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.