Wednesday, August 22, 2018

Cruising through West Virginia and the Blue Ridge Parkway…

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We sure enjoyed our stay in Cincinnati but we must continue to push eastward to Raleigh for some pre-weeding festivities prior to our daughter’s wedding. We had a one night planned stay at the Sandy Springs Campground in Stout, Ohio. Man we should have made a better choice of routes as we ended up on a state road that was not only very narrow but there were also lots of low limbs forcing us center the road at times. Fortunately there wasn’t much traffic but it was still a bit disconcerting…

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We pulled into the the campground  which was quite nice sitting on the banks of the Ohio River as we could look out our windshield and see Kentucky on the other side. The RV park is a nice little park and a Passport America park so it was a bargain for our one night stay. Hurry if you want to visit this park as it is up for sale. We drove around the area to sightsee a little, then simply relaxed at camp the rest of the day.

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The next day was another travel day. We originally planned a one night stop in West Virginia but I just couldn’t find a park close enough to the toll road that would suit our desires. As a result we would go ahead and drive on through West Virginia. We had 289 miles to travel this day which is a very, very long day for us. Therefore we put together a crock pot (which we have had since we were first married – yes, it’s avocado green) for a dinner of Carne Guisada.  We stopped for lunch about midway at WV casino where with their free-play dollars we were able to leave with enough to cover the tolls and some of the diesel. After the stop we continued on down the road until we pulled in for a few nights stay at Fancy Gap Cabins and Campground located on the Blue Ridge Parkway in Fancy Gap, Virginia.

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It’s been a while since we had been on the Blue Ridge Parkway so we drove quite a ways down it. We had never been on this part of the parkway but there was a place I wanted to see on it. We drove a short distance to the Blue Ridge Music Center. This cool little museum run by the National Park Service not only educated us about music and specifically the evolution of the banjo from its beginnings in Africa but there was also a daily jam going on between 1 and 4 pm.

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Today’s music was a couple playing a mix of folk and light county and although we didn’t stay a long time to listen we really did enjoy this stop on the parkway. Afterward we drove along more of the parkway, took a short hike and also saw a nice black racer in the road along with a few deer. We then drove over to check out the town of Galax but were a bit disappointed in this small town which is also home to the Old Fiddlers Reunion. I guess I had higher hopes for Galax that what we found.

Back at the RV it was time to pack up for our last leg to the Raleigh North Carolina area…

NOTE: We are now in Raleigh NC at Jordan Lake Campgrounds to attend some pre-wedding parties for our daughter….

6 comments:

  1. When we lived in MD, driving the parkway was one of our favorite things to do.

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  2. Beach and I have camped in Jordan Lake Campground twice. When we were out of the campground in the evening doing some shopping with our granddaughter, we returned about 8:30 pm, and the gate was locked to the campground. We had to leave the car at the gate and walk around it to find our camp host; she said the campground closed down at 8:00 pm. She was kind enough to walk down to the gate and unlock it for us so that we could get our car back to our site. Have you experienced any of these rules at Lake Jordan?

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    1. Yes they lock the gates at 9:00 in August and starting in September they lock them at 8:00 from what we understand.

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    2. Kind of tough when you need to visit relatives outside of the campground!!

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  3. Moving right along now ready for some wedding partying. Have fun.

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  4. It has been years since we’ve been on the parkway!! If we can get Mike healed up after his ruptured disc we’ll have to make a trip!
    Enjoy all the festivities of the wedding!!!

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