Another day in the mountains...

The weekend before I visited the Hamilton Rhododendron Gardens in Hiawassee, GA. (see my previous post here ) was the beginning of their weekend festivals. There were some vendors' tents but they were closed, apart from one that was partly opened. You could see the rustic wood pieces for sale. Before I left the gardens I checked to see if someone was in this tent, but there was no one, although I was able to get a business card of the wood craftsman. In 2019 a large hackberry tree in front of my house in Nashville was struck by lightning and had to be cut down. A piece of the tree was given to me and it fit on top of a plant stand I had. So I was interested in a little table I had seen under the tent in the garden as a match for my plant stand.

Upon return to the lodge I called the wood artisan and left a message. He called me back and told me he had some pieces for sale in his house and only lived about 6 miles away in Young Harris, GA. We agreed that I would go there the next morning early, before 9 am as I had to meet a friend in Hiawassee at 10:30 am. He gave me his address and said I could find it easily with my GPS. I got up at 6 am the next morning to pack and have a quick breakfast. I was able to take a photo of the sunrise over the lake as pictured in my header photo. I checked Google Maps and saw his house in the middle of woods on a hill. Below is a map of the aread where I was. It is located in the Southern Appalachian Mountains on the border of Georgia and North Carolina. (Click on collage to enlarge.)

I placed the address in my car GPS and drove away. Upon reaching Young Harris my GPS told me to turn right on GA State Route 66, then left, then a bit later right, then further on left, then right again, then left and then it said "You have reached your destination." I was on a hill with no houses anywhere near. I called him and he told me two roads had the same name and I was on the wrong one. My GPS was useless then and I could not remember all the turns. After a while I tried to call him again but I was on a tiny road on a hill and there was no cellular signal. I kept driving but the road was twisting up the mountain. I was totally lost.

I had seen a house on the side, among the trees, and started going back toward their driveway to ask for directions. Then I remembered that I was in the US, and asking directions can be dangerous. The red marker on the map below shows where his house was and the black cross near the North Carolina border, in the mountains, was where I went.

I gingerly turned around (as by then the road was one lane) and after twists and turns somehow got back on the main road where my cell phone worked again and he came and met me. I did find a small table at his house and bought it. Then I had to find my way back to the main road again... not easy. This little trip should have taken me 45 minutes but ended taking almost 2 hours (I was lost for a long time...) Luckily I made it back to Hiawassee by 10:30 am to meet my Swiss friend. Then after a nice visit with a strong cup of coffee and a tasty piece of almond cake I drove down the road again toward Bavarian-style Helen, Georgia. It was a lovely morning and the route around the mountains is scenic but I had forgotten that it is steep hill mountain driving on a winding road with blind curves. Although I am used to these mountain roads if I don't use the interstate highways between Tennessee and Georgia, but I had to keep my eyes on the road and not the blubbling stream along the highway.

Arriving in Helen, I stopped at the Betty's Country Store. The first time my husband and I drove to Hiawassee we stopped at Betty's Country Store to buy a snack for our baby daughters. That was back in 1975. The store had opened in 1973 and was quite small, selling mostly fruits, vegetables and snacks. Now it had expanded quite a lot, like a large supermarket, with meat, beer and wines, etc., and eating areas outdoors.

I drove about 1.5 miles down to the village of Sautee-Nacoochee and stopped at the Nora Mill Granary Grist Mill and Country Store (one of the southeast's last working grist mill.) A small dam on the Chattahoochee River was built there in 1824, and later, in 1876, a grist mill was established selling grits, flours and cornmeal. The mill is four stories tall and has 1,500 pound French Burr Mill stones, a 100-foot wooden raceway and a water turbine. A gold prospector, John Martin, built the mill in 1876. In 1901 it was purchased by Dr. Lamartine G. Hardman who named the mill after his sister Nora.

Now the mill has been run by four generation of the Fain family. They still use the original stones to make flours, grits, cornmeal, etc. They sell other products like jams, salsa, hot sauces, syrups, local honeys and pre-packaged products such as pioneer's porridge, pancake and waffle mixes, biscuit and bread mixes amd more. The old-fashioned country store attached to the mill is quaint and it is fun to walk around and look at everything for sale, which I did and took numerous photos.

An assortment of kitchen items were also for sale such as cast iron cookware, cookbooks, wooden mixing bowls and trays, old-fashioned candles and other attractive kitchen gifts.

I walked out to the breezeway and porch that overlooks the Chattahoochee River. Large trout could be seen gathering at the foot of the dam.

It was a warm and sunny day. Watching the trout from the deck and listening to the bubbling river below was vey relaxing after all the mountain driving.

Back inside I took more photos of interesting old items on the walls.

There was also information on how the mill operates. It uses turbines rather than the water wheels used by most mills of that time. It gives an idea on how flour was produced in the past, and how this mill has kept producing stone-ground grains for almost 150 years. The mill is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

Before I left I purchased a few items, some requested by my daughters, and a few for me, as shown below. I make my own jams but I bought a couple that were a mixture, to taste and see if I'd like to try making them - T.O.E jam (tangering, orange, elderberry) and Five Pepper Strawberry jelly (strawberry, green bell pepper, jalapeno pepper, Thai pepper, cayenne pepper, habanero pepper.) For the people who cannot drive to the North Georgia Mountains to buy their products Nora Mill has an online store, click here for it. Once you click on the online store link you will see all the different items for sale, and they ship.

Then it was time to hit the road again. I could have driven down the highway to Atlanta but that would have meant crossing the city during rush hour... Instead I cut across the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains to Talking Rock, GA. to join highway I-575 down to my area, close to Kennesaw Mountain. It was a small two lane road from Nacoochee to Talking Rock with many curves, but there was hardly any traffic, and it was scenic.

I arrived home at 5:30 pm, quite tired and hungry as I had had no lunch. I unloaded the car and noticed that my newly purchased table (made of maple) was a lot smoother and shinier than the piece of hackberry wood I had placed on top of my plant stand. Later, I called the wood artisan to ask him what I should do. He suggested that I bring my piece of wood back to him and he would work on it. Well, now, will I dare go back and get lost in the mountains once more? I told him I may come back in a couple of months...

There was no fresh food in the house and I did not feel like eating a frozen dinner, so I drove to the local diner. They serve fresh meals with large portions. I usually can bring food home for a couple more meals. I had a meat, two vegetables and a side of coleslaw salad. Then the server came and asked what dessert I had selected. I told him I was full and ate only a third of my meal. He said he would bring me a take-out box and asked again what dessert I wanted. I repeated I desired no dessert to which he replied "you have to select a dessert." I asked him why? He said "because someone has paid for your meal and dessert is included." I asked him who had paid and he said he was not at liberty to tell me. So I selected a piece of strawberry cake to take home. When he brought it to me he said "a funny thing happened - someone else wanted to pay for your meal and I said 'too late, her meal is already paid for'. I was astounded and asked him if this occurred often in his restaurant. He told me he had been working there for a long while and he could think of no other time this took place for one of his customers. I was speechless.

What a day it had been - getting lost on primitive roads in the North Georgia Mountains after sunrise, and being afraid to ask for directions, then having two different patrons wishing to buy my dinner at sunset. How about that! Certainly a day to remember.

Old Car City in White, Georgia

On Sunday 6 November, 2022 I drove the 4 1/2 hours from Nashville to Greater Atlanta so I could vote in the mid-term elections on Tuesday Nov. 8. Before, I usually voted during advance voting at the main Cobb County polling place, but this time I could not. At about 10 am I drove to where I used to vote in my area. There were just a couple of cars in the parking lot; I thought they had moved the voting location but a sign showing "vote here" was in front of the door so I went in. I was first in line and it took me only ten minutes to vote. Of course I live in the extreme northwest of Cobb County, in the rural area where houses are far in between (my neighbor has 40 acres between us behind the lake, and the next one is a farm.)

Thursday Nov. 10 was a bright and sunny fall day begging for me to stay oudoors, but where to go? In early 2020 I had planned to become a member of the Nashville Photo Club; then Covid happened and I did not. They met monthly and went on regular outings, near and far. They had been planning to drive to White in North Georgia to an old car junkyard-museum. I checked and realized it was only 26 miles from my Georgia house. If they were willing to drive 4+ hours to visit, I certainly could drive half an hour to take a look. So this is what I did that day. My house is not far from the Bartow county line. The red dot below, between Acworth and Kennesaw, is where my house is located.

Arriving around 10:30 am there was just another car in the parking lot (from Pennsyvania.) Old Car City is on highway US-411 with just a small southern restaurant across the road. I went in and paid the entrance fee (cash only.) There was an eclectic assortment of memorabilia, vintage collectible, antique toys, Americana, an old piano, etc. in the interior area.

I was shown a map then told the property had 6.5 miles of trails on the 34 acres (137,593.12 sq meters.) I walked by a sign with a short history of the business and a witch left over from Halloween when they offered a spooky "Haunted Trails." (Click on collage to enlarge and read better.)

The parents of Dean Lewis, the current owner, started a general store in 1931 that sold various items from tires, gasoline, clothing and car parts. Because of the Great Depression steel was scarce so they changed their line to scrapping cars; by the late 1940s it had become a salvage yard. When Dean acquired the business in 1970 there were 40 cars on the lot. He had a passion for old cars and spent decades acquiring wrecked and junked vehicles from recycling yards, auctions and private parties. But Dean did not like to sell the old vehicles' parts, he wanted to preserve them. He kept collecting them, had to buy more land; he stopped counting when he had collected over 4000 rusting metal carcasses. People were stopping by to take a look or take pictures, so about 15 years ago Dean realized that the business could be better sustained as a museum charging admittance. I started walking on the grounds, passing more unusual items, rusting bicycles and tricycles.

Then I entered the trail, looking in awe at all the decaying cars covered with pine needles and creeping vines. Some cars had trees growing through their bumpers or windshields and even lifted them. Some cars were on top of each other, maybe as they had been delivered. After more than 80 years the cars had been taken over by nature, they were part of it. This is why the slogan here is "Nature, Art, History and Cars." It was an amazing sight, but very quiet, with just the birds chirping, and no one else around.

Stopping to take photos, walking, turning, I knew I was getting lost, but so what.

Along the way there were random unique hand-painted signs, with optional spelling.

It was in the high 70s (26 c) but under the pine canopy it felt cool. It was a forest, really, with some very large trees and a heavy carpet of pine straw on the ground and covering the cars.

Actually with all the pine straw it was hard to read the make of the cars. I like vintage cars but I am not an enthusiast and unless I can read it I can't distinguish between all the different brands and certainly can't tell the models or years. Maybe after a good rain, if the straw moved it would be easier to read. I kept stopping and snapping - I had brought my Nikon D5200 and my small Sony DSC-HX90V plus took some with my Iphone. There was an embarrassment of choices - where to point?

I read the oldest car there was a 1918 Buick, then a few from the 1920s, more from the 1930s and most vehicles from the 1940s to 1972. They included Packards, Desoto, Chevrolet, Studebakers, Hudsons, Fords, Edsels, Mercury, Buicks, Plymouths, Oldsmobiles, Dodges, Cadillacs, Chryslers, Pontiac, Lincoln, some buses, a 1941 Mack milk truck and a few foreign cars - I recognized some VWs. From a distance I thought I read "vagabond" on the back of a car. Getting closer, sure enough, it read "vagabond." I never knew such a model ever existed. Back at home I researched it. From 1946 to 1951 the Kaiser-Frazer Corporation made upper-medium price luxury automobiles; their Frazer Vagabond was a unique hatchback sedan. The Vagabond shown below (courtesy Wikipedia) has been restored to its prime glory. (I wish I could be restored...)

There certainly was a plethora of rustic relics from days gone by and I understood why another of the Old Car City's slogans was "Photographer's Paradise." How to select the best angle to snap these decomposing dream cars?

Some metal chairs were placed in some of the trails for a quick rest or meditation or reflection?

Then I saw it - a car I knew. Flying to France in 2008 I watched on the flight the movie "Gran Torino" starring Clint Eastwood with his prized muscle car, a 1972 Ford Torino. Here was a poor sweet green Torino resting under the Georgia pines.

It was already past 1:00 pm. I had been wandering in the forest among this chrome and rust cemetery for 2 1/2 hours. It was time to go back and cross the highway to the restaurant for lunch, but which way to get back? I kept going up and down trails, and they all looked alike. I did not reach the restaurant until close to 2:00 pm!

I understand that locals gather there for lunch and it gets quite busy, but by then there were just a couple of patrons. Wes-Man Restaurant is a typical rural southern restaurant. They open 6:00 am to 3:00 pm. Inside it looked cozy and tiny with license plates covering the wall along old newspapers, old high school annuals, etc. The lunch menu has a large selection of classic southern comfort food with burgers, salads, blue plates (meat and 3) and more.

There were bags of water hanging over the booths - to prevent flies they told me. I ordered the standard southern vegetable plate: fried okra, turnip greens, black eye peas, fried green tomatoes and corn bread. I'm pleased they served the vinegar pepper sauce for the greens, as they often don't in Tennessee. For dessert I had the blueberry cobbler. Everything was tasty especially the okra and fried green tomatoes.

Now that I had re-fueled my body I was ready to cross the road back to the forest of disintegrating relics. Close to the front of the lot the cars and trucks were parked on cement or gravel, not under pine trees. Many had moss and grime from all the decades they had been stationed there.

I wish I recognized some of those cars, like that long black one above. I did drive two vintage cars back in the days. My father, in the late 1940s, had bought a 1936 Simca-Fiat coupe, with stick shifts, for my mother so she would learn to drive. She always refused. The car spent years in storage in a French country warehouse until she gave it to me for my 18th birthday. I drove that old car all over Paris in the early 1960s and had so much fun. I also drove my boy-friend's 1939 Chevrolet coupe in Great Falls, Montana, a couple of times. The Chevrolet is in the bottom photo, below.

Walking back to the forest trails I passed some vehicles that were under shelter and some above the shelter's roof.

I kept on my little trek stopping here and there to snap hood ornaments, car remnants, ghosts of VW Beetles and vans, and crumbling school buses.

At 3:30 pm I was ready to head back as they close at 4:00 pm. Getting back to the main building I stopped by a collectible automobile in great shape. It was the maroon 1977 Lincoln Mark V Elvis Presley bought in 1977, just months before he died.

Later I read some negative comments about this unusual museum. Some said it was useless hoarding these pieces of junk. Other said the land would be better used in more money productive ways or that the owner Dean Lewis would profit more by selling the land than keeping that garbage around. I don't think Dean is interested in that. He says "I don't know what I would do if I couldn't get up every morning and look at old cars."

Since a little boy Dean had a passion for old cars. He was able to build a business around it and make a living. Eighty plus years later, Dean is still around his beloved old cars (he was born in 1937.) There is a lot to be said about this - life is not just measured in dollars. These vehicles had their day, their use and now can freeze in place and give pleasure to others. About 99% of them are unsalvageable. They have another use - a destination for families to walk in an uncommon forest. They are ideal as photo opportunities for professional photographers, ad agencies, media companies, videographers, photo clubs or just people like me who enjoy shooting unusual and unique pieces.

Another comment was: "A friend and I just traveled almost 1400 miles to photograph the incredible cars at Old Car City. We arrived at opening and stayed till closing for 3 days and didn't even come close to seeing/photographing it all!" There have been visitors from Sweden, Australia, New Zealand, China, Russia, Canada and the UK in addition to domestic visitors. I truly enjoyed getting lost in this one-of-a-kind forest and snapping these lovingly neglected car remains fading away under the Georgia sun.

A stay in Bangor, Maine

In mid-November I was back in Greater Atlanta, Georgia. I intended to take pictures in a park nearby for a fall blog post. Time went by too quickly and instead I just took a couple of photos of the leaves in the backyard.

In lieu of this fall blog post I'll relate my summer stay in Bangor, Maine. In early June my daughter asked me if I would like to drive with her, my son-in-law and the kids to Bangor, Maine. I replied, no thank you - it is too far. I had only planned to drive the two hours north to Paducah, Kentucky. Nashville, Tennessee to Bangor, Maine is about 1,330 miles (2,140 km) about the same distance as Brussels, Belgium to Budapest, Hungary - it's quite far as I said.

She explained that three of the four grandchildren were going to attend several weeks of Chinese language immersion summer school in Bangor. She only could stay with them part of the time but then had to get back. As an enticement she offered to have me fly there and then she would come back when the Chinese school ended. She said we could drive down the coast of Maine and on the way stop a day in Kennebunkport, Maine, then New Hampshire and also in Newport, Rhode Island where I had always wished to go, and then stay in Boston a couple of days and I could fly back from Boston. So I went. Because Bangor is close to Acadia National Park summer lodgings are difficult to find. My daughter could only find a small farm to rent. The owners lived in another house adjacent to the original farm. The owners, the wife, drove a Prius, a Toyota hybrid (instead of one of those big SUV vehicles) and the husband, a pick-up truck. Actually, compared to Nashville and Atlanta, there were a lot less SUVs in Maine (where winters are rigorous and they could say they need them, not like in Deep South downtowns ... but in Maine they are more mindful of the environment.)

The farm was built in 1900. Chickens were free to roam and would come to the front door. They would run to greet us as soon as we drove into the farm. Horses were in the back near a wildlife trail. (Click on collage to enlarge.)

I took some photos of the interior but found some better ones on the owners' site (theirs were taken in winter.) The farm has 3 bedrooms, a large bathroom, a kitchen with eating area and two front rooms with a piano. I stayed in one of the upstairs bedrooms.

My daughter and her family drove to Maine a week prior to the start of the Chinese summer school so they could visit the area and Acadia National Park. This park is about 41 miles from Bangor. It is located on Mount Desert Island and Isle au Haut. The highest mountain on the Atlantic Coast of the US, Cadillac Mountain, is in this park.

In its 49,075 acres (76.7 sq mi or 198.6 km2) the park contains wetlands, forests, meadows, mountains, lakes, streams, beaches and a large diversity of animal and plant life. Millions of visitors come to the park and I believe reservations are required now to enter it, at least in the summer months, because of the congestion. In 1929 the name of the park was changed from Marquis de Lafayette Park to Acadia National Park in honor of the former French colony of Acadia that used to include Maine. The center photo is of my son-in-law - he had to fly back to Nashville after a week in Maine.

My daughter flew back to Nashville after her 3 weeks and left the big van in Bangor. They use this large van to transport the 4 kids, 3 adults (including the au pair) and two dogs (no SUVs for member of my family.) For commuting to work they just have two small passenger vehicles. But the van is quite high and long - I was afraid to drive it. Fortunately the au pair stayed during my time there and he drove. He is an Italian of Moroccan ancestry and his family lives in France now, so he speaks Italian, Moroccan Arabic, French and English. We ate most evenings in local restaurants and pubs, apart from the day the Italian soccer team won the European Soccer Championship, its first time since 1968. Our au pair was so overjoyed that he treated us to a pizza dinner. That week was also my youngest grandson's 10 years old birthday. He requested a chocolate cream pie. I found a bakery in Bangor that was able to bake one especially for him. Below is the van, the bakery, the pie, the au pair with the Italian flag wrapped around his shoulders and my grandchildren. The grandson in the center is letting his hair grow to donate to a group helping young cancer patients who lost their hair.

The first Sunday after I arrived I was pleased to meet one of my blogging friends for lunch in Bangor. I had been reading her blog for years until she eventually stopped blogging. Ruth's original blog was named "synch-ro-ni-zing" and her last blog, ended in 2017, was called Birds of the Air quilts where she showed the quilts she made. Ruth and her husband retired and moved to a small coastal town in Maine, not far from Bangor. It was so much fun meeting her after having read her blogs for over a decade. We met at the Mason Brewing Co. Restaurant along the Penobscot River. We ate outdoors as it was a warm day and also because of Covid.

I was surprised by the long list of beers and ciders. Ruth told me that there are a great many pubs and restaurants in the area featuring local artisanal beers and ciders. Later I read that behind Vermont, Maine has the second highest number of breweries per 100,000 residents in the USA. The 100 or so local breweries produce New England IPAs, English ales, stouts, porters, sours, Belgian, farmhouse, lagers and more. They have the largest variety of hard cider that I have seen outside of France and Belgium. Most restaurants and pubs will offer "sample beers" of your choice in 4 small glasses. I did not try them since I am more partial to cider.

I remember writing Ruth and telling her I was going to stay in a small town in Maine - Bangor. She answered that Bangor was one of the largest cities in Maine, and with 32,000 residents is considered the unofficial capital of northern Maine. Well, when you consider that the population of the state of Maine is 1.34 million, Bangor is ... large. But coming from greater Atlanta with 6.09 million and the state of Georgia with 10.83 million, I thought Bangor was tiny ... oops! The weather was nice though, not as warm as in Atlanta. We did not have to use air conditioning and I was chilly a couple of times. Of course, in winter it must be quite cold - much too cold for me. Here are a couple of photos of the city in winter (courtesy the Bangor Daily News.)

Definitely a city to visit in summer, in July like I did. At least for us southerners ...