Craggy Gardens

The overcast day started with me picking up 2 Dames, Kimber and Beth, while two GA Dames followed along in their car (Janet and Kellye).  The weather held up just fine, til we neared Asheville NC, then the sky just opened up.   We pulled over at the nearest exit and into a BILO grocery store.  Where I bought 3 rain ponchos.  We got back on the road and exited into Asheville.  Somehow, my directions weren't clear and we ended up traveling up Tunnel Road, a steep dead end road.  With rain pouring, we stopped to look at directions, when the parked truck in front of us suddenly blared his high beams on us.  Someone was in the car!  Oops, we u-turned it and headed back on the main road. 

We finally found the parkway!  Cruising along in the rain, we some how lost the other car.  I just figured we would all make it to the meet up spot where were were supposed to meet up with 3 more Dames, Chris, Deirdre, and Nina.  Well, the rain gods had other plans for us that day. haha!

We waited and waited and waited for a good 1/1/2 hours.  The GA girls had made a wrong turn and ended up at the picnic area instead of the visitors center, but we were able to text them the right meet up spot.  Since the other 3 Dames were missing, I decided to call the only other visitors center within a 50 mile radius.  Guess what....the other three Dames were there and had the called our visitors center and were on the way.  So we stuck around and played in the rain and wind. haha!  Seriously :)

Kimber, Beth and I,  we put on our colorful ponchos and had a good time splashing around in the rain.  It's great when your around a other people with great attitudes.  I'm so lucky to have such a group of wonderful Dames that have been a blast to hang out with, no matter the circumstances.  Instead of griping and complaining, about waiting and all the rain, we all had a great time being silly.  Since the ponchos were red, blue, and orange, we gave each other names.  Koolaid (as in the big red pitcher drink) Pumpkin, and the blue poncho was named Violet (as in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Violet who swelled up into a giant blueberry.) Each time the wind bellowed up the ponchos and made us look like our goofy namesakes, we laughed like school girls.  When the rain, wind and temperature got to chilly, we all piled into my car and continued the fun.  Noshing on our trail mix, we saw Chris pull up!  She told us she did go to the wrong visitors center and when she releazied it, she made here way here.   But she got stuck on the parkway when a huge tree had fallen in the road and has stopped traffic. She had to wait for a tree cutting company to come up and cut the tree out of the roadway.  We figured that's what happened to the other dames, Nina and Dierdre.

When the skies cleared up, we decided it was time to go on our hike.  So we drove down to the Craggy Pinnacle trailhead, hiked up a mile in the rhododendrum tunnel and when we got to the top, we were in awe at the stunning view of the NC mountains. We all agreed it was worth the climb.  I took some photos and we hung around enjoying the sunshine and breeze before we hiked back down. 

When we got back to the visitors center, we finally go a hold of Nina and Dierdre.  They also got stuck in the tree traffic, so they were just going to head into Asheville for lunch.  The rest of us decided to continue on with our second hike to the picnic spot.  I found out that we were very lucky enough to have climbed up Craggy Gardens at the perfect moment.  The view is usually socked in with fog about 60% of the time.  Must of been our good attitudes that brought us good karma :)

The trailhead for the next hike was at the end of the parking area in the visitors center.  We had all intentions of hiking up the Craggy Gardens trail to the picnic area, passing a Mountains to Sea Trail shelter along the way.  I was excited to show the group what a trail shelter looked like.  Well, after 10 minutes of hiking, the entire sky turns grey.  All of the sudden the winds start whipping all the rhododendrums around and it starts to sprinkle and lighting.  I decide to call the hike and return back to our cars.  We were hiking up to higher elevation and since it was lightening, I didn't want to risk it.  Back at the parking lot, we bid goodbye to the GA Dames and got a hold of the other NC Dames.  They were in downtown Asheville having a microbrew at Mellowmushroom.  We were so there! haha!  We hopped back in the car and drove the 5 miles back into Asheville, with Kimber giving a mile by mile text to Nina, to let them know where we where.

We parked the car and in our colorful ponchos, we walked into Mellowmushroom to meet up with Nina and Dierdre.  Finding the other Dames, swiling a clean microbrew, and munching on a salad and pizza was the perfect way to end our day.  :)  This was a bit crazy, logistic wise, but we all agreed that we couldn't help the storm or the tree falling.  All in all, we had a great time and still got in a little hike.