree is nearly as strong as the crook of our arms! 

Signing the log book - this time we had a pen to sign it properly.  

Our third geocache of the day - for this one we had to search under rocks.

We put in the Travel Bug that dad and Erica picked up in China - it's been traveling around the world!  

Pisgah National Forest in the rain and good eats

Getting ready to hike up to John's Rock in Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina 

 Skipping over dry stones on the way up - by the time we came down it was a river!  

 We made it to the top just in time to put our new ponchos to use - 

we brought a bit of color to the grey day

 Slipping and sliding our way down

Instead of grilling our hot dogs outside we had a feast inside

S'mores on the porch - we didn't let the rain keep us from roasting a few marshmellows 

Another great meal - Papas and Beer in Asheville, North Carolina.  Best Mexican in town 

Geocaching and Model T's in Fairview, NC

Going for a ride with our friend Sandy Lynch in his old Model T

Connor:  This is us in Sandy's garage.  I'm cranking up the Model T.
Alex:  We cranked the 1914 Model T up for a geocaching adventure.
Connor:  Sandy took us to Hot Dog King where I found the geocache.  I suspect that he'd already found it and he surely put in one of the geocache toys.

Alex:  When you find a geocache you have to log in in the log book.  We didn't have a pen or pencil to sign the book so Sandy decided to use grease from the car to put on our thumbs - we left our thumb prints in the log book!
Connor:  It was incredibly fun!

Connor:  This is us with Sandy at the end of the adventure.  

Alex:  We had a great time going geocaching and hiking in North Carolina.

Hiking Big Glassy Mountain in Flat Rock, North Carolina

On our way up Big Glassy Mountain at the Carl Sandburg House in Flat Rock, North Carolina

Connor:  This picture was taken at the start.  Me and Alex didn't know how exhausted we would be!
Alex:  We are with Bonnie our dog from Africa (she is the yellow lab) and Barley.  Barley is Chad and Jodi's dog and she is a little black mix.

Connor:  This is halfway up and I felt like I was about to fall down and couldn't move!
Alex:  We were so exhausted that we stopped and had some water.  When we continued we were still exhausted so we got the dogs to pull us up!
Connor:  Every time we saw a bench and asked if we could have a rest or a drink dad said, "Nope!  We will move on to the next bench!"
Alex:  When dad said we had to keep moving I went ahead and stopped to take a breather!
Connor:  It was so unfair - they marched us straight up a mountain!

Connor:  It was a great relief when we got up to the top!  All the hard work and effort paid off for that one view.

Alex:  It was so good when we got to the top.  The dogs were exhausted, I was exhausted and I believe everyone else was exhausted!  And then my mind was blown when I heard we had to hike back down!!  And I was also shocked when Erica told me that we had taken the hard route up!  But at least we got to take the easy route down.

Alex:  When we got near the bottom we could hear thunder and then it bucketed down with rain!
Connor:  Alex and Erica and Barley were wimps hiding under trees while me and dad and Bonnie just kept walking!

Erica:  I couldn't have been happier!  A day in one of my favorite places in the world with my favorite people (and dogs) in the world.

Georgia on our minds and Krispy Kreme in our tummies!

Eddie:  Interesting to be back in a 1970s aircraft!  Plane, staff and entertainment system all hand-cranked.  Glad to have made it - phew!

Alex:  On the first flight we just played on the iPad with dad and our PSPs.  And then on the second plane Connor fell asleep in the first five minutes and then when he woke up he asked how long have I been out?  His mind was blown that he'd only been out for 49 minutes!

Connor:  The first flight was short, the second one was exceedingly long.  The third flight was the same as the first flight - just on a different plane.  When we arrived in Georgia I thought the air was really thick and heavy - I could barely breathe.

Erica:  Right now it's 5am - we have jet lag and are wide awake!  We are off for a real American treat and we are going in our pajamas.