Wednesday 17th July

Both slept well after yesterday’s exertions. All the wood very damp this morning, and after a couple of hours of struggling and swearing we managed to get some moderately hot water for coffee. Then a gentle meander north up the Blue Ridge Parkway, after saying goodbye to the two boys from the US Army who had befriended us on the hill yesterday and who had made a great fuss of William, giving him a chocolate bar and talking knowledgeably about Harry Potter.

First stop was the North Carolina Museum of Minerals – very well done, with lots of interactive displays to build your own atom, measure radioactivity, move continents around by cranking a handle etc. An elderly guide told us “This hayuh ahun ore is wuhn billion and thirty-six years old.” When asked how he could possibly date it so precisely, he replied, “Well, ah’ve worked hayuh for thirty-six years and it was just wuhn billion years old when ah started.”

To begin with we stopped at every viewpoint (“overlook” in US English) to marvel at the views,

but eventually pushed on a bit more quickly. Next stop was Linville Falls, where an insuperable force (the Linville River) meets an immovable object (the Linville Fault) and goes over it in two falls, one quite small and one tremendous.

Linville Upper Fall

Linville Lower Fall

Then into Linville itself looking for food, of both the lunch and supermarket varieties. The latter was not to be had – Linville is the perfect one-horse town – but we did find a shop called “Everything Scottish”, behind which was The Tartan Restaurant. We lunched on traditional Scottish delicacies – stuffed jalapeños with salsa, pinto beans, macaroni cheese and slaw with cornbread for me, cajun chicken fries and hotdog for William, all washed down with root beer. Since it also has its Highland Games coming up next week, Linville would seem to be the heart of expat North Carolina Caledonia.

While we were eating, some traditional Scottish weather kicked off outside,

so we had to run for the car in torrents of rain. The Blue Ridge Parkway then proved to be rather elusive, mainly because it was nearly impossible to read signs in the rain, but we managed to rejoin it at a town called Blowing Rock. By now we had decided to make for the campground at Doughton (pronounced Dawton) Park, which according to the map offered fuel and restaurant facilities in addition to camping, so the supplies problem seemed to be solved. When we arrived, there was nothing – restaurant, gas and supplies long gone, campsite utterly deserted apart from a couple in their converted Ford Transit, who must have overheard us planning a meal of dry bagels and bananas, since they came over and gave us enough food for a good meal cooked over a fire of beautifully dry wood and fir-cones.

As I write, the rain has returned and we are both sheltering in the car while the thunder bangs and grumbles around the hills.