The mountains are calling, smart fishies, and breathtaking

The view from the end of the driveway at my favorite mountain hideaway.  This guy was quietly fly fishing one afternoon.

A gloomy walk, but still beautiful at the dam on Lake Chatuge in nearby Hiawassee, Georgia.  The fishermen speeding away had been there awhile, with no luck, and some fish actually jumped out of the water when the boat left.  Laughing behind their fins, no doubt.  :)

Look at those mountains in the distance.  Just breathtaking, I think.  I stopped my car and got out to gaze at the view for a moment.

These photos were from a visit Labor Day weekend and I will be there again in a few hours.           "The mountains are calling, and I must go." John Muir

Good Things Happened: Hello Spring!, Dreams, Moody view

The proprietor of my favorite little antiques / cool stuff shop in Lilburn, Georgia created this homage to Spring, which is almost over.  Sure has been beautiful.

Early last Saturday, the young 'uns were up and at it at the ball field at Mountain Park Park.  I titled this photo Field of Dreams and wonder how many dream of being big leaguers.

And there was a trip to my favorite mountain area the weekend before that.  It was a soggy trip, but I didn't mind.  I read two books on the back porch and just watched the river go by.

The last photo is of the drive up the mountain to my sister's vacation house.  Loved the mist on the mountains there.  Hope you all are well.  I'll be around for blog visits the next couple of days.  Hugs!

Misty river, purple mountains majesty and stylin'

I went to sit beside the Hiwassee river and read (and sleep) last weekend - so lovely that it was a long one.  This was my first sight when I got out of the car upon arrival on Friday evening and my blood pressure lowered immediately.

The most athletic I got was on Saturday morning, when I walked at nearby Chatuge Dam (and somehow dodged the rain). 

And I visited the plant nursery I like so much and loved this stylin' lady with Creeping Jenny growing out of her head.  :)

And it was back to the real world on Wednesday, but it's always good to be home, too.  Happy weekend, everyone!

Lovely day, enchanted and walk about

There was another visit to the river house last weekend, and this was the view on Friday afternoon when I drove in - the Friday Market in the town square.  I couldn't wait to get my stuff in the house so I could come back here and peacefully mingle.

My only real task was choosing a new hanging plant to take back home, and I found it at an enchanted plant nursery, which was completely off the beaten path.

The delightful lady who helped me pick this out said it is a dipladenia, here in it's temporary parking place by the river, until I took my leave on Monday.  In a true Good Things Happened moment, she tucked it away in the back seat of my car, and said to it, "Now you behave on your trip home."  I thought she was talking to me at first.  :)

The river was beautiful on Sunday morning, so I walked around the banks of the Hiwassee River a bit.  I flushed out a phantom egret that we see now and then.  We both startled each other and then it flapped away south.

My internet is down at home (since last week), so I am not able to visit blogs as much as usual.  Waiting for a technician to visit and things will be back to normal soon, I hope.

Tranquility, what a beautiful morning and helping out

- Another tranquil photo from last weekend in the mountains.  This farmer has harvested his crops already, but I love the furrows left in the fields.  Not to mention the mountain range in the distance. 

- Someone is allowing camping on their property along the river (you can see campers in the background.)  What a beautiful morning that was!

- In Atlanta this morning the sky is gloomy - a result of Hurricane Matthew making its way up the coast (we are 362 miles, on a straight line, from coastal South Carolina).  Nothing good about this weather event, but I admire the people helping out others who had to evacuate from their homes, by taking them in.  My sister, in the Florida Panhandle (out of harm's way) is hosting beloved relatives from the east coast of Florida, until it is safe for them to go home.

I decided to reformat my photos a little, to make them bigger, so I don't have to say "click to enlarge" every time.  :)  Hope you have a good weekend. 

Shimmer and fog, music and art

- My favorite river view - the Hiwassee River in the Nantahala Forest.  (My photos always upload with the location Nantahala Forest - I love that.)  It was my last visit there until late spring 2017.  I was sitting on the back porch reading on Saturday afternoon and was loving how shimmery the river looked.

- Sunday morning - 9:30am (EDT) - fog over a farmer's fields. Click to enlarge to see the lovely light.  I was on a back road and paused briefly to snap this photo - it was too lovely not to capture.

- I was on my way to the John C. Campbell Folk School Fall Festival, where there is much pottery, artwork, basketry, jewelry, etc. for sale, as well as lots of music performances. I loved the woman on the right, playing so energetically with her family's band. 

- And I amused myself by photographing this section of cars.  If I panned to the right, you would see thousands more.  Since I got there early, I was able to park fairly close. At first I couldn't see my car, but remembered it was parked in front of a yellow one.  Once I spotted the yellow one, the long-time dent in the right fender of my car singled it out and off I went back to the river.

October is my favorite month, and right on schedule, the air turned a wee bit crisp.  This little weekend trip got the month started out just right.

Doing nothing, shimmering and moving on

- I pretty much did nothing but read and sleep while I was at the house by the river last weekend.  Click to enlarge to see the yellow daisies that are blooming away across the river there.  Photo taken early Monday morning as I was planning my departure.

- The water flows gently by.  It's so beautiful, the way it shimmers. 

- Can you see the two young deer munching on the grass there?  I was in the kitchen, preparing to make coffee even earlier on Monday morning.  These were both male - they had sprouting antlers.

- If you click to enlarge, you can see that the one on the left had spotted me.  They turned and ran into the woods - I was rather sorry to have interrupted the munching. 

Labor Day weekend

- Labor Day weekend in the United States:  "Labor Day, the first Monday in September, is a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country."  This fact comes from the US Department of Labor website.

- I'm just happy to have the holiday, in which I'll wake up to this view on Monday, although I think I have contributed plenty.  :)  No matter the case - I love this long weekend.

- The river bank was eroding at the front of my sister and brother-in-law's property in the Nantahala Forest of western North Carolina, so they had this rip rap put in to stop it.  Photo taken on my last visit.

I hope you have a wonderful weekend, wherever you live, my friends!

Out and about on a busy week

This is a sort of round up of photos taken during my recent short vacation with my sisters.  I had such a hodge podge of random photos that I thought they belong together.  

 - After I uploaded photos from my phone the other day, I couldn't think at first what this was.  And then I remembered - it's the N5 entrance of Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in Atlanta  (one of many entrances).  I was picking up my sister from her incoming flight and was afraid I'd forget the direction my car was in, so I took a photo of it.  It's a massive airport, with equally massive parking and everything is letter and number coded.  I did remember this label though - probably because I took the time to snap the photo.

- I do love grits for breakfast.  My sisters and I thought this "10 Commandment of Grits" on the menu at Mary's Southern Grill in Young Harris, Georgia was funny.  :)

- Elvis graces the entrance of the furniture department of Alexander's Store in Blairsville, Georgia, where they sell "everything under the sun."  

- Brasstown, North Carolina, population 240, is home to a rather colorful convenience store, named "Clay's Corner."  The Clay's Corner website proclaims Brasstown as "opossum capital of the world."  Hmm - a dubious claim to fame, but it helps to explain the label on this water my sister brought back from inside the store.  That's her arm there - she was frowning at me for snapping her photo, but I only wanted the water bottle in the picture. 

- We were surprised to see these pink flowers (lilies?) that sprang up, or "volunteered" as our late mom used to say, in the flower bed next to my sister's vacation home, in which a profusion of orange daylilies were growing in July.

That's it.  I decided not to put Elvis in the title of my post, although it's always so interesting to see how many hits a post will get if you put something popular, like Elvis, in the title.  :)  Happy weekend, y'all!

Sister time, rambling around and view at the end

 - The side of the house view from my sister's vacation home in the Nantahala Forest in western North Carolina.  I think of that view all the time when I'm not there and can hear the gentle rushing of the river when I close my eyes.

- The three of us had a lovely time rambling around.  This was a shop porch in nearby Blairsville, Georgia.  I had a quiet moment while sisters were still shopping inside.  The owner had a lovely, big black dog who was very shy.  She said he had wandered up to her home and they never did find his owner.  He's got a great home now.

- This young man is a teacher at the local high school in Clay County, North Carolina.  He and his students grow vegetables and fruit and sell it at the farmers' market on Thursday evenings.  I got one of the $3 watermelons to take home.

- The view from the road, as you round the bend, when leaving the mountain neighborhood where the house is.  We were on our way to a final breakfast out together on Sunday morning before going three separate ways - Georgia, Florida and Virginia.  Can't wait until next year!

Taken for granted (not), sentimental nod and sister time

- More beauty from my sister's home in northern Florida, taken last weekend.  I stopped at this spot and marveled at its loveliness.  My sister says she tries not to take the view for granted - I have to say, I never do.

- You can barely see the old Gulf Oil sign posted on the barn.  When they bought this property, the barn and some other old out-buildings were already there.  They kept them and built their home in the middle of the property.  Their family has always been in the oil distribution business and they started out with Gulf, so the sign is a sentimental nod to the past.

- And another beautiful spot - about eight hours north of there, in the Nantahala Forest.  I ran across this photo when I was looking for something else.  This is where I am today - along with my two sisters.  We are having "sisters only" time. 

And Sunday, August 7 is National Sisters Day, so this is working out!

Catching a few notes, the bend of the river and finally finished

- Thanks to the US Founding Fathers, I got a long weekend, so headed to my sister's Nantahala mountain retreat for a few days.  There is no internet service in that spot, so I have to come into town to email, etc. from my phone.  I love that they display the flag on the gazebo, where bands play every Friday night.  When I was passing by on my way in last Friday, I rolled my window down and caught a few notes of the bluegrass music the band was playing.

- My favorite nonagenarian farmer, Mr. Martin, was busy all day Saturday and on Monday working his crops.  He is a slight man, who always wears an ironed, long-sleeved shirt and a large, white cowboy hat when he is working.  He has always had that farm across the river and it never ceases to amaze me that he has so much energy to keep on doing it.  

- Back in Atlanta this morning, I noted the mural on the building across the street from my workplace is finally finished.  The window company has moved out of the building, so we are looking forward to seeing who our new neighbors, who commissioned this artwork, will be.

Window, so good and making its way back home

 - The kitchen window at the mountain house in the Nantahala Forest - taken a couple of weeks ago when I was there.  So much going on in that window:  I like that my sister's late mother-in-law put items in the house with Native American touches, like the artwork on the left, since there are two documented bent trees on the property.  Native Americans used the bent trees as trail markers.  The watermelon and duck tchotchkes on the sill evoke Northern Florida, where the family is from.  And the tree outside the window is a Japanese Maple tree - I loved the sunlight playing across it and it's what made me snap this photo in the first place.

- Friend Leisa and I like to meet at L'Thai, near my home in the Atlanta suburbs, for dinner sometimes.  This plate of shrimp and vegetables in Panang sauce from our last visit was so beautiful that I had to snap a photo of it.  And it was so good!  There are so few patrons there during the week, that we wonder how they stay open, but so glad that they do.

- On a somewhat somber note - my late father was a veteran of World War II, in the US Navy on a minesweeper until the end of the war in 1946.  This photo album was taken from a captured Japanese soldier and considered a "spoil of war", I guess.  My very kind dad and I talked about it before he died.  He said he wanted to see if I could return it to the soldier or his family.

     So the journey to return the album began, but efforts to handle it through the Japanese embassy in Washington failed (long story), until I was watching CBS Sunday Morning two weeks ago and saw a story about similar efforts.  The story focused on the flags (Yosegaki Hinomaru) that Japanese soldiers took with them into battle.  They were signed by their family members and friends before they went off to war and they kept the flags with them in battle.  Many American soldiers found them and took them home.

     The story featured a non-profit organization in Astoria, Oregon, called the Obon Society, that is handling the return of the flags to the families, which sometimes takes time, but they are having some success.  So I contacted them and they most kindly agreed to take the album, warning me that this might take some time, that 67 cities in Japan were burned to the ground during the war, so they are finding that often the families have moved on and can be difficult to trace.  However, they are having some success finding the families if they are / were living in rural areas.  There is a name and address in the front of the album, faded, but legible, so I'm hopeful.  I sent it to the Obon Society on Wednesday.  Keeping my fingers crossed.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

At rest, more beauty and family fun

- More mountain scenes from the Nantahala Forest taken with my iPhone.  This is a farm I see every time I drive up the mountain to my sister's vacation home.  See the cows there resting in the distance?  The field of yellow wildflowers caught my attention every time I passed.  Click to enlarge.

- Back at Hamilton Gardens in Hiawassee, Georgia.  I loved the wildflowers next to the Oakleaf Hydrangea bush.  That's some sort of utility shed in the distance.

- And the view to the right from the back porch at the house.  The farmer across the river is in his 90s - I've mentioned him before.  He was out every morning and afternoon, working on his plantings.  You can just see a corner of his property there on the left.

- And there was some of this - watching kayakers go down the Hiwassee River.  Family fun, looks like.

Several days ago, I realized there is a bird's nest in the fern hanging by my front door.  Mama Wren flew out as I started watering it and kept yelling at me from a nearby perch.  Early this morning, I was outside watering potted plants and heard movement and chirping from within the plant - it was positively vibrating with life. Lovely.

Sunrise, mama bird and poppies

To celebrate Earth Day, Friday, April 22, I went back to another spring, five years ago, for some photos that make me smile this morning:

- Sunrise at my sister and brother-in-law's farm in Jefferson county, Florida.  Niece Amanda will be married on this spot, just before sunset, next March.

- This bird had a nest in the fern hanging by my front door.  She flew out as I was coming in with packages, keeping a vigilant eye on her nest.  I had to water that plant very carefully, I remember - keeping the water to one edge of the plant.  The plant lived though and when I got home from an out of town trip around the first of May that year, the baby birds had left the nest.

 - Poppies from the mountain property that I love to visit in the Nantahala forest.

Happy Earth Day everyone!