We landed in Charlotte, North Carolina, a bit dazed after a long old night flight from Hawaii. During the flight I made friends with a lovely lady from Tennessee who confessed that she had a “real strong Southern accent”… She was awesome. Once we picked up the car, we made the four hour trip to the Great Smoky Mountains. Approaching the National Park, we noticed that there were a large number of large men sporting dungarees, handlebar moustaches and enormous beards, and that the people were incredibly friendly and welcoming. Now, Tom left you on a “cliffhanger” about the tent so here goes… we’d had many thoughts on how to fix it, some more ridiculous than others, none seeming very likely to work. We eventually found temporary success by cutting the elastic, removing the broken section
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