A place you just can’t “visit”, you have to experience it.

 

What draws us to return year after year to this quirky, little bohemian town is the colorful little houses scattered over the hill side, the unconventional residents, random art throughout the town, numerous music venues with varied genres and finding the unexpected.

Returning after a four year hiatus, we were sad to learn our self-described hippie friend, Bruce, had passed away. Bruce was the first person we met on our inaugural visit. He introduced us to the music venues throughout the town.

 

Through Bruce, we met Keith (aka The Blues Wizard,) whom we learned has recently moved to Mississippi.

 

Also, no longer in Bisbee is the blonde, blue eyed Jesus.

We found music choices were limited to only a couple of venues during the weekend. The Stock Exchange closed after the owner had died and The Copper Queen was doing a private event. But The Grand continues to have music Thursday thru Saturday.

We miss the folk style we enjoyed on previous visits.

The vibe in Bisbee has also changed as it is becoming quite the tourist attraction, with which many of the residents are not pleased. Overheard in a conversation (ABN is prone to eavesdrop on occasion) affordable rent is hard to come by as houses are increasingly turning to more lucrative short term rentals aka AirBnB and VRBO.

 

Meeting up with friends, Steve and Adele from Colorado, we revisited some of our favorite hangouts. Like The Grand

and the Bisbee Coffee Company where ABN overheard a conversation about capitalism (the speakers were not in favor.)

And, of course, the “hike to the cross.” ABN, knowing the hike was above her current level of fitness, decided to wander around town as Captain led our friends. Well, it should be said “he attempted to lead.” His 10+ year-old boots had blowouts before they reached the cross.

Steve and Adele continued without him.

 

Taking the recommendation from “new friends” we met at The Grand, passing the Lavender Copper Mine,

we walked over to the Lowell Community

for brunch at The Breakfast Club.

Seen in Lowell

Returning to Old Bisbee we took a brief tour of Shady Dell.

Should we consider a spot in our outdoor space for The Wanderer when it is time for her retirement?

 

The Bisbee locals seem to think The Hitching Post over in the Warren district is a great venue for music.

Have you ever seen a chicken in a bar? Neither had we. It seemed to be quite at home and the two dogs paid no attention.

 

Being so close to the Mexican Border, it seemed reasonable to check out “the wall” in Naco.

Nothing much to see here.

It’s not all fun as we travel about. We do have to take a bit of time for chores, like laundry. How convenient to find a laundry next to a Brewery. The Electric Brewery hosts a craft group every Tuesday. While Captain did the laundry, ABN slow stitched and visited with the locals. Perfect! (for ABN.)

To truly experience Bisbee, one has to walk; and walk we did. Starting out with no plan or destination, we just wandered. At times we found ourselves above the town

and at other times we found no street, just steps.

ABN’s FitBit recorded close to 25 miles over the week. Keep in mind, in these miles were many stairs and hills.

 

Walking around Bisbee, this is what we found. (We tried to not duplicate photos from previous trips. If you want to see more photos of Bisbee, click on the links below.)

Waking up to about 1 inch of snow this morning, we decided it is time to leave Bisbee.

 

For more photos of Bisbee, click here.

 

Discover Bisbee Visitor’s Guide

 

Please excuse the inconsistency of the text in this post. Could be issues with the Blogger host or (probably) user deficiency.

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Into the woods we did go, to clear our minds and feed our souls” (paraphrased from John Muir)

 

Five days we spent in The Great Smokey Mountain National Park without Wi-Fi, cell service, sewer connection or electricity (except for solar panels and the occasional generator.)  We have stayed in the park before but this was our first stay at Elkmont Campground. Aww...the peace and quiet. At night the only sound was the rushing of water in Little River.

 

Little River

After sunset light came from campfires scattered throughout the campground or from flashlights as campers trekked to the Porta-Potties. (ABN was grateful we had our own facilities in The Wanderer.)

We will return!

Elkmont is located a few miles from Gatlinburg, but we were not at all tempted to visit that world. (In fact, we have visited The GSMNP at least a dozen times over the past 25 years but have been to the tourist town only once.) We prefer the quieter side of the Smokies. 

After a couple of nights at Elkmont, we moved to the more familiar campground at Cades Cove where a couple of our good friends from home joined us.

 

Cades Cove is a popular tourist destination in the park so it is not as quiet. The road paving during the day added noise and congestion. Still the nights were very dark and quiet. During the day we entertained ourselves with hikes (or walks, depending on one’s definition of a hike),

 

"Does that mean us?"

Abram's Creek

and a bike ride around the Cove. You may recall our posts from previous stays at Cades Cove. Traditionally the cove is closed to motorists for a few hours on Wednesday and Saturday mornings, providing a safe place to bicycle. That was not the case this time.  Closed most of September for road repair; it reopened Tuesday afternoon with miles of traffic waiting to get in and was open to motorists again on Wednesday morning. Wanting to cycle the 11-mile cove but not deal with bumper-to-bumper traffic, we elected to ride early in the morning. At day-break we saddled up and peddled through the fog and the cool temperature.

 

We applauded ourselves that not only could we still do this, but not one of us had to walk the hills.

In the evenings we sat around the campfire, telling retelling stories of previous camping, hiking, and biking adventures; over the years, there were many. If you are reading this and you were a part of those adventures, you can bet your stories were told (and probably embellished a bit.)

Since the sun doesn’t rise until around 7 a.m. and we usually wake around 4 or 5, with no paper to read or social media, we started reading Bill Bryson’s The Lost Continent.  Not surprisingly, we have different opinions of the book; Captain thinks it is hilarious, ABN thinks Bryson traveled around our country searching for support for his biases. We both agree, his travel experiences did not mirror ours.

 Just to be clear, we did find a cell signal at a high spot one day and on the last day of our stay we discovered there was a guest Wi-Fi at the camp store, so we were able to do a couple of quick checks for messages.

On Friday Roger and Duncan headed home and we headed to a full-service campground in Walland to do laundry and catch up with the real world. (Actually it was so Captain could watch another disappointing A&M game.) After a week of really good camp food, (thank you, Bonita) Roger and his wife, Jean, treated us to a delicious fried chicken dinner in their beautiful mountain home.

We were pleased to find the folks that own Dancing Bear restaurant and lodge have replaced a really bad Italian restaurant in Townsend.

There we caught up with ABN’s cousin, Susie and husband Don.

After lunch, we visited their beautiful mountain home for the last time as it was recently sold. They will be spending time in their Kentucky home and promise to visit us (if they can catch us at home.)

Folks have asked us if, during our travels, there is any place to which we like to return. The answer is yes, there are a few. The map below will tell you that East Tennessee is one of those places. Each color represents a trip in The Wanderer these past 6 years.

 

Moving on toward Texas; without further distractions, we should arrive later this week.

 

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Trekking through the Carolinas

 

Aww….the mountains!

Our “friends and family” tour continued across the Carolinas, stopping in Greenville, South Carolina for a short visit with our longtime friends, Carol and Lee.

As always, Captain and Lee shared news of former co-workers and traveled down “Memory Lane.” Mostly they told jokes and shared memes that most folks would not understand.

Lee challenged us to a couple games of Smart A**, which Captain won with Lee a close second.

Crossing the North Carolina border we caught up with our Maryland friends, Juanita and Greg in Asheville to do a bit of brewery hopping. Sampling at these eight breweries, Wicket Weed Funkatorium, Wicket Weed, Burial, Hi-Wire, Twin Leaf, Wedge at Foundation, Bhramari and The Whale.

While The Wedge at Foundation in the River Arts District was quite interesting,

We voted Burial as our favorite, both for the beer and the ambiance.

If you are interested in doing a brewery hop, here are a few tips:

·       Ask for a taste; some breweries will accommodate, others will not. Don’t count on the bartender to make an offer. (Of course, after you sample, you are expected to buy a beer.)

·       Most breweries will do a 5oz pour, but if you don’t ask for it you will get a 12 or 16 ounce glass.

·       Flights are a good way to sample multiple brews.

·       If possible, walk from brewery to brewery to burn calories.

We said “goodbye” to Juanita and Greg with a campfire and promises to stay in touch.

Continuing west, we parked The Wanderer at ABN’s niece and husband’s cabin in Marble, N.C.

After a Saturday morning walk along the Valley and Hiwassee Rivers,

we settled in to watch some disappointing football. Well, it was disappointing for Captain, the Aggie, but Sue and Dave celebrated a win for their team, the Boilermakers.  

Their border collie, Pani, provided most of the entertainment.

Trekking west through the Appalachian Mountains, we have left the grid for a few days.  We are finally in the mountains without electricity, water, sewer connection, and cell service.

 

 Note 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.