Meeting Sheila! One of the first highlights of our summer vacation

We began our journey toward New England two Mondays ago, at 5:00 a.m.

On Tuesday morning in Knoxville, I got to meet an old cyber-friend, whom I've known for at least a decade! It was as if we only lived a few towns away from each other, meeting up for coffee every few months. Read her description of our coffee and conversation; we really hit on all topics and had a laughing-good time, along with some wonderful heart-to-heart.

Let me back up to that first day, July 27th. On that first day, we drove straight through to Knoxville, Tennessee, and set up camp in Maryville, by a lovely pond (or lake? I don't know if it was spring fed or not...it looked pretty clear).

The next highlight of our summer vacation came in the form of hundreds of Canadian geese and a couple of meadows...see for yourself!




Our campsite in Maryville, TN just behind the tree


We were over-run by these geese! I thought this might happen just from the poo on the site when we sat up the tent the previous night.


One of these guys even hissed at me, 'cause I got too close ;-)


Hubster and me at our first campsite of the trip



View from our tent site


On Tuesday, after leaving Knoxville, we headed up through Virginia and went off on our first "wild-goose-chase" of a very different kind! Kylie decided she'd like to stop and see some of Annie Dillard country...for those of you who are _Pilgrim at Tinker Creek_ fans.

We were thinking of camping on 'her' mountain, but we were losing daylight. We found Tinker Creek, instead!



Our dd was beside herself with excitement.


Stay tuned for more narrations of our amazing trip in the coming days!

Ciao for now!

Javamom