A Subconscious Celebration

Do you think that your subconscious knows when you should be celebrating? After this weekend I think ours just might…

We started our three-day holiday weekend, by going out to eat sushi at a local place in town we discovered. David used to call sushi “BAIT” and now he has me eating it too…

After sushi, we did a little shopping and then we stopped on our way home for some ice cream.

Saturday, we got up and gathered up our river gear and headed for a day out on the river canoeing. The weather was gorgeous for a day outside on the river.

The water was clearer than it had been on any of our trips this year. We’ve had a lot of rain and the times we had gone before were not long after it had rained. Saturday was one of those days that I wish there was such a thing as a glass bottom canoe.

Between the gurgling rushing water over the rapids, and all the scenery I became so relaxed at one point I actually fell asleep on the canoe!

We stopped for a lunch picnic and I found a log to relax on while David continued to fish. As I sat there on that log and gazed at how Skyline Drive carved out the top portion of the mountain in the distance. I thought about how David and I needed to take another drive up there…

As always, the fishing was great and David caught a lot of fish. Maybe it’s the sheikh look he has with that bandanna? I don’t know, but he catches a lot of fish almost every time we go fishing.

I joked with David about getting up at the “butt-crack of dawn” to go up to Skyline Drive to watch the sun come up. I had threatened this before, but slept through dawn as I always do, because I am really not a morning person. For some reason, I magically woke up about 5 a.m. I decided to make true with my words. I hopped in the shower and the first thing that came to my mind was: I hope it isn’t supposed to be cloudy today and I am not standing in the shower this early in the morning for nothing. I proceeded to get ready and then put my robe on to go outside and look at the sky from our deck to see if it was clear. I was so glad I could still see stars shining in the dark early morning sky.

For some reason David and I switched rolls that morning. Mr. Morning Person was hard to get up and get moving, but he finally managed to get in the car. Unfortunately, I did not feel comfortable with the amount of gas that was in the car. We stopped for gas, and I believe that is what made us miss the very moment the sun popped up from the edge of the earth. It really didn’t matter that we missed that moment. It was still beautiful. I believe we may have to make a habit of this early morning outing…

          

Perhaps not making the sunrise allowed us to experience a real treat within the national forest.

We saw 7 bear on this trip! There were a couple like this little fella just minding their own business crossing the road as we drove along.

Then we came across a car pulled over on the side of the road. A father and two sons standing on the side of the road staring up into a very tall hickory tree. We asked what they were looking at. It turns out there was a mama bear and three cubs eating hickory nuts in a tree. The bears looked like monkeys climbing around from tree limb to tree limb.

Amazing the tree branches could withstand mama bear’s weight. Even more amazing was the crunching sound she made when biting down on the hard hickory nuts.

A couple of the cubs came down from the tree. We decided to let them enjoy their hickory nuts in peace. (Note To Self: That’s the last time I leave my camera with a zoom at home)

We pressed on south bound on Skyline Drive.

Not as slow as this little guy, but we kept our eyes peeled for more bears and made sure to obey to posted speed limits.

The wild flowers have been amazing this year, due to all the wonderful rainfall we have been getting.

Fortunately there was no ice to watch out for.

One of my favorite spots is the tunnel at Mary’s Rock.

If only those walls could talk…

About ¾’s of the way down, we were extremely hungry and decided to go to one our favorite places for brunch. We then headed home and took a long afternoon nap.

We were so worthless that we didn’t even cook the cheeseburgers we talked about making for supper. Instead, we didn’t go to the store at all. I defrosted some BBQ we had in the freezer from our favorite North Carolina BBQ Restaurants, “Ralph’s” and we had some corn in the fridge from the week before (Yes it is was still good).

We didn’t do any grilling or much cooking in the kitchen this weekend. We did something else without even realizing it. You see, it was five years ago Labor Day weekend that our journey to live in the mountains began (I promise to get us out of that tree soon). Without either of us even planning it, we celebrated the mountains we love so much, by doing some of the things we love about them.

This leads me back to the question I asked before sharing our weekend adventures. Do you think that your subconscious knows when you should be celebrating?

I think so.

Do you?

DMS