This weekend was my second trip to beautiful Staunton, Virginia with dear friend Alana for the scrapbooking weekend. It was a busy morning (week actually) getting everyone ready as there was to be a period of a few hours between the kids coming home from school with me already gone, and Keith returning from a trip to Philadelphia. In fact, Kendall was being picked up by the mother of a soccer team mate to head to Myrtle Beach, SC for a tournament. Of all things, I even had a gynecological check up this Friday morning, followed by a mammogram! It worked out well, the offices were running on time and I was back home to finish loading my stuff and get on the road by our set goal time of noon.
Last October, when Alana drove, we took a highway and country roads route rather than the interstate. It was the route she had previously taken when she went alone once before. I put in the address of the beautiful, historic Stonewall Jackson Hotel into my GPS and chose the route that was highlighted that was NOT interstate travel. Off we went.
It became apparent when the GPS had us winding through Durham that this wasn't the same route we had previously taken. Alana looked at the map and said it looked like it was going to put us on 29 (the route we were hoping for) eventually, it just must be getting us there differently. Well, OH MY GOODNESS...it never did. The ride was pretty, a little winding, but pleasant, so we figured we'd just go with it. There was a direction to turn right and then immediately left, so we did. Within a half mile, it was apparent that this was a most unusual route as we were switching back and fourth over a very tall mountain. By the time we figured it out, there was really no option to turn back as 1. where would we go from there if the GPS said to do this and there was no cell service to check for an alternate route and 2. no place to make the turn around. It began to get a little scary. We were going around corners where you couldn't see if another car might be coming and the road, which had NO markings whatsoever, had no room for another car to pass. In addition to that, the drop off was steep. With no guard rail. After a mile of this switchback style of driving, the pavement ENDED. Are you flipping kidding ME? We were now on gravel with another 3.5 miles to go til our next turn. We came around a corner (all while Alana was both nauseas and laughing hysterically at my rant), and came grill to grill with a pickup! If we were following proper driving etiquette, we would have passed on the right side, which happened to be the side where the mountain drops off with no guard rail. I was having NONE of that. So, I stopped, backed up, moving so close to the rocks on the inside (his lane) and sat and waved my hands apologetically. I made him pass me on the outside. He was so close to the passenger side of my car that I thought he was going to side swipe me. At that point, I didn't care, I chose life over an unblemished Escalade. He glared as he passed us. I had wild eyes looking at him. No biggie. I honked the rest of the way up the stupid mountain. (To warn any cars of course, because I was driving in the lane that would belong to anyone coming down in the opposite direction)...
Thankfully, we didn't pass any other cars. At the same time, it was very creepy that we never passed any other cars. We get to the top, where our directions say to turn right and travel two miles. It was the Blue Ridge Parkway. Guess what? Closed in both directions with barricades, saying "closed due to snow and ice". No other turns were possible. We could head back down that mountain, the way we had just come. But that wasn't going to happen. Fearing arrest if caught, I chose to take the right turn and went around the barricade. I didn't get caught. I was shaking. Knees weak. Repeating over and over, "I can't believe what we just did." and "how in the world could a GPS send someone on a route like that". I was so mad at Phoebe (our GPS has a name), that I was yelling at her.
We eventually got there. It took an hour longer. Due to the 3 MPH drive up that mountain I am certain. We were starved because we never passed a restaurant the whole drive up. We had planned to dine at our favorite Staunton restaurant that night at 8pm, but called them as we got to the hotel and asked for an earlier reservation. We ate at 5pm. Alana treated me to the most delicious leek ravioli with roasted fennel, pan roasted brussels sprouts and a bottle of wine (all for my bravery in driving). This is where the fun began. We began our scrapbooking at 7:30 that evening, scrapped Saturday from 8am til 2am (with breaks for lunch and dinner), scrapped today from 8 until noon, when we packed up and headed home...with lots of new pages created! We avoided the horrible mountain on the way home and safely arrived back in Cary at 4pm today. Can't wait to do it again!
No comments:
Post a Comment