Friday, May 13

We’re officially making our way back home to Wisconsin now. We’d like to be there by next weekend, but don’t have a finalized plan on how we’ll get there. The fastest route is to backtrack the way we came through Tennessee and Kentucky, but a part of me wants to see someplace new. I suggested we go to Roanoke, VA this weekend (it’s only slightly out of our way) because it looks like a really cool city, but it’s suppose to rain there tomorrow. No sense driving out of the way to walk around in the rain all day when we could go somewhere else with more favorable weather.

Literally without a plan as to where we’d end up tonight, the four of us set off from Clayton, Georgia around 9:00am. Driving down Black Rock Mountain wasn’t as harrowing as going up in the RV, in large part because we didn’t meet as many cars on the narrow, twisting roadway. Andi wanted to stop at a marina in Johnson City, TN so we put that town in our GPS and away we went. Good-bye Georgia!

Speaking of harrowing drives, the Blue Ridge Mountains are no joke to drive through. It doesn’t help that we’re driving a 25’ RV pulling a Jeep. The RV could barely make it up the hills. I would have loved to stop in Asheville, NC, but Andi was worried we wouldn’t find last-minute camping on a weekend. Additionally, it wasn’t really the right timing. Asheville is only two hour from North Georgia and we’d only just begun driving for the day. If we had more time, we could have stopped and stayed the weekend but we are anxious to get home to Wisconsin and start on the many spring chores we have to complete there.

We continued north of Asheville to a small town called Mars Hill & decided to stop for lunch. Andi found a restaurant called The Stack House which looked like the perfect place to get out of the RV and stretch our legs. Mars Hill has a quaint small-town vibe, so we browsed in a few shops before walking to the restaurant for lunch. Andi bought some loose-leaf tea and a bar of soap from a natural foods store called The Wild Violet.

The Stack House was packed with patrons, so we took a seat in their lounge area as we waited for a table. We ended up waiting there for 30 minutes which Andi and I wouldn’t have expected, nor would have stayed if we knew it would have taken so long. While we waited there though, we placed our food order so our meals were delivered to our table as soon as we finally sat down. Our service was great and the food was excellent. Andi and Tory each ordered burgers, Aden had chicken tenders and I had a burger salad.

From Mars Hill, we continued north to Johnson City, TN where we made a quick stop at a boat shop there. This was the point in our drive that we really had to decide where we were going — east to Roanoke or northwest toward Kentucky. Kentucky is the faster and more direct route home to Wisconsin, but I really wanted to see Roanoke! Ugh. Both and I were in decisive moods and neither of us was making a concrete decision. I checked the weather about a million times for various cities across the Appalachians and honestly it looked like a chance of rain everywhere! Finally, logic won. Andi pointed the RV toward Kentucky.

We drove for another hour until we reached a town called Pennington Gap, Virginia. It felt like we’d been driving forever today, but we didn’t make any progress. In reality, that wasn’t quite the case as we’d driven four hours north through the states of North Carolina and Tennessee. Andi found an open campground called Leeman Field RV Park near where we were. We decided to camp there for the night and then visit a nearby off-road adventure park tomorrow morning.

Before making our way to the campground, we stopped at the local grocery store to pick up some veggies for dinner. As we walked into the store, a man in a mobility chair stopped us in the parking lot. He told us he’d just buried his 38-year-old son who’d succumbed to drug addiction and had always wanted to travel in a RV. He wanted to know if we liked it, and how hard it was to get around. We chatted with the man & his daugter in the parking lot for a few minutes. I hope he’s able to heal his broken heart through travel the way he aspires.

Funny story— the daughter of the man in the parking lot was listening to our conversation with her father. She heard we were from Wisconsin and asked, “And you’re here? Why?” Andi and I had to laugh. No matter where you are in the world, the grass is always greener. We truly believe you can find beauty wherever you are — even Pennington Gap, VA.

The grocery store had slim-pickins’ so we didn’t leave much more than a package of frozen vegetables. I find trips to the grocery store so interesting when traveling. Even the frozen vegetable bags are different in various parts of the USA — here they sold steamer bags of okra, collard greens and black-eyed peas, foods you’d never find at the grocery store in northern states.

After the grocery store, we made our way to Leeman Field RV Park. It was pouring rain now which made this campground lose its appeal. There was suppose to be a pool and a nice walking path / hiking trail that connected to the park, but we obviously wouldn’t be doing that if it was raining. Andi hopped out into the rain to reserve us a campsite for the night and then hopped right back into the RV. “I found a Harvest Host site not far from here — let’s go there instead.”

Chalk up one more instance of our decisiveness today. We couldn’t even decide where to camp tongiht! Back in the RV, we drove about 15 minutes across town to Axe Handle Distillery. The distillery is a Harvest Host location which means with our membership to the program, we are able to camp there for free tonight. It wasn’t raining at all on this side of town and the distillery had a bluegrass band playing until 8:00pm. Perfect! This felt like a good fit for the evening.

Brian, the owner of Axe Handle Distillery, greeted us in the parking lot and told us to park wherever we liked. A major bonus! This Harvest Host location even had water and electric hook-ups. We settled into a camping spot within the lumber lot of the distillery’s sister log home business, and then quickly warmed up some frozen veggies and leftover chicken from last night’s dinner. After we ate, we made our way into the distillery to buy a drink and catch the last hour of the bluegrass concert.

In the end, this felt like exactly where we suppose to end up tonight. We had a great evening chatting with the owner of the distillery and he even gave us a tour of his facility. It was interesting to learn about the bourbon-making process.

It was a perfect 70-degree evening to sit outside and listen to music. Aden, especially, really loved it. It was obvious that a log-home company built and owned this distillery — it was beautiful craftmanship! The inside of the distillery was adorned with gorgeous wood and even the decking and wrap-around porch were well done.

Before closing, the owner had Andi do a blind taste-test with his favorite bourbon (Blantons) and Axe Handle’s bourbon. Andi was impressed! It was very comparable. Andi bought three bottles to take home — one for us, one for my brother Adam and one for our brother-in-law Kyle — all three are bourbon fans.