Tennesee Accents Are Crazy

Woke up bright and early this morning around 7:30 am. I was super pumped that it was fairly quiet once the cicadas stopped being jerks and went to sleep. And there weren't any insane people up at 4 am being loud or anything, so that was nice. What's even nicer is that hey, I'm in a different time zone! So I actually slept until 8:30 am! Yay! I was a real World Ready Woman and attempted to roll up my tent, which was not easy, given that dew had accumulated on the bottom and the gravel stuck to it like mad, so I just sort of half-heartedly rolled it up and shoved it into the back seat, hanging half out of the bag. But whatever. I'll fix it when I get to Allison's. Off to the main office to get a map and figure out what I'm looking at.

Pit stop on my way to the falls. Seems like a pretty place to have lunch. I saw an incredible blue heron flying along the river when I walked up to the bank, but I didn't get a photo of it. It was huge and flying so low to the water. Just stunning. 

These, my dears, are the Great Falls. They are very loud and beautiful and they are on the same side of the river that the campground was on.  

Pretty extraordinary, right? I, as I always do, thought of the Native Americans and how they lived on this land before the Europeans invaded. What an amazing thing to live near. 

Down the river we go! The Twin Falls were downriver a bit, but in order to get to them, I had to drive back down river, cross the river, and drive up river again. About 6 miles total. 

Hey. There's a little castle back here. 

These were absolutely magnificent. I mean, just... wow. 

I took this photo because it was very Last of the Mohicans and Nina would have loved it. 

My mother will be very disappointed to know that I climbed down on these to get a better view of the falls. 

I actually enjoyed these rocks as much as the river, perhaps. 

These falls were a good 1,000 feet long, starting with the little ones like this and ending with the larger ones above. 

I stayed here for quite some time, just listening and breathing and thinking of two of my friends in particular who would have loved it there. Ironically, they both texted me within the hour. 

The view from where I was sitting. I can't recommend this park enough. It was not crowded at all, it was very easy to find, the camping was great, it was out of the way, and obviously, it was phenomenal scenery. On my drive down the back road to see these falls, I met no other cars, either there or coming back. There were 3 or 4 campsites still open at the campground, in late July. My kind of peaceful place. 

Then I had a very dumb drive to South Carolina. To be fair, it was not entirely dumb, it was just very long. That stretch of Tennessee into North Carolina from about Knoxville to Asheville is just gorgeous, but very twisty. I stopped at a diner called Sisters Diner and it was everything I hoped for. I got a huge breakfast meal for $4 and the waitress said, "Come back now, y'hear?" and I said, "I will," even though I most definitely will not. 

A second pit stop in Asheville to get some veggies for Allison at the farmers' market. 

It was so sweet. Everyone had big southern accents and called me ma'am and I just was so happy to be in Asheville again after years of not. 

Some of the fresh veggies that made their way to Allison's.

Yay!! South Carolina!! This is my friend Allison in the blue and my friend Jennifer next to me and Norah is on the ground acting like I'm not sure what. The last time I saw Allison, Norah was 3 years old, we think, and she was downright thrilled, not only to see me and Jennifer, but to also have more than just her parents to play games with. We played Pictionary Telephone and then Taboo, both of which involved a good amount of laughing, as every game night should. 

Tomorrow we are going the Thai restaurant we went to 5 years ago. Just to see if it's still the same and still there.