Trailers, Churches & Biscuits

Finally a chance to breathe, and catch up in the on-line world. In the first two days, we covered about 900 miles, a goodly part of that in rain. But that was fine, as the "get out and look around" part of the trip was planned to start on day 3 anyway. So on days 3 and 4 combined the mileage covered was barely 400. Now, finally, it's 3 nights in one spot, and a base of operations to come back to post-sightseeing.

Yesterday and today were definitely "off-the-grid" days for a good part of them. There were stretches on the back roads where I could imagine breaking down and not being able to call AAA for a tow, not only because there was no cell signal for about an hour's drive in any direction, but how would I tell them where the car was? "Um... AAA? Yes, we're broke down here somewheres between Frog Hollow and Piney Ridge on Gunflint Trail? Y'all know where that is? I ain't got me one of them GPS thangs in my ve-hi-cle."

The night before, when still in the realm of the connected world, I made the mistake of pulling up a clip on YouTube of the Dueling Banjos scene from "Deliverance". We hain't seen those ol' boys exackly yet, but we shore enough have seen us some o' their kin. And durned if they don't make a feller a tad narvous.

Well, I could go on and on (and probably will when I get home), but let's just say that West Virginia has already left some definite impressions. Immediately on crossing the border, the trailers bloomed like mountain wildflowers - everywhere, prolifically, and randomly. Only nowhere near as pretty. Here are two of the cleaner ones.





Then there are the Waffle Houses and the donut places. There's even a chain of fast food joints called Biscuit World. Really. Finally broke down and stopped at one today, and hoo-ee. Now that is a biscuit.




Not to be outdone by the trailers, biscuit places and Gentlemens' Clubs (which for decorum's sake I decline to display), were the churches. Every kind you can imagine, and some you really couldn't, popped up in the oddest places. There were so many of them that they had to amount to mostly just the pastor, his family and in-laws, and a few scattered neighbors. How they support themselves, I can't imagine.



The eating places have been a slice of local culture, too. And the more remote they were, the better the cookin'. More than once we had what amounted to private dining.




More to come later, maybe when I get to where family is and can borrow a memory card USB adapter to upload photos in bulk instead of one text message at a time. :(

In the meantime, I leave you with some picture-postcard scenes of the mountains, which will probably wind up as screensavers for my Mac back home. My goodness, it is lovely here. :)