travel, tourist sites, and roadside stops
I was recently traveling along North Carolina Highway 52 when I was taken back to my childhood summers spent with my grandparents in southwest Georgia. While most of my summer days were spent with my gramma, traveling along this road specifically brought my grampa to mind. He wasn’t a man of too many words, my grampa, but every afternoon he would summon me into the den in the back of their tiny house, hand me one of the two bags…
Way back in 1900, L. Frank Baum first published his children’s novel entitled, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.” It’s a story we’re all familiar with about a young girl named Dorothy Gale who was whisked away by the whirling winds of a tornado that swept her house off to a distant land before plummeting on top of one of the community’s archenemies. It’s a story, and a movie, we all grew up with. I have many memories of “The Wizard…
Natural Bridge: A town located in Rockbridge County Virginia, whose name is derived from its National Historic Landmark, a two hundred and fifteen-foot-tall natural limestone arch carved out by Cedar Creek a side stream that flows off the James River. Although the population of this small town is only right around fifteen hundred, it sees its share of visitors particularly during the summer traveling months. Tourists from all over flock to see the Natural Bridge that has often been included…
Amid the many businesses located on the busy Brambleton Avenue area of Roanoke, Virginia, one seems to stand out. With its bright red windowed percolator sitting atop the rustic log cabin design, The Coffee Pot Roadhouse just might cause a newcomer to do a double-take. There’s no mistaking, The Coffee Pot certainly does have both a unique look and feel all its own. It was a late October evening, when I was invited to join parapsychology professor Deborah Carvelli during…
I’ve often enjoyed a casual stroll through, many, a quiet cemetery. I have seldom brought this to many people’s attention, for the mere fact that it may seem strange or odd to regular folk, you know, to promenade in a graveyard without having any reason for it. I did feel a bit better about this after I had learned that a very reputable and “normal” pastor friend of mine, too, enjoys a cemetery walk every now and again. Once you…
When one hears the word “prison,” the vision that most likely crosses people’s minds are far from that of The Ohio State Reformatory. With its towering Gothic turrets and stone castle appearance, the historic reformatory has a way of intimidating even the bravest of visitors. Photo credit Ivy Kingery My first visit to The Ohio State Reformatory (OSR) was a little over a year ago. As I headed onto 100 Reformatory Road, made that left turn and started down the…
The town of Bedford Virginia is one of character, charm and lots of history. If you ride through Main Street and out onto some of its bordering drives, you’ll see residents taking morning runs, kids playing in yards, owners giving their furry friends their daily dose of exercise, and those avid gardeners working diligently to maintain their botanical masterpieces which, of course, adds to the beauty of this charming place. If you’re lucky enough, which I have been on several…
I know, I know, the title alone sounds like some kind of cruel and unusual punishment. Like, what kind of sick and demented parents (or grandparents) would ever commence to such a heinous act?! I thought the exact same thing, but hear me out. So it was January, and as I was marking our calendar for the new year, I noticed that we had a timeshare week we had bought into years ago that was about to expire. It…
In late September, my husband and I were, once again, back up in Ohio, but this time we “planned” our stay a bit ahead. We decided to spend one of our nights at the Punderson Manor Lodge, in Newbury Ohio. When we called for a reservation, there were several rooms in the “new wing” available that fell within our budget. This kinda bummed me out. If I was gonna stay in a “historic” hotel, I wanted to at least stay…
In mid-September, my husband and I were headed back to Ohio for another visit, this time it was for family. With our visits to the Tudor Arms, and Blennerhassett, we had made up our minds that we would try and be consistent in staying at one-of-a-kind accommodations instead of your run-of-the-mill chain hotels. Face it, if you’ve seen one Holiday Inn, you’ve seen ’em all. Now, I’m not knocking regular hotels, but they certainly don’t measure up to the…