Burr. What gives? We just left this weather up north! For the past few days, we've been frolicking around the small town where Mikie grew up - Franklin, North Carolina. LOTS of leaf-lookers piled onto the 2 lane mountain roads of Appalachia but man, was it was beautiful.
The main purpose of our trip was to be at our brother's wedding. (Please don't misinterpret - Michael and I are not related... Yes, I realize he's from the mountains, and yes, I realize that the movie Deliverance was filmed just a few miles away from his hometown across the Georgia border, but I promise inbreeding is not something we're into! Technically, Dave is Mikie's brother, but I will forever claim ownership to both of his bro's... because I can.)
We got to meet Dave and Charlotte's first born and, if I do say so myself, the kid is just adorable:
As many times as we've visited Franklin, we'd not yet done the #1 tourist thing to do: mine for rubies!
As hokie as it might sound, for some reason when you sit down with your straining trough, pour out some dirt (yes, people - us included - actually pay for the authentic mountain dirt!), roll up your sleeves and see the first shiny thing sitting there amid all the mud, man is it easy to get gold fever.
Well, I found a lot of shiny stuff. Unfortunately for me, it was mica which may as well be for-mica because it's worth about as much: squat. Mikie found a pretty decent sized ruby and I did end up finding a real Indian arrowhead, so that was pretty cool.
At the church that Dave found for his wedding, there is no power. There's no plumbing either. In fact, the church hasn't even been used in years, but some members of the community had done some upkeep that kept it in decent shape. Yes, there was a wasp's nest, yes there were lady bugs EVERYWHERE and yes, there had been a mouse nest in the little ancient piano which made the keys stick, but hey - we were in nature! And there was a piano! And a bell tower!
And an outhouse!
Which we put to the test and are happy to report, it seemed to work just as an outhouse is intended to work.
The church was beautiful. Imagine a much-less-traveled country road and set back just a little, a tiny (think 30x20 here, folks) old white clapboard box - and there you go.
Really, what more do you need?
Congratulations Dave and Charlotte!
