Christmas 2008

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Here is photo of our tree this year. It has to be one of the best shaped trees we have had in years.

This weekend we received another six (6) inches of snow and now have extremely cold and windy conditions. This is on top of the eight (8) inches we got last week. Our backs are sore from all of the shoveling!

We are looking forward to the Christmas season. We had a dinner party in Minneapolis yesterday with our ANG friends. On Christmas eve we are going to Russ and Janice Frys followed by Christmas day at Michelle's. Andrew arrives for a week on Christmas and we are looking forward to seeing him and hearing about his new position.

We wish everyone a save and joyous Christmas and New Year's!!

Panther Valley Hike

Monday was beautiful day in North Carolina for a hike. The group consisted of Ralph and I and six other guys. The hike leader, Chan was very familiar with the area as he had hiked in the valley many times before with Carlton, an older man who had lived in the valley and made many of the trails. We parked at Carlton's house and took a few short cuts to start the hike. Panther Valley has a very primitive trail system, there are some logging roads in the area that you can follow, but we followed Carlton's trails. The trails looked more like deer paths to me. We followed them through Carlton's Field of Ferns to Devil's Elbow where we crossed a stream. Ralph and I had to go barefoot. Brrr!!!! We hiked back upstream and up hill to Camille's Falls where we had lunch. Each time we went down to the river we had to find a trail through the rhododendrons and mountain laurel bushes, no cut branches to make it easy for the tall guys. Chan took us to Green Creek Falls, Warren Falls and the most well known falls in the area, Schoolhouse Falls. You can walk behind Schoolhouse falls if you are careful. It was a great ending to the hike with a fairly short uphill climb back to the start of the hike.

Perfect Fall Weather

Today was a perfect fall day. Cool evening temperatures ( around 30 degrees ) followed by blue skies and temperatures reaching 68 degrees around 3:00pm. The photos do not capture the how vivid the colors are in the area. This is the peak week for colors and what surprises us is how long the leaves stay on the trees, compared to Minnesota or Wisconsin.

Tomorrow we are going on a long hike in western NC. We are going 40 miles west to a lake region where everyone tells us we will see around 15 waterfalls. We will publish another post later this week with some pictures of the hike.

With one week to go, we are looking forward to seeing family and friends, but will miss this area.

Happy Birthday, Justin !!

Happy 35th. Enjoy the day !!

Snow and Cold !!

This morning the weather was worst than Minnesota ! At 9:00am the temp was 34, the skies overcast and the wind gusting to 30+ mph. At 10:00am it starting snowing. The sun came out briefly this afternoon, but the weather has definitely changed. Camille went out at 8:30am and played nine holes. I decided to cancel: Too cold to play !

Buck Springs Trail

This morning we had brilliant blue skies, a brisk wind and a temperature of 38 degrees. The hike attracted thirteen (13) hikers due to having lunch at the end of the hike at the Pisgah Inn. The Pisgah Inn is on the Blue Ridge Parkway and is only open from May thru October. Here are some pictures from the Blue Ridge Parkway looking east.

After getting to the Pisgah Inn around 12:45pm the place was overcrowded with tourist's driving the Blue Ridge Parkway. There must have been over 35 people waiting in line for the restaurant. We put our name on the wait list, but after 45 minutes everyone wanted to eat, since we hiked over six miles up the mountain. The regulars from Champion Hills knew exactly where to go. We ended up in Brevard (10 minute drive) and ate at a great place called the Hobnob. The restaurant is a converted old house and the food was great. Since everyone was hungry, we would have liked anything they had. We got home at 4:00pm and had a good nap. Great way to start the week !!

Happy Birthday, David !!

Sending our birthday greetings to you on this great fall day.

Love,
Mom and Dad

Looking Glass Mountain Hike

Due to operator error, I have to post an additional posting to get the photos in the right sequence. (Maybe I should have started prior to having some wine!!)

North Carolina - Fall 2008

Here is the place where we are staying this month. It has four (4) bedrooms, but we only needed one.

Today, 10/20, we went on a 6.4 mile hike. We hiked up a 2000 foot elevation trail and ended up on top of Looking Glass Mountain. Here are some additional photos, looking down.

Good News

David and Melissa announced their engagement during the Madison Ironman. ( Yes, Melissa did Ironman, not David!) They are planning a summer 2009 wedding in Colorado and we are looking forward to a great trip next year. In Madison we got to meet Melissa's parents who live in Montana and spent some time drinking some of Madison's great beers.

CONGRATULATIONS David and Melissa. We are proud of you and we wish you all the best. Love,
Mom and Dad

Large Visitor Spotted

This evening at 6:15pm I saw a large black bear in our yard. It had to be three feet high at the back and over five feet in length. Our neighbor mentioned he spotted a bear several weeks ago, but this is the first time we saw it close to the house. Mom saw the tracks in the yard so we took a picture. The paw prints measure eight (8) inches in length and over four (4) inches in diameter. Just what we needed during a house showing !!

Fourth of July 2008

Vince and Christie out did themselves again with great feast of crawdads, turkey, roast and ribs. The rest of us brought enough desserts and salads to feed an army. We enjoyed the lake, did a little fishing and caught up with each other. Dad was able to visit with us much better with his new cochlear implant.

Grandma's Marathon Duluth

A great time was had in Duluth during Grandma's Marathon. We were up early to watch the half marathon. Everyone was on the sidewalk ringing cowbells and cheering on the runners during the main event. We ended the day with a fire and roasted marshmallow samore's.

Andrew's Graduation Party

On June 1, we had an impromptu party for Andrew. The day could not have been better weather wise, 80 degrees under sunny skies. Besides those in the pictures, Steve and Jim came for a few hours in the afternoon. A good time was had by all. Camille and Andrew fixed a great luncheon of brats, beer, potatoe salad, Connie brought a good jello salad, and Michelle brought a good tasting watermelon. We ended the evening with root beer floats!

Andrew will be here until June 12, then back to Boulder, CO.

Jeeping in Colorado

Camille and I visited Jerry and Sandra Baumann for several days prior to heading home to Wisconsin. Jerry and Sandra live in Durango, CO. Jerry lived next door to me when I was growing up and worked at IBM prior to retiring several years ago. Jerry and Sandra love to go jeeping in the mountains, snow skiing, white water rafting, hiking, etc. Colorado is a good place for their hobbies. As you can see from the picture there is lots of snow in the upper elevations. This road is north of Silverton, CO and we were going to see an old mining town at the start of Anamis River. There are many deserted mines that 100 years ago were going strong. The temperature at 11000 feet was about 45 degrees. The snow is melting and the streams are really flowing. Spring should hit the area by mid-June!!

Andrew's Graduation

It's great fun to have all of us together. Andrew looked very handsome in his cap and gown. Colorado has two graduation ceremonies for their graduates. The Engineering Dept. has a smaller ceremony where each of the graduates is named as they walk across the stage and a large ceremony for the entire school with the keynote speaker. We attended both and went out and celebrated each one. It was great fun and the fun isn't over yet!!

Hello Colorado

After too short time at home and a nice visit with Dad and Connie, we headed off to Colorado. We were picked up Michelle, Justin and Milly and headed to Nederland. Good thing we got used to driving on windy roads in North Carolina, the road to Nederland is very windy and scenic.

Goodbye, North Carolina

It was a sad day, the day we left and a happy day. One day closer to home and family and friends. We have spent the last few days enjoying having Leo and Dottie with us. Leo and Ralph finally got a day of golf in at Champion Hills. They ended up soaked, but happy. Dottie and I toured the waterfalls I knew the location of and spent a quiet afternoon reading.

BlueRidge Parkway

On Monday, April 21 we went to see several waterfalls. It was our objective this trip to see various waterfalls in the area. The waterfalls in the lower picture is a very small and we saw it from the road.

We hiked up a road, along side a stream to look at a waterfall noted on the literature we received from the Ranger station located in the Pisgah National Forest. If we would have hiked another 0.5 miles up the road we would have saw the waterfalls we were looking for. The rustic road was washed out at a bridge and we were concerned that the van would have planed out on the rocks.

We drove on the Blue Ridge Parkway and had excellent views of the area from various turnoffs. In a few days, with warmer weather, the trees will be fully leaved out and the area will be ready for a pre-summer period.

The Dogwood are Blooming

Spring is officially here in North Carolina. There are many flowering shrubs at their peak and this week the dogwood opened up.

We spent the entire week meeting with building contractors. Although this area has not been hit as hard as the rest of the nation, the builders are looking for work. Some progress made, but things progress at a much slower pace than back home. The individuals we have met coined the term "Carolina time" to reflect the laid back approach most contractors take.

Leo and Dottie will be visiting this week and we are looking forward to showing them around. This is our last full week here and we are amazed at how fast these two months have past.

One highlight from last week was a dinner party held for us by our potential new neighbors. Three couples hosted the party and made us feel right at home. Everyone has come from various parts of the US. California, New Jersey and Minnesota. The couple from Minnesota lived in Plymouth and he worked for Pillsbury for many years.

Camille is really enjoying retirement. For someone who was not sure about the whole process, she cannot imagine ever going back to work! Even her golf game has improved to the point that she is making more progress than I am. The ladies call and she's off for another round.

We are looking forward to coming home and seeing everyone. Then it's off to Colorado to see Andrew graduate from the U of Colorado.

Ralph & Camille

Bridal Veil Falls

Friday we drove to Brevard to see the white squirrels. The last time we were there we didn't see any. We also stopped at Looking Glass Falls to show Ed and Cindy. We hiked to Hookers Falls after lunch at the Dutch Cupboard restaurant in Etowah. The main hike planned for the day was to Bridal Veil Falls. I had the map and it said that the hike to the falls was a total of 2.1 miles. We set out along the route and found out that we were walking on gravel roads for most of the way. We did find a rock for Greg, but it was too big for the car.
We made it to the falls and a boy scout leader wanted to take us across below the falls to see some snakes. Some of the boy scouts were all wet so decided not to chance the trip. We found our own snake sunning on a log.

The trail had taken us to the bottom of the falls and we wanted to get to the top of the falls. In the past, people were able to drive under the falls and we wanted to get there. So the map was consulted and we thought we would be able to see the top of the falls from the trail named Bridal Overlook. It was a nice hike because it was mostly in the woods and it wasn't a road. It ended at the edge of a cliff with brush blocking any view of the falls. Discouraged and tired we started back. We stopped at Shelter Rock for a short rest. The thought of the wine just waiting for us at Kenmure kept us going. It took a lot more time than we expected to hike in and out.

Brothers

Everyone was seeing double when Ed and his girlfriend Cindy joined us for two days. The weather warmed up (72 & sunny) just for them. Ed, Ralph and I golfed on Thursday and Cindy rode around with us. Ralph and Ed practiced for the hike we took on Friday by walking up and down the hills, looking for their golf balls. I got my exercise by taking a lot of swings and playing in the sand.

Rain, Rain, Go Away

This past week we have experienced many cloudy, rain filled days. Everything has really greened up and the leaves are going to pop any day. The flowering fruit trees are still blooming, along with the daffodils, pansies, tulips, etc. The dogwood and other flowering varietals are expected to bloom when we have some sunshine. Hopefully, next week.

Here are pictures of the place we are staying in, along with some of the flowering trees on the property.

April fools

Here's the picture we didn't add to yesterday blog.

The Ides of March

It was cool and damp today so we decided to get out of the house and see the Carl Sandburg Historic site a few miles north of where we are staying.

We just hiked the property, visited the working farm, then hiked up Glassy Mountain.

Weather this week looks rainy and cool. What happened to Spring !!!