The family encouraged me to record the events of our Georgia Vacation 2007, so we collaborated on this diary.  I typed it on a laptop over two days’ drive from Helen, Georgia to Purcellville, Virginia.

Thursday, Aug 9

Weather:  HOT, 98 degrees – “sweat your jeans off hot”

Mary drove 7 hours from Purcellville, VA to Statesville, NC.

On the way, we stopped at VA Tech to visit the memorials to the slain students and to pay homage in front of the buildings.

When we reached Statesville, we stayed at an EconoLodge with minimal air conditioning. 

We went to dinner at a local restaurant, Sagebrush Steakhouse.  Carrie had salmon; Mary had a BBQ sandwich and tried all 6 sauces, which came in a case like a six-pack of bottled sodas; Gil and Seattle had steak.  Gil was so hungry he finished his sirloin, still had some mashed potatoes left on his plate, so he asked the waitress to bring him a filet mignon to help him finish the potatoes, which she did; Seattle had “fabulous macaroni and cheese.” 

We were too tired from travel to play together so we all turned in.  We turned up the AC as high as it would go.  Mary and Seattle had their own room.  Mary chose the bed furthest from the door, cause, you know, she wanted to be away from burglars.  Then it was too hot so she made Seattle switch beds with her because the bed by the door was also the bed nearer the AC.  This did not help much.  In order to feel the AC, she would have to be 6” higher so, she dragged two chairs in front of the AC unit, and put a bench between them to make a raised platform bed.  But this did not work out.  It was too hard, so she went back to her bed and slept with her head at the foot of the bed.

Friday, Aug 10

Weather: HOT; 99 degrees, “sweat dripping down your face hot”

Mary drove. Gil and I wanted to stop in Ashville, NC because we had good memories of it.  We got there and parked and wanted to walk around and visit the shops but we were a little early and many were not open.  It was also too ghastly hot to be out walking  anywhere. 

The girls were not impressed.  After a little more exploration, it came to us why we had fond memories of Ashville.  It is a hippy enclave.   Lots and lots of hippies, old, young and in between.  They probably grow marijuana on their kitchen windowsills.  The Grateful Dead is piped through the shops.  We decided to eat lunch at the Mellow Mushroom.  Yeah.  It looked just like it sounds.  Psychedelic paraphernalia decorated the walls, air, tables; all the sandwiches were served with bean sprouts; the wait staff sported colorful tattoos (our waitress had a veritable mural of the caterpillar and the mushroom from Alice in Wonderland over half her arm).  The food was great and Gil was a good sport about sitting under a dripping air conditioning unit.  As long as he leaned forward, it dripped on his shirt, not his head, and, cool water on your shirt was a good thing in the oppressive HEAT.

We stopped in shops and saw arty and weird stuff.  We left and drove to Helen, GA.

We arrived safely in Helen.  Mary negotiated the white-knuckle drive up the very, very steep roadway to our Alpine Crest condo.  A black cat was sitting in front of the Frankfurt units.  We had condo 102, which had no extra pillows, two remotes that did not work, and a chirping smoke detector, which Carrie fixed by opening it and plugging in the battery.

The girls had a room with two twin beds and no pillows (they found a couple in the closet) and Gil and Carrie had a room with a queen size bed and a TV and private bath.  We had a lower unit with a balcony we did not use because it was like sitting in an oven to be outside.  We had a cushy living room with TV and fireplace, sofa and chair; we had a little dining room with a round table suitable for games and lunches; we had a kitchen with everything you’d need, plus a washer/dryer.

The first night in Helen, we went to La Cabana for questionable Mexican food and even more questionable service.  We were in a hurry (I know that sounds crazy, given that it was the first night of a week’s vacation, but I will explain later) so I asked the waiter if he could recommend anything on the menu that didn’t have cheese (because Gil can’t/won’t eat it).  He looked at me as if I had two heads and asked me to repeat myself.  Maybe I should have asked in Spanish.  He probably had not learned how to respond to such a request in English.  And, when he finally understood, he had no suggestions.

We ordered.  We ate, and then we made our way over to Fesste Hall for Bingo (this is why we were in a hurry).  Bingo is close to a religious experience for Mary and she was beside herself with joy.  Gil has no use for Bingo ever since he was routed during Bingo Night at a fire hall in McGaheysville, VA, so he did not join us; we sent him to Betty’s grocery store with a list we had made together and told him to come back at 9:00 pm.  Mary and Seattle and I chose a table out on the deck overhanging the Chattahoochee River, where smokers’ smoke would dissipate (Bingo is all about smoking, too); we bought pink, purple and orange daubers for $1 each, and we excitedly studied the rules, and the Bingo card configurations for winning.  There were only six games; five paid $150.00 and the last “cover all” was worth $750.00.  There was an intermission between games 3 and 4.  The three of us pressed our palms together and whispered, “Let’s go witches!” (better than “bitches”) and the games began.  First game was called “B&O Railroad” because you had to cover the B and the O columns to win.  I got it.  Hah!  “Bingo!” I shouted.  So did someone else.  So we split the pot and I got $75.00.  Very cool.  I took pictures of a little baby (about 5 months old) who sat on top of the table and ate the bingo sheets her parents discarded.

Speaking of cool, there were children drifting in the river below, in Cool River Tubing tubes.  One kept shouting out “Bingo!” much to the consternation of some weathered-faced old man who grumbled nasty things like, “… someone oughta shoot that little bastard,” and “come closer here kid; I got an Exlax candy bar fer ya.”  His table-mates smoked and laughed.

Gil met us outside afterward and rejoiced with our winnings; he also rejoiced in his excellent shopping and described and displayed each item he bought at Betty’s, getting everything on the list except for grapefruit, which Betty did not have.

We noted that there was Bingo on Wednesday night too, and vowed to come back.

Saturday Aug 11

Weather:  HOT.  Again. 

We slept in really, really late.  All of us.  Which means we were up by about 11:00.  Yeah… vacation, baby. 

We went to Habersham Winery, the place with the best Chambourcin red dessert wine I ever had.  The first time we had it was over ten years ago; then, we came back to Helen about 5 years ago, and they were out of it; this time they had it and I bought 3 bottles.

Of course, you have to try the wines, so I did.  I started with the reds even though I have never had a good East Coast red.  East Coast does not have proper weather and growing conditions for good reds (like cabernets or merlots) but, since I told the guy I wanted the Chambourcin, he assumed I wanted reds and said I’d have to save the Chambourcin for last because it is sweet.  My favorite reds are cabernets, and I told him this.  He poured me 2 ounces of his best cab.  “I don’t love it,” I said.  “Why?” he asked.  (This guy was an owner, about 6’ 2”, very wide and pink-faced, and he would ask this so that he could zero in on his customers’ taste profile and steer them in the right direction.)  I told him I didn’t love it because it was too “dusty-dry” and that I liked a more rich red.  He declared I must like sweet red, then.  This was not true, Chambourcin notwithstanding. (Chambourcin is a dessert wine; it is supposed to be sweet.)  So, he gave me another of his reds.  “I don’t love it,” I said again.  I was being polite.  “Why?” he asked.  I don’t remember how I tried to explain it, but finally Mary and I just out-and-out told him it evoked the taste of vinegar.  Now, vinegar is a sign that wine has gone bad, so I knew this was somewhat of an insult.  But, hey that is how it tasted.  So, yeah, he got kind of defensive and declared I just liked sweet wine, that’s all.  Bullshit.  And I did not think it would help to tell him that his wine is the same as Virginia reds or all other East Coast reds I have ever had – just not good. 

The sign on the counter said, “Limit your tastings to 4 wines,” and here I was wasting my time on Georgia reds.  Bleh.  So, as I approached my 5^th wine, I asked him, “So, are you going to make me leave and come back another day to try the whites?”  “Yes, m’a’m,” he says.  Wrong  answer.  So, he allowed that I could eat a cracker and go take a break for 15 minutes to clear my palate, otherwise “it would be like drinking orange juice after you just brushed your teeth,” and that just wouldn’t do.

I came back 15 minutes later, and got a young, fun, friendly sommelier this time, with no guile, defensiveness or haughty condescension.  We tried lots of whites and he even redeemed some reds and we bought a case plus one bottle of Georgia Peach wine to drink back at the condo with our homemade lunch of turkey and ham sandwiches, grapes and peaches and chips.  We also bought some jazz music and a wine opener. We resisted buying more.

Saturday we also went to Nora Mill Granary and tasted homemade grits which I loved and the girls did not.  We bought biscuit mix and jams, candies and even bought candied jalapeno peppers for a gift for Rosemarie.

We drove around some more, and visited the Helen Welcome Center; across the street was a hair salon.  “Wanna’ get your hair cut Seattle?”  “Yes!” So, we escaped the scathing heat and sat in the salon for an hour while a young hairdresser cut Seattle’s hair.  She gave her a long wedge – kinda trendy and bohemian.  Really different for Seattle.  But Sea was glad to have the long, heavy hair gone.

Then we went to the Hansel and Gretel Chocolate Candy Shoppe, where they had all manner of homemade rich chocolate confections.  Gil went hog wild and got fudges and white and dark chocolate-dipped apricots and orange rinds.  Also both naked, and white chocolate-covered caramel/pecan turtles for Carrie. Then declared, “Hey, there are people waiting here; get your act together and let’s pay for this stuff!”  So we paid.  The girls would go back Thursday and get the things they wanted – white chocolate-covered rice crispy treats on a stick and white-chocolate covered marshmallows on a stick.  And a couple of chocolate covered cherries.

We took everything back home, and stopped at Betty’s before we got there, to pick up lunchmeat.  We had a late lunch and then played poker with jelly beans for “chips.”  I think Carrie won.

We went back to Helen in the evening when it was cooler.  Helen has copious, extra large, wonderful flowers everywhere, and a big fountain.  We went into many shops but it was outrageously crowded, and some of the shops we visited were clutches of Atlantic-city-like depravity.  Like, one particularly bad one thought it was funny to sell tighty-whitey underwear on a hanger with a label “REDNECK BRIEFCASE.” There was a hip-hop bar blaring music and youngsters in black, sporting tatoos and spikes perched like vultures in the rafters on the balconies.  But some of the shops were nice and we oohed and ahhed and giggled and took pictures at the appropriate times.  We bought a hand-painted Christmas ornament with a scene of the lovely Bavarian Helen shops in snow.

We went back to our condo and played more card games and Sorry.

Sunday, Aug 12

Weather:  HOT; 98-100 degrees “better-get-to-the-river-and-jump-in-before-you-expire hot”

We decided if we were going to be out in the daytime, we would have to be on the river, because it was too knock-you-naked, balls-to-the-walls, holy-crap hot to walk anywhere in the area.  We donned river shoes and sunscreen, bought push sticks and boarded a crowded bus that trailed a hundred colorful inner tubes and took us up river.  The river was very shallow, because they have not had rain in a long time.  Nevertheless, it was possible to float, leaf-like, spinning and turning and bobbing down the Chattahoochee, gazing at colorful river rocks beneath the water and tall graceful trees above.  This is one of my favorite things to do.

I like it so much that I didn’t even mind much that the swirling and bobbing ended up giving me motion sickness, so that for much of the trip I lay sprawled across my tube on my stomach – the better to hurl if I had to.  By the end I was praying for death or rescue.  Neither came.  Over the last waterfall, I was shot into a still eddy and backside first into a line of Mexicans who kindly ignored my feet in their face and gave me a push out.  The tube went back into the eddy and I decided I had to get off and walk it to a place where I could get some current.  I got off, and instead of hitting the bottom, I found I was in a deep hole, so the tube flipped, bonking me on the head, and sending the waterproof case I wore around my neck into the bridge of my nose - hard.  I was lucky I was not knocked out.  So there I was, beaten up, ready to vomit, delirious, treading water, while Mary was up ahead on a rock wondering why I wasn’t returning her cheerful wave.  I made it out alive, begged to be taken to the hospital, but they took me home instead, where I went to bed for a few hours.  The family took Aleve for their tired muscles.  I took Pepto  Bismol for my ravaged stomach. 

I got up later and made tuna cheese melts for dinner and we ate and played games at the table. We got Gil to play Risk with us. Mary won.  Gil would rather forget that Mary won by rolling six after six after six, which basically beats every other roll, and he could only roll twos and threes and an occasional five.

Monday, Aug 13

The difference in Helen on the weekend and Helen on Monday was remarkable.  No crowds; you could walk wherever you wanted without bumping into other sweaty tourists.  However, it was still God-awful HOT, so our movement during the daylight hours was carefully choreographed and planned. 

Since we had slept in late again, we had a very late breakfast/early lunch at Huddle House.  The weekend crowds must have cleaned them out, because several things we and other customers asked for were out.  Mary had eggs and toast and the rest of us had amazing sandwiches and burgers.  I ordered sweet potato fries, since we were in the South.  The fryer in the restaurant made a horrible racket to let you know it was finished.  Since no one was racing out the door, we figured out it was not a fire alarm.  Gil wanted dessert, but they were out of that too.

After lunch, Mary found a shady spot to park in a defunct restaurant parking lot and we walked to explore a corner of the town shops we had missed the night before.  Mary and Seattle spent almost an hour in the Magic Shop being entertained by the larger-than-life sized magician storekeeper.  While they were there, Gil and I were in the DreamCatchers store poring over Native American artifacts and chatting it up with Boy Who Walks With Buffalos.  We bought a couple amazing, one-of-a-kind layered clay pieces by Kicking Bird.  The girls eventually joined us and enjoyed time with the shop keeper who gave them each a Native-made dream catcher and gave Seattle a Sacred Smokes book to learn about smudging.  He gave us buffalo sage to use for this purpose. The girls eventually also got us into the Magic Shop, made Mr. Magic do some tricks for us, and bought Delites and a Card trick book.  Seattle amused and amazed us later that night with her card tricks.

After that, we visited a place that had about a dozen bears who were on display and who we could feed.  We walked among the different holding pens, looking down on the many different kinds of bears – grizzly, black, brown, etc.  They were fun, standing on their hind legs, some doing little tricks, and some roaring.  We tossed them bread and fruit.  In the center of the platform from which we watched the bears were Plexiglas cages with other wildlife, the most entertaining of which was the cage with the two, cute baby bears.  The caretaker opened the door to their cage to replenish their water bowl with a hose.  Ignoring his bark of “NO!”, given that the door was cracked open, the bears quickly pried the door all the way open and jumped out onto the platform.  He grabbed one by the scruff of the neck, and it struggled mightily and yowled.  These baby bears weighed 70 pounds each.  While he struggled to control the one, it gave the other one the opportunity to jump out of its cage too.  He quickly grabbed that one in the other hand – both (all 140 pounds of them) were now struggling and screaming and trying to bite him while Mary and I decided to get the hell out of there.  Gil decided to stay.  There was no way for the keeper to open the cage door to put the bears back in because both hands had a  bear in them.  So, he released one crazed bear cub while he threw the first in the cage.  The cub took off running for the exit, where Gil stood.  Gil positioned himself firmly in the doorway as the cub approached.  It would have been easy for the cub to do an end-run around him, but he got scared and backed off.  Gil did not.  This gave the keeper the opportunity to corral the cub and put him back in the cage too.  Mary and I missed this drama, as we believed all the signs around telling us how dangerous bears are and that we should stay away from them, so we were waiting it out downstairs.  Seattle watched from the sidelines, in stunned amazement.

We went to an Asian importer’s shop after that and bought FANS to combat the unbelievable HEAT.  We also bought, for $8.95 real poker chips so we wouldn’t have to play with jelly beans.  We tried them out that night and I think Mary won. We decided we liked it but also agreed that there was more charm and interest when playing with jelly beans.

That evening we went to the Nacoochee Grill for dinner.  When we entered, there at the hostess stand were the cast for the OC.  Well, not really.  But there were three, buff, tanned, smiling hotties who were remarkable in their uniform beauty – perfect specimens of young attractive males.  Mary swooned.  We were assigned hottie Will as our waiter; Mary stared.  Will was a fair-to-middlin’ waiter, but what he lacked in waitstaff skill he made up for by smiling and looking beautiful.  When Mary had to order, she told him what she wanted, and bit her lip, perhaps holding back what she really wanted to order – him on a plate.  When he left, I pointed out to her how she bit her lip.  She said, “I did not,” and of course she had no idea.  We got a kick out of that, since she is always teasing Seattle about the involuntary facial expressions she makes when she is embarrassed or insecure.

Poor Will.  When he came back to deliver our food, he reached down to place Mary’s plate in front of her and she realized that she was biting her lip!  This freaked her out a little and she made a fist and a little exasperated huff as she looked at me to say, “Damn!  I just did it!”  Of course this meant she was actually making a fist at Will as if to say, “How dare you put these scallops and shrimp in front of me.” He recoiled briefly, in surprise, (probably heard the “Damn!” part) and she had to say, “Oh, no, it’s not you…”.  This all happened within about 5 seconds, and so was over with quickly, but left me and Seattle laughing for long afterward.

I told Will it was our tradition to take photos of our waitstaff when we went on vacation (it’s not, of course,) so before I paid the bill I told him it was time to take his picture.  I walked him out to the hostess stand where “Soccer boy” was waiting and I took a few photos of the two of them for our vacation memories.  We call them Helen Hotties.

We played games together at night.  Gil kept a watch on sports, especially Cleveland Indians baseball, but the Indians had the night off.

Tuesday, Aug 14

Weather: HOT, almost 100 degrees.

We rose a little bit earlier, determined to go out in the morning and then take shelter when the heat of the afternoon hit. We ate breakfast at Hofers, a genuine German bakery.  It was great. 

We set out to go to Cleveland, Georgia, the home of Babyland General Hospital, which is where the original Cabbage Patch Kids dolls were, and still are, made.  There is a cabbage patch there, under a “Magic Crystal Tree,” and during your free, self-guided tour, they will usually have a “birth.”  We watched as the “nurse” narrated through a birth of a new cabbage patch baby.  It is tradition to name the new baby after someone in the viewing audience.  We knew this, since we had been there before.  So when the time came, Mary suggested the baby boy be named “Daniel” for her friend Daniel who is a new dad.  “Jordan” was the middle name, suggested from another audience member.  The red-headed Daniel Jordan was now available for adoption, but was not what Mary had in mind, so she went to the Hospital Store and spent 45 minutes scrutinizing all the unique dolls and finally settling on a baby, “Melina Georgia,” who had dark hair and blue eyes. Melina would be Sarah and Daniel’s baby Carly’s Christmas present this year.  Carly has dark hair and blue eyes too. 

This trip to Cleveland was also supposed to be our opportunity to locate a recycling center so we could deposit the many empty water bottles we had accumulated.  Let’s just say that we saw more Georgia countryside than we’d bargained for as we drove around trying to follow locals’ sketchy directions, but what we did NOT find was a recycling center.

We gave up, and instead went to Willow Pottery and The Red Door to ooh and ahh at the lovely artwork.  Gil bought me delightful kitchen towels and Mary bought Ian a golf pillow that said, “On a good day of golfing I hit the ball further than I throw my clubs.” The Red Door lady encouraged us to visit a Gourd Shop.  So we set out to find it.  It was a little house out in the middle of nowhere.  It had all manner of gourd artifacts – a gourd museum with specimens and education about gourds around the world.  It had dyed gourds with intricate carvings, and puzzle gourds and cups and bowls cast in a clay mold made from the inside of a gourd, with its unique veins and markings.  We donned gourd masks and posed for pictures.  We did not buy anything, but we were grateful to see these unique artifacts and we were grateful too for the bathroom and the air conditioning.

We traveled on and found The Mark of the Potter, in an old mill next to a running stream.  They had pet trout, a waterfall in the basement, and hundreds of pieces of pottery made by the four artists who owned the place, and some made by others.  We didn’t buy pottery, but we did buy some t-shirts and a country “signs, sayings and omens” book to entertain ourselves on our long car ride.

When we got back to Helen, the girls and I went to the resort’s waterslides.  They were deserted; we had them to ourselves.  The girls and I made the trek w a a a y up the stairs and we braved the high, long, chutes.  Seattle and I left simultaneously on twin slides.  I reached bottom first, propelled by the momentum of my uh, weight.  The landing, as I was shot off the end into the waiting pool, was not graceful, as I had almost no control.  Also, two resort employees had appeared – I supposed it is their job to oversee the use of the slides – and the lady couldn’t stop remarking on how she had never seen anyone ride these slides faster than I did.  She was laughing and shaking her head.

Mary had taken a ride down too, but was taking a very long time to emerge.  Turns out that because she left her shorts on, she got stuck again and again on the way down.  That was not a very satisfying ride, so she took off the shorts and was shooting down the slides like crazy, just like me.  The second or third shoot for me found me landing awkwardly, blowing out my left knee and mangling my left foot.  The girls would have to continue without me, but the slides were closing soon anyway, since it was almost 6:00 pm. 

The girls went up the hill to the indoor pool while I went down to the river to relax among the beautiful rocks and trees.  I spent a half hour there, then joined the girls up at the pool.  I had no desire to go in the pool, so I watched from a deck, through a clear fiberglass wall.  The girls played, raced, and played Marco Polo.  Mary would close her eyes and count to ten then call “Marco!”  The rules are that Seattle had to immediately call “Polo!” to let Mary, eyes still closed, know where she was in the pool.  Once Mary determined where she was, she had to reach out and touch her.  When Seattle was “caught” they switched roles.  I watched with amusement.  When it was Mary’s turn to be “it” again, I silently moved into the pool area, and gave Seattle the sign to be quiet.  When Mary yelled, “Marco!” I yelled “Polo!” but I was in the opposite direction from Seattle.  This had the desired effect of confusing the heck out of Mary, who took extra long to “find” Seattle because she was getting mixed directions!  I crept back to my seat on the deck before Mary opened her eyes, so when she did, she had no idea I had moved at all.  We told her a couple days later.

Carrie accidentally left her shorts behind at the pool; Seattle kindly ran back to get them. Mary got water trapped in her right ear and no amount of bouncing, shaking and bobbing could release it, so she walked around with a muffled ear for a couple days.

We played games together at night – cards, Risk.  I think Carrie won at Risk.  Cleveland lost.

Wednesday, Aug 15

Weather:  HOT HOT and more HOT.

One of my favorite things is canoeing on the river.  Since I had blown out my knee, I did not trust myself to negotiate the riffles, rapids and potential capsizing that a canoe river trip would involve (we’ve canoed the Chattahoochee before, and last time, Mary, Sarah and Seattle DID capsize in class 5 rapids).  So Gil suggested we go to one of the beautiful lakes in the area.  Hiawassee is one such lake, so we went to a marina there and rented two canoes, one for me and Gil and one for Seattle and Mary. 

This was the first canoe trip where Seattle was big enough to row.  She took her seat in the front of the canoe, with Mary as the one who steers from the back, and they did great piloting their boat through the water, working together.  I got lovely pictures of them.  They were sisters paddling through life together, singing Pocahontas songs – Just Around the River Bend and Colors of the Wind. Gil and I were in the other boat and we did okay, but Gil had to sit in an uncomfortable position, the strain of which he can still feel in his legs.  It got HOT fast, and we returned the canoes 45 minutes earlier than promised.  We bought some nice t-shirts and stuff in their shop. 

We went to one of the worst restaurants ever – Donna’s – in Hiawassee.  It was horrible because the waitress was clueless (if it was not her very first day of her very first attempt at waitressing ever, then damn) and the food overpriced (for instance, for $9.95, I ordered the fried grouper basket, and I got a basket with 99 french fries and ONE SMALL piece of batter-fried grouper. ONE.  $9.95.  Give me a break!) and the kitchen understaffed (we waited ages for everything).  I left an uncharacteristically low tip and brooded as we left.  We saw, in the same shopping center, a place called “Shake Healthy” and had our tastebuds all ready for a good milkshake to wash away the bad experience at Donna’s.  But it turned out the store was a front for some guy’s Herbal Life home-business sales, and the shakes were healthy meal replacement shakes that tasted like cardboard.  While we waited, we had to look at all his sales stuff on the walls and in “testimonial” binders.  Geez, people.  We didn’t love Hiawassee. 

However!  None of that mattered because we were together, we had air conditioning in Mary’s car, were doing fine, and we had BINGO to look forward to that night!  Gil didn’t want to come, so the girls and I grabbed our daubers and set out.  Mary chose the same lovely table on the open-air deck overhanging the Chattahoochee.  The “witches” pressed palms together in a pregame salute, and it began.  Once again, I won the first game – a $150.00 pot!  And once again I had to split it with another winner, except this time the other winner was… Seattle!  As I looked at my Bingo card, and the pay-out lady was on her way over, Seattle realized that she had just won too!  So, the lady counted out $75.00 to each of us.  What are the odds?  Gotta love it.

We thought of going to Pirate’s Cove mini golf that night after Bingo, but Gil wasn’t with us, and we were tired so we just went back to the condo.  Carrie iced her knee again.  Mary tried to bounce the water out of her ear.  Gil was a happy guy because Cleveland finally won.

Thursday, Aug 16

Our last full day in Helen.  Weather:  HOT

We decided to try mini golf in the morning, before it got too unbearably hot.  The place didn’t open till 10:00.  We went to a course high on a hill overlooking the town of Helen.  I was a nice course, and there was a breeze up there, which helped since it got very hot very fast.  Mary cleaned up, putting excellent par, or sub par holes, while I, at the other extreme, was really, really inept.  Seattle and Gil did fine.

A highlight was when Carrie realized she was walking around the golf course instead of limping painfully.  “Hey, look!  I’m walking!!”  And, Mary, whose water-logged ear had a break-through, said, “Hey, I can hear!” 

We sat in the air conditioning of the place after the game, reading In Style magazines and catching up with Tom and Katie and all the other Hollywood stars. 

The girls decided to go swimming again and had great fun together.  Gil and I napped.  I got up to make Jello for Gil, and there was one monstrously big thunder clap that woke him from a sound sleep.  No rain though, just more heat.

We also borrowed Good Morning Vietnam from the welcome center and watched that together.  Lara called with the great news that she got the job she had been hoping for – a Knowledge Engineer with Acquistions Solutions.  So I sat out on a swing under the trees and we chatted for a long time.

For dinner, we went to Paul’s Steakhouse on the River for all-you-can-eat snow crab legs.  It was crowded when we got there; I gave up my license in trade for a lighter/buzzer thingy that tells us when our table is ready.  I also got a stamp on my hand “P-21,” indicating that I was okay with Paul because I was 21 years old (ha).  That allowed me to go wait in the bar.  The swinging doors to the bar said “Only 21 years old beyond these doors.”  Turns out Seattle, at 15, could not come into the bar (where it was 15 degrees cooler) because there was smoking allowed in there.  Apparently, Georgia protects its youth from second-hand smoke, by law.

I felt bad, but left the girls in the hallway while Gil and I went to the bar and ordered fabulous Amber Bock beer.  Seattle had been craving a slushie for days so I also ordered a virgin pina colada for Mare and a virgin strawberry daiquiri for Seattle (the glass for which, Mary would later steal by putting in her purse.  It said “Paul’s on the River”on it).  I paid for all these drinks with Bingo winnings J.

It took a long time to get our table, so long, we ordered another round of beers from a 40-ish waitress with tousled hair on top of her head, and with a long southern drawl who called me “Baby-Girl.”  I loved it.  When the buzzer thingy finally went off, Mary let us know, and we all got ushered to the best seat in the house – a wrap-around corner booth with a picture of Elvis above it.  The girls and I ordered crab legs and Gil ordered prime rib.  The snow crab portions were FIVE sets of legs for each of us.  Holy cow.  Ahem, I mean, Holy Crab.  It was great.  We ate our fill and took home super rich fudgy chocolate cake as well as Bananas Foster pie.

We played Contract Rummy and taught Gil dice, which he liked and was good at, in fact, he won!  It was a good night.

Friday, Aug 17

Friday was our day to travel home. Well, half way home.  We started with the Best Breakfast Ever at Hofers.  The ladies had French toast and Gil had ham and eggs on a croissant.  When we were finished, Mary peered into a window and watched a master baker frosting layers of a wedding cake.  He spread huge dollops of frosting on a cake, and spun its platter, like a potter spinning a wheel.  Mary stared.  He looked up – yep, Mary is still there.  Oh, now she is taking pictures.  He waved; she waved back and smiled her goofy “this is so cool” smile.  He frosted the small cake that would go on top of the other layers, very carefully, methodically, smoothing, even-ing, till it was perfect.  How was he going to get it off the platter and onto the stack of other cakes?  We watched him perform this feat, which Mary applauded and cheered.  He seemed proud.

We decided to travel the Blue Ridge Parkway with its remarkable rock formations, a billion years old, its panoramic layers and layers of blue mountains filled with spruce pine and what looks like yellow coneflowers.  We stopped at several overlooks and tried not to tease Gil too much as he tried not to panic from being so high up on a narrow, winding road.  The road speed was only 35 mph because it was so winding.  It was a driver’s dream, but after several hours of this it got to be like being on your favorite amusement park ride one too many rides in a row.  There were lots of tunnels, most of them named.  Mary loved the tunnels.  There was also one puzzling sign “Warning: sudden curve ahead.”  What the?  That’s like having a sign on a river, “Warning, water ahead.” 

Most of the hills we wound up and down had a 7-8% grade.  We saw many 25 mph curvy road warnings and a couple 15 mph hairpin turn signs.  Carrie made sure she took Dramamine, since she was sitting in the back. There is lots of kudzu in Georgia.  It makes the forests and byways look like gnome castles – kind of magical and beautiful, but kudzu also kills all the plants it drapes itself over.  Kudzu flowers have a heavenly scent too – I got to smell it at the Gourd Shop.

When we got off the Parkway, we ate a late lunch at Burger King in North Carolina.  The staff had very thick North Carolina accents that were fun to listen to.  In the parking lot was a car with a full half of its windshield cracked, and on that windshield was a NC car inspection sticker, saying it passed inspection.

On the road again, we passed a business that offered Video Rental and Taxidermy services.  And the marquee at the roadside said it sold night crawlers too.  We turned onto “Lulu Belle and Scotty Weisman Highway” (Rt 194).  Oh, this was going to be fun.  Not.  Actually, Mary was getting very restless with all this driving and since she is just a teensy bit of a control freak when it comes to her car, she wouldn’t let me or Gil relieve her and drive.  Finally, when I was fairly mesmerized by the curvy roads, my contacts gluey and my eyes ready to close, Mary was ready to let me drive.  “Okay!” I said, trying to wake up, and I drove.  The family doesn’t know that I nearly killed us twice because I was falling asleep.   It was only about 30-45 minutes more, right?

Famous last thoughts.  As we neared the NC / VA border, I started checking with Gil – “So, we’re looking for a Comfort Inn?”  “No, it’s a Quality Inn.”  OK.  Where is it?  “I don’t know, it’s in Hillsville.  When we get to Hillsville, it ought to be right there.”  We got to Galax first (pronounced Gay-Lax, like a laxative for gays) and then we got to Hillsville.  Then we drove straight through Hillsville, out the other side.  Hmm.  No Quality Inn.  Tempers were flaring, frustration mounting as Gil groused, “Dammit!  It shouldn’t be this hard.”  Blah blah blah.  “Call the hotel, Gil.  Someone give him a phone.”  He took my phone and called an 800 number for Quality Inns and kinda yelled at the operator telling them we were at a high school in Hillsville and needed to know how to get to their hotel where we had reservations.  They were no help.  I said, “I think I have the reservation here in my purse, and pulled out the confirmation for the Comfort Inn.”  He called the Comfort Inn.  We got directions and made it there lickety split.

The girls retired to their own room to watch High School Musical II, and Gil watched some TV, including highlights of the nail-biter Cleveland/Tampa Bay game which Cleveland won on a near-collision high-fly catch by Sizemore.  I took advantage of the hotel’s Internet connection to connect to the rest of the world again and retrieve e-mail.  We had such a late lunch that we decided not to try dinner.  The girls did go downstairs in their pajamas to look for fruit and cookies that Gil and I told them were available – only after they had already raided a vending machine.  We slept in a marvelous bed.

Saturday, Aug 18

We woke early, showered, and went downstairs to the complimentary breakfast – which was MOBBED.  We did our best to eek out some items for breakfast – “the good stuff” was gone.  We don’t like crowds, so Gil and Mary paraded us out of the breakfast room with all the crowded tables, with breakfast items balanced in hand (cereal, milk, fruit, waffles, syrup, banana) straight through the indoor pool area and out the other side to sit in the sun on the pool deck at a table there.

We checked out, re-packed the trunk and hit the road.  Within a half hour I had to pee.  Mary stopped at a Burger King for me.  Another hour passed and I had to pee.  Mary stopped at a Pink Cadillac restaurant with a King Kong statue outside it, and a field of sunflowers across the street.  The bathrooms were labeled Lucy and Rickie and we only felt a little bit guilty coming through just to use the toilets instead of sitting down to eat.

Around Lexington, VA, Mary saw the sign for the Safari Park which we have always told her she should experience.  Should we go?  Yes!  Why not?  So, we spent a couple hours with safari beasts.  Mary drove her car slowly through steep grasslands, windows open and two big buckets of food pellets on our laps.  Thousand-pound elks and yaks would wander up to the car and eat from the buckets, putting their whole heads in the car, if you let them.  We were not allowed to feed the Watusi, the Bison or Zebras, Seattle reminded us, as she cowered in the back seat, still traumatized from the memories of the last time we came here.  She is afraid of things like this.  The emus – black with insistent red eyes – freaked her out.  We didn’t get to experience the emus this time, but we challenged Mary to feed the 300 pound ostrich.  Ostriches are very assertive and their pecking is decisive, fast, and too erratic for Mary.  It freaked her out, and after 3 or 4 pecks, she drew the bucket into the car and closed the window, shuddering the whole time.  We saw Blackbucks, rheas, all manner of deer, including a female Pere David Deer that had tourists figured out, man.  Mary held the bucket out the window for the deer and the deer jammed her nose into it and forcefully knocked it out of Mary’s hands so that the deer could have all the food for itself.  This pissed off Mary, but we were not allowed to get out of the car, and the deer out-weighed Mary by about 600 pounds, so Mary just groused about it for the rest of the ride.  Unlike Pere David Deer, the yaks and llamas were very polite eaters, and very gentle.  We still had food left when we finished our drive so we went to the Safari village and fed goats, more llamas, and pigs.  We also climbed a raised platform to feed giraffes.  We enjoyed tropical birds who ate out of tourists’ hands and perched on shoulders. 

We were really hungry by the time we were finished so we drove to Harrisonburg and ate an early end-of-vacation celebration dinner at Chili’s.  Carrie had a mango margarita, Gil and Mary had Miller Lites.  We had good food, and an annoying waitress who kept saying, “No problem,” when we ordered.  Like, “I’d like a half-rack of baby back ribs with that.”  “No problem.”  Uh, I’d never imagine it would be a problem, so what are you talking about??  She also said things like, “Would you like me to clear away these plates for you?  Okay, I’d be happy to do that; no problem.”  I’m thinking, what kind of stupid question is that?  What would you do if I said, “No, no, by all means, leave all these appetizer platters and plates right here in front of us.  We don’t want to trouble you.  You can balance the dinner entres on top when they get here.”  Dip.  I guess that just proves that I am ready to go back to work on Monday, where I can call the shots on decent customer service instead of wilting under the likes of Chili dip-girl.  The food was great, and the family all got back in the car for one more 90 minute ride home.

You know, more than once during our 10 days together, the girls mentioned how glad they were to be spending time all together, and how grateful they were that our family liked each other and enjoyed each other.  Oh, we had our testy moments too, but very few, and all the rest of the time was just… happy.  Yay.

Copyright (c) 2007