The Crooked Road

Rout 58 runs east to west from western Virginia in the area where Tennessee and North Carolina all come together. The road is indeed very crooked, so curvy that the the State  signed a portion say that trucks over 35 feet in length should not transverse this road. We did manage to travel most all of the road with the exception of the " forbidden section". That being said, in our quest to avoid Interstate highways, our route from Asheville brought us through a National Forest on a road that we probably shouldn't have been on. It was narrow and contained many hairpin turns that would have been problematic had there been any traffic. We arrived in Damascus Virginia through the back door. Damascus is home to multiple trails including the Appalachian Trail and the Virginia Creeper Trail. The Creeper is a 38 mile rails to trails gravel path along a mountain stream as it winds through the mountains of Western Virginia.

Damascus serve as a launching area to start our journey along the musical heritage trail known as the crooked road. We visited Bristol Virginia/ Bristol Tennessee where the Smithsonian affiliate Museum of The Birthplace of Country Music is located. The museum lived up to the Smithsonian appellation. We also almost scored a "B and B" there, but the brewery half of the equation was closed. The Bakery did not let us down. Just east of Bristol is the Town of Abingdon Virginia that houses Heartwood a cultural heritage center.

The next stop along the Crooked road was Galax Virginia, just 50 miles east along rout 58, but due to our size we had to drive over 100 miles to get there. The Rex theater that is home to a weekly radio show was our primary focus. The Cabin Creek Boys put on a fabulous show. The audience was mostly all regulars. A great slice of Americana!

Floyd Virginia our last stop on the Crooked Road features the Floyd Country Store a venue for local Blue Grass Music. One of Saturday afternoons artists was a 12 year old boy named Presley Barker, a guitar picker. His mentors include Bryan Sutton and Wayne Henderson. Presley captivated the audience. He is sure to rise to one of the greats some day. If you have a chance look him up on U Tube.

We are now out of the Mountains and at Petersberg Virginia the location of the famed Civil War siege. Today we visited the National Battlefield and saw what remains of the famed Crater where so many Americans perished.

Sunset Asheville NC

Hole on rock entering Damascus from the "back door"

Crater of Petersburg Siege

Mountain Stream that passed behind our trailer in Damascus

Rex Theater downtown Galax VA

Ceder Creek Boys at Rex

Concert at Floyd

Pamplin Historical Museum Of The Civil War Soldier

Blue Ridge Parkway

Savannah to Asheville

Biltmore Estate

Informal Dining Room

View From Biltmore Varanda

Azalea Garden

Tree Swallow

Solitary Sandpiper

Performer at Savannah Music Festival

B 17 Bomber Mighty 8th Museum

Morning Fog as seen from our campsite in Asheville

Trailer Camp Site Asheville

                                                       Savannah to Asheville



The Savannah Music Festival lived up to our expectations in delivering a variety of great world class entertainment.  Shortly after arriving we were off to see the Earls of Leicester, a bluegrass group that plays music inspired by Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs. The next day we had the treat of listening to 3 High school Jazz Bands from various parts of the country that were in a competition with12 of the country’s best High School Jazz bands. It was hard to believe these were high school kids we were listening to. The rest of the week involved 4 additional concerts. Saturday was blues featuring Paul Oscher who played with legendary Muddy Waters for many years. Sunday we were treated with guitar music of Richard Thompson said to be one of the worlds 20 best guitarist. The only day off from the Music Festival was spent at The Museum of the Mighty 8th AirCorps. This unit played a pivotal part in WWII in Europe and North Africa. It is amazing to see what these young airmen did to help defeat Germany.

Mike and Carol were gracious hosts for our visit. It was great being able to spend so much time with them. It was a treat to get to better know Mike’s friend PJ down from NY for the Music Festival.

Our next stop on the journey North is Asheville North Carolina. We decided to break up the trip by leaving Savannah one day earlier than planned and stopping for a night in South Carolina at a core of engineers park on a man made lake. It was lovely.

Asheville is located in the Appalachian Mountains in NW North Carolina. This is our first sight of mountains since we passed through Arkansas in October. The elevation also helped provide some cold weather to start our acclamation back to Maine weather. The first day we visited the town of Asheville. Here we did some bird watching and also visited, a Bakery and Brewery ,my idea of a B and B. In fact we managed two of each.

Today we spent the day visiting Biltmore the palace like home constructed by George Vanderbilt at the turn of the century. Biltmore is an opulent home of 253 rooms billed as America’s largest home. The huge rooms are filled with priceless antiques and painting and tapestries created by world famous artists. The original grounds consisted of 125,000 acres. The acres and acres of gardens are filled with a myriad of colorful spring flowers. The Azalea garden alone is comprised of 15 acres with a wide variety of colors. We finished off our visit with a great mid day meal at a restaurant  on the estate.

Tomorrow it is off to SW Virginia for the start of another musical delight along what is known as the crooked road.