One of America’s best scenic drives, the Blue Ridge Parkway is a narrow, winding road at the top of a mountain range. It offers spectacular views and some great things to stop off at along the way.
It’s about 400 miles long, but I only drove the North Carolina part and skipped the Virginian part. There’s only so many scenic overlooks you can be inspired by and as beautiful as winding roads are, they are also very tiring to drive.
I love the film Scott Pilgrim vs The World. It is such a cool film and an original execution. So while in Asheville, North Carolina, I was excited to see that there was a free outdoor screening.
I headed down to the cinema carpark where it was shown on the outside wall, set up my folding chair that I’ve only used once or twice, and sat back to enjoy the film.
Driving past a Volvo dealership in Asheville, North Carolina, I decided it was time for a little tune-up after more than 6000 miles on the road. I was lucky to be able to walk in and get her an appointment where she got a new headlight. I hadn’t even noticed that a headlight was blown as I haven’t been doing any night driving. When I realised that, I thought it sounded a little strange to me. Two months on the road and virtually no night driving. I sound like a nanna.
Stretching for 2000 miles from Maine to Georgia is the famous Appalachian Trail. For many hikers, this is the ultimate adventure, and if they can’t complete the whole thing at once (a huge commitment) then they will cover it piece by piece.
Atop the Smoky Mountains at the state border between Tennessee and North Carolina, there is a monument and a 1.7 mile section of the Appalachian Trail you can complete.
On this trip I’ve discovered a bit of a liking for hiking. In Peru all those years ago I discovered I didn’t like walking up or downhill. Something rather limiting when travelling in mountainous regions. But I think that laziness has faded, and I don’t mind exerting some effort to climb a mountain or descend a canyon.
Therefore, I wasn’t going to pass up the ability to say I’d hiked part of the Appalachian Trail. I set out from a carpark full of Americans and expected to find the trail heavily trafficked. Well, as my Lonely Planet explains, 90% of visitors don’t venture further than 100 yards from their car. I found this to be true. The first stretch was filled with families, but after a couple of hundred metres, the trail was quiet and just had a few people passing by.
Maybe here it was that I started to flesh out the idea that Americans aren’t particularly adventurous. I hasten to add that I have also met many adventurous Americans in my travels, it just seems people are less likely to take risks and will continue in the well-worn formula of life – school, university, work, get married, raise a family, retire.
I was all gung-ho to do a difficult hike to some waterfalls, but after the campground owner came around to have a chat because he was excited to have an Australian staying with them so he could talk about his daughter and granddaughters who live in Sydney, he had scared me off doing it.
He told me there was going to be a big storm. And that it wasn’t the ideal weather to be doing a big hike as the storm looked pretty bad. For some reason this news seemed to hit me like a punch in the chest and I had to bite back the tears that were threatening. It doesn’t happen very often that I have such an emotional response to disappointment, and even more rarely over something as trivial as a hike. But here I was, dealing with the dismay of having to change the plans I’d carefully crafted.
So I hiked to a different set of falls that were closer and easier to get to. I had my gore-tex jacket on to keep the constant drizzle off. My glasses fogged up which made seeing the network of exposed roots difficult. The walk was really pretty and given the weather, I had it pretty much to myself except for encountering a few brave families along the way.
After I got back from Hen Wallow Falls, the weather had cleared up, so I drove to the Visitor Centre, through the touristy town of Gatlinburg, and then decided with the sun now showing, that I would hike to Rainbow Falls.
It was more of an uphill than in the morning, and there were more people on the trail. It never fails to surprise me how under-prepared many Americans visiting national parks are. They embark on these hikes wearing flip-flops and carrying a half full bottle of water. Maybe I’m overprepared with my backpack, 4 litres of water, snacks, hat and Merrell hiking shoes, but I’d rather have those things than find myself wishing I had them.
Feeling like I’d walked a long way, I asked a couple coming back down if it was very far to the falls, and they said it was just around the corner. Around the corner was a smallish cascade that, while pretty, didn’t really seem impressive enough to name a trail after. So after a pause, I decided to keep following the trail and see where it lead. Lo and behold, 10 minutes later, I came across Rainbow Falls, complete with a sign. I shook my head and thought about those silly Americans who had walked all that way only to miss the actual falls because they weren’t curious enough to see where the path went.
It must be something to do with coming from a flat, barren topography that makes the mountains so majestic and beautiful in my mind. They are awe-inspiring and I gape with wonder.
As I neared the Great Smoky Mountains, I nearly exploded with wonder at their dense, green blanket and low wispy clouds. The steamy, jungly smell of the forest and the vivid green appealed so strongly to me.
That combination of green and mountain is completely fascinating to someone who lives on the edge of the desert and where there is only one place in town to practise handbrake starts.
I can tell I’m going to love this part of America.
Is that not how the song goes?
Nashville surprised me. As I scanned the radio station for a country music channel playing something I could tap my toes to, I found a great city that can completely be related to Las Vegas – it is a city made of dreams.
The neon lit bars of Broadway splashed colour along the strip, enticing the hoardes of tourists in to hear the live music.
Cowboy boots and little floral dresses seemed to be the fashion statement of choice and more than one person had their photo taken with the giant guitar on the street corner.
Like Vegas, the main street was filled with people there to have a good time. And that vibe is infectious.
So even if you’re not into country music and Nashville isn’t your mecca, it still provides plenty of fun. Although don’t bother with the mechanical bull at Cadillac Ranch, it’s lame in comparison to the true country bull at PBR in Kansas City.
“I wonder if the rangers need to be accredited?” was a comment I head a young woman ask her partner as I was following a hundred Americans through Mammoth Cave in Kentucky.
I almost snorted out loud.
Maybe my attitude was tainted by the little sleep I’d had the night before and the subsequent drive, but this tour was interminably boring. Since you can only see the cave on a tour, I selected one that described the difficulty level as ‘moderate’ hoping it would weed out the old, feeble, very young and unadventurous. However we still had all of the above on the tour, as many people seem to overstate their abilities.
Perhaps my ‘tude also came from being told by the long-haired, red necked ranger that I couldn’t take my bottle of water even though I’d been told at the ticket booth that water was allowed. Apparently it had to be in a see-through bottle. Thanks for telling me earlier instead of in front of 100 waiting Americans.
On the bus to the cave entrance, an old yellow school bus that this time I was not excited to ride, I decided to close my eyes and take a little nap. I was interrupted by the small children in front of me saying “look Grandpa, she’s sleeping”. Grandpa replied “Oh no, she’s just pretending.” So when I did open my eyes to glare at them, I caught 3 pairs of little eyes watching me like I was a Wiggles DVD. Grandpa received my sleep status update with a whisper.
I probably should have cut my $12 loss on the ticket and walked back to the visitor centre from there instead of following a bunch of painful people through a largely unimpressive cave.
The last cave I was in was at Waitomo, New Zealand where I abseiled through two waterfalls and got to rock scramble. That was exciting. The cave before that in Margaret River, Western Australia was incredibly beautiful and full of formations.
This dry cavern wasn’t particularly interesting, even less so when you are traipsing behind oohing and aahing Americans in a conga line that’s enough to make someone claustrophobic.
Thankfully the last little bit of the tour took us through the only patch of stalagmites and stalactites in the 300 plus miles of Mammoth Cave, the biggest in the world. That was interesting, but sadly my enthusiasm had completely disappeared and I needed to get away from the herd.
Now I’m hellbent on avoiding anything that is “family friendly”. I need more excitement than those type of activities can muster up. Or maybe I just need to be more tolerant. A situation greatly aided with a good amount of sleep.
I met some English guys at the pub in Louisville and in the pouring rain I drove two of them to Wick’s bar where were going to get pizza and party into the night.
I half-heartedly conversed with them as my concentration was required on the roads which were like rivers, and were it seemed to take an eternity to drive the two miles there.
My knuckles whitened and gripped Esmeralda’s steering wheel harder as a weather warning for tornadoes came over the radio. No sooner had we driven past the bar did I hear the tornado sirens wailing in the streets.
I quickly parked Esmeralda behind a bank and post office, not caring if it was a towaway zone and said to the guys “We have to get out now!” and jumped out. The two Poms didn’t understand my haste and ten metres from the car I screamed at them to get out of the car so I could lock it.
“These are tornado sirens, we have to get inside NOW!” I bellowed like a fishwife.
I was petrified. I had visions of the tornado raging through the water-filled streets sucking me up along and slamming me with debris.
I ran about 20 metres to the street corner and barely checking the traffic, crossed the streets at a sloshy run holding my hands up in a ‘stop’ command to any vehicles thinking of crossing my path. I didn’t stop until I got to the safety of the bar and then turned to see the guys still standing on the other side of the street, bewildered and looking lost.
We asked a couple in a booth eating pizza if they were tornado sirens in the street and they were so nonplussed as they said “yeah” with a shrug of their shoulders. I was still packing shit. My legs were jittery from the adrenaline that had pumped through them in a state of fear just moments before.
At the counter I asked a girl about the sirens, my voice incredulous as it asked “Is that a tornado warning? Is there a tornado?” My eyes were wide with fear and she laughed it off and said oh-so-coolly “Yeah”. I asked if we were going to be okay and her reply was a not particularly comforting “Yeah, if it gets really bad we have a big basement.”
The guys clearly weren’t afraid as they were more worried about getting drinks. We had to go through to another section where you got all the beer and pizza you wanted for $10.75. The tornado warning and sirens were still on my mind and I ended up having a big conversation with the bouncer checking IDs about it. He finally calmed my nerves as he gave me all the info I was after. Apparently the tornado had touched down in Louisville earlier that afternoon (while I was in the safety of my motel room) and had taken the roof off a sports stadium. He said the danger was over and the rains were just what follows. Only after this conversation did I start to feel less shaky.
I think, even though I wasn’t right in middle the storm, that this is the most scared I’ve ever been.
It feels kind of strange to sneak up on a National Monument from behind, but that’s what happens when you come from the west to a monument signifying the gateway to the west.
I joined a throng of Americans to go up to the top of the 630 foot tall Gateway Arch, which kind of looks like a massive half of a McDonald’s M, just in silver. In the capsule to the top, a guy commented “I’m surprised McDonald’s hasn’t set up shop next door” echoing what I was thinking.
a little cameo 