First stop, Percy Priest Lake

The first stop on our Fall 2016 Adventure was Percy Priest Lake east of Nashville. We parked The Wanderer at Seven Points, a quiet, peaceful Corps of Engineer campground, where we could watch the deer in the evening.

Finding the Stones River section of the Music City Greenway Trail located nearby; we ignored Friday’s heat and humidity, loaded the tandem on the pickup and went to the trailhead. It was a lovely ride, at least for 8 miles before the dreadful flat tire fiasco.

“No worries,” Captain said. “I came prepared with a spare tire, 2 tubes and 3 CO2 cartridges. It will only take a few minutes to change the tube and we will continue on.” But, wait; there is a cut in the tire so it will have to be changed also, only a little extra time. Dang it, the tube got pinched and now there is a hole in the new tube. Thank goodness we had a second spare. “What, why are there cracks in the tube and it won't hold the CO2?” (Maybe we should carry our spare tubes in the handlebar bag instead of strapping them to the seat post.) Okay, we have one CO2 cartridge left, Captain will patch the original tube and we will head back to the truck.

(In the meantime, ABN is taking photos and making plans to walk the short distance to Opry Mills and call a cab to take us back to the truck.) And then a Good Samaritan arrives in a 1953 Chevrolet truck. (Actually he arrived on a bicycle; his truck was parked just a short distance up the trail.) He loaded the tandem on his truck and took us back to our pickup.

Thank you, Paul Goodman!

Saturday we experienced the Nashville scene with our friends, Melissa and John. After coffee and sweets in their condo in West End, we headed to the Farmer's Market. 

We put away our produce and walked around Cheekwood Botanical Garden looking at the International Playhouse exhibit,

working up a thirst (not to mention a sweat) which led us to look for a smoothie bar. With the afternoon heat and humidity, it seemed like a good idea to take in the Bellissima! The Italian Automotive Renaissance, 1945–1975   at the Frist Center.

Dinner was at The Old School , a new farm to table restaurant just a short drive west. We ended the evening up on the roof of their condo.

On Sunday we went to the greenway trailhead at Shelby Park in East Nashville and rode back to the point where we flatted on Friday. It is a very nice, well used greenway trail. It happened there was a half marathon and 10k in progress when we arrived as well as several walkers, dog walkers, a skateboarder and other cyclists using the trail.

We rode the trail into downtown Nashville for a nice little 15 mile ride.

Later we discovered a neat art area in East Nashville. (ABN is thinking “when can I return without Captain?")

 

The Idea Hatchery

 We couldn't be in the Nashville area and not see some of our Murfreesboro family.

ABN with Nieces, Tia and Kim

Thank you Kim, Tia and Brantley for driving out to the lake for a visit.

Today we will wander over to Townsend and hang out with our East Tennessee friends. Be patient, Texas, we are on our way.

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Let the Fall Adventure begin!

The Wanderer is loaded and pointed southeast. Texas here we come!

Can we boast a bit?

After a jam-packed summer our girls are back in school. The pretense of this post is, our families are interested (and maybe they are.) The reality, we are quite enamored and love to talk about them.

After eight weeks of dance intensive, Camille returned to Fort Walton High School last week for her sophomore year.

She will attend classes at the high school 4 hours a day, then she will go to the Northwest Florida Ballet Acadamie for her electives in dance. She will also teach an evening class at the academie.

Today Alison started her senior year at Navarre High School where she is the Brass Captain in the high school band.

Driving her dad's Prius

It was quite an exciting and busy summer for Alison. In June she spent 3 weeks in Greece with her school's AP Science teacher and a group of his students. In addition to exploring and scuba diving they did environmental and marine science research. In July she headed to Belize for a 2 week adventure with the Gold Star Teen Adventure program where she did more scuba diving, hiked and camped in the jungle and survived a hurricane.

What is the GSTA program? I'm glad you asked. From the GSTA web site: The founder is Kent Solheim, a special operations service member and father of two that was very seriously wounded in combat in Iraq in 2007 ultimately losing his right leg. (Our note, Kent is a truly remarkable man that is an excellent role model for the teens. He is a hands-on example of succeeding in spite of adversity.)The program promotes healing, mentorship, opportunity, in addition to leadership and character building to the children of the fallen special operation comrades. It is truly an awesome organization for which we could write a lengthy accolade and description (and probably get the facts wrong,) so why not click on over to their web site and read it for yourself. After reading it, make a donation if you are so inclined or do what we do, designate them for your Amazon Smile recipient and they will receive .05% of your Amazon purchases (and you will be a patriot.)

 A reminder to email subscribers, hitting reply to the email notification of a new post will send your reply out somewhere in cyber space and we will never know of your comments.  If you wish to comment, please do so in the comment section on the blog site or send a note using the email address you have in your contact list. 

Our 4th Annual Texas BBQ is now in the books.

In spite of the heat and humidity, 40 of our friends joined us on the patio and carport for our annual Texas barbecue on Saturday evening. This is an event to which we look forward every year. Yes, it is a bit of work to spruce up the outdoor living space, load and unload tables and chairs, prepare food and clean-up. But it is worth every bit of the time and energy we spend to see our favorite people all together. (And we do have a little help from some of our friends.)

We like to think we are bringing folks together from our different social circles so they  can become acquainted. In reality, we have found birds of a feather flock (or sit) together. So we have tables of church friends, tables of former co-worker friends, and tables of bicycling friends.

After an interruption by listeria, we were happy to have Blue Bell (the official ice cream of Texas) back this year. Folks had a choice of Homemade Vanilla, Rocky Road, Cherry Vanilla, Butter Crunch or Cookies ‘n Cream. (Sadly, Blackberry Cobbler is not yet available.)

In an earlier blog post, we shared our recipes for the barbecue menu of beef brisket (with Captain’s barbecue sauce,) macaroni and cheese, and Jean’s beans. Since we often get requests for the recipes, we are adding them to a separate blog page (see tab at top) to make it easy for folks to print.

The Wanderer is out of storage and being readied for our next road adventure. Stay tuned!