Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Nov. 17-20th - Blue Ridge Parkway.

  Sorry for the delay in posts but we have been staying out of the cities, thus away from technology but we are back for a little bit. Anyhow this is what we've been doing. After leaving North Adams we headed down through New York and West Virginia before hopping onto the Blue Ridge Parkway. The Parkway was amazingly beautiful with new views around every bend and less brakepads after every overlook (yeah we stopped a lot and yes there will be lots of photos). We spent two nights at different rest stops along the parkway, cooking our food with an amazing stove (more on that later).
On Saturday the 19th we made it off the Parkway and into Roanoke, Virginia where we hustled our way through a Farmer's Market and a wonderful Natural Foods store with an amazing bulk section. That night we stayed in another rest area/overlook where we were able to cook an amazing meal with fresh vegetables and cheap beer.
 On Sunday the 20th we hustled our way down a long stretch of the parkway which included a couple hikes. One of the hikes was a 4 mile trek down to a gorgeous waterfall called Crabtree Falls. The waterfall was awesome, not an overly powerful falls dominated by the cacophony which is created by a large volume dropping somewhat vertically, but instead a steady rhythm of the wide stream pouring down a 75 degree rock wall.
 After the falls we loaded back up into our caravan and continued down the parkway to Asheville, North Carolina. After spending so many nights in parking lots, we decided that a campsite would be a great alternative. The first campground we tried was a mainly RV site and at 35 dollars a night for a tent site, the price was highway robbery. After talking to the managers at that campground we found out there was a couple more down the road so we continued down the French Broad River until we found the next campground, which was 29 dollars. We decided that was still not cheap enough and continued further down the river until we found A Place on the River Campground. The PRC was a modest plot filled with about 7 campers, a couple tents, and only cost $12.50 for the night so we decided to park ourselves there for the night. We didn't know what we were getting ourselves into...