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Published: August 1st 2016
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Lynchburg, Tennessee
This is where Jack comes from Georgia to Washington
Georgia on my mind.......and Jane and Joe our two friends from Athens, Georgia. Who we met in a Pub in Belfast Northern Ireland.
As we head from Nashville and travel through Chattanooga, Georgia. Feeling very excited about meeting our friends again, however staying in people's homes we feel a little rude , though we love people to visit us, we're just not used to the opposite. Stressing for no reason we arrived at there beautiful home, and were greeted with so much warmth, we instantly felt very comfortable. Joe and Jane had been excited too, it's amazing how you meet people and you are instantly drawn to them. We enjoyed being in their home so much, and feeling part of their family. Alice the family dog even made us feel welcome, she took a shine to us also.Jane's such a southern bellē, and cooked up a storm, the best cooking ever, we were treated to her culinary delights, typical southern dishes, giving us a great example of the regions tastes. We chatted about all the questions we had about life in America. Politics, education to name a few. I enjoyed Joe's conversation about his political and ideal
Lynchburg, Tennessee
150 year of Jack Daniels views as he gave sound reason for his beliefs. Jane is such a strong minded women too, I loved how she would put Joe into line, not in a condescending way but she was definitely her own women. It was funny to see them interact with one another very much like myself and Glen. We enjoyed sitting in their garden and looking at the beautiful birds, and they even had Deers that come into their garden we saw a Bambi too. We explained to Joe and Jane that we had Kangaroos in our garden! Same same I suppose......I suppose we take our wildlife for granted until overseas travelers think how special it is.
We learned all about Athens, it's a college town and very ordinated around college life and the college football, we learn't all about Tailgating and Frat houses and the Bulldawgs, Wroof Wroof hope that was deep enough Jane. We visited some great places too, Joe drove us around the beautiful city and country side. Athens it such a great place, and we enjoyed it so much as we were shown it by people who had raised there children there, all the young people knew Joe and
Jane.On our last evening Jane had prepared yet another gourmet delight, and Joe the BBQ griller extraordinaire finished the job off with grilled baby back ribs with Janes southern BBQ sauce.I think we put on about 5 kilos in weight after Jane's cooking, but I'm not complaining, lovely to eat home cooking. It was so sad to leave them, we hardly chatted on our journey to Charleston, in South Carolina we could have so easily stay we enjoyed there company so much. I am sure we can convince Joe and Jane to come visit Australia and repay the hospitality they offered us. We look forward to our continuing friendship with these beautiful people, we thank you again for making us feel like part of your family. And Joe thank you for inside info on places to visit and tips and ideas you gave us, it's great to get inside information.
South Carolina and Charleston, as you drive through South Carolina you get the impression of how it might have been during the civil war, Plantation homes are now expensive hotels with grand gardens, large trees of the estates still stand and you get the feeling of grandeur. The city
and harbour,the heart of the city and squares still stand where they sold the African slaves to the rich Plantation owners, such a historical place.
We stayed only a day and turned around to head towards North Carolina and Henderson town to start The Blue Ridge Parkway which began from a town called Cherokee. The Blue Ridge Parkway is another National Parkway. Staying at Henderson we drove to Cherokee and started the drive, along the Parkway back to Henderson and then the next day along the Parkway to Mount Airy for the night. The days drives were spectacular and took in magnificent vistas of the Blue ridge mountains, if your really lucky you will see Moose and deer. We saw beautiful butterfly's and wild flowers and towards late afternoons thunderstorms would begin to build so great views and photos of clouds that would build. Along the drive the third day saw us leaving North Carolina and cross into Virginia and finished the The Blue Ridge Parkway. The next day we joined the Skyline Drive yet another scenic road which takes you up again into the mountains and delivers you very close to Washington DC. At a viewing point on
the high ridge along the road,we stopped to take in the view and perhaps a photo. Another couple were taking photos, the lady put her fingers to her lips and said really quite we have bears a Mumma and two cubs. We sat and watched and took photos, the Cubs were harder to see they where in the undergrowth of blackberry bushes but Mum was enjoying the fruits and wandered about two metres from us, very content and occasionally raised up on her hind legs looking curiously at us. We were thrilled and got some great photos. Well we now we're on the look out for bears and we saw dozens of them, every time we drove we saw them stopped and took photos, then deers too just amazing day of wildlife I was so excited to be privileged to see all this wild life. What a fantastic day!After a night spent in Front Royal we traveled to Maryland and for a four day visit to Washington DC which turned into a one day visit, but in our defence we got there very early and walked kilometres, taking in all the sites of Washington, we got to a few Smithsonian
museums, it just got more and more busier with tourists everywhere. We get so concerned with crowds and the fact is, in so many country's experience terror attacks make us feel quite apprehensive so we like to avoid crowds. I know we shouldn't run our life's like this but we want to enjoy life and our family. We were happy with what we saw with Washington although I don't know if we were disappointed but I don't think it was as manicured as I thought it was going to be. But I loved Arlington Cemetery, Pentagon and the WW11 war memorial. The White House was a lot smaller than I expected, and The US Capitol building was covered in scaffolding. And the Ulysses Grand memorial was under wraps. But we saw the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial and the Thomas Jefferson Memorial. So we totally saw what we wanted, not city folk....... Well not with thousands of tourists. As we drove out of Washington and Maryland the traffic heading towards Washington was amazing I think we made the right decision. Driving towards Pennsylvania and our next stop......
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Jane and Joe
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YA'LL JUST TO KIND!
We loved the write up. We faired better then we thought we would. Missing you guys again. Alice keeps looking for Glen. Love, Jane and Joe xxxx