A weekend away

So I logged on to look at the blog and noticed that our profile picture was, well, a picture of Justin. Hint taken. I'll write more.

So after a week of pure misery, Justin and I decided we needed a fun weekend in the mountains. Just the thought of camping/hiking makes us both happy and Justin's a ten year old at Christmas every time he gets to play with his gear. So while I went out for a friend's bday dinner Friday night, Justin got us all packed up and ready to go. We dropped the rather disgruntled pug off at the vets and assured him that he'd be much happier with a bed and people to hug him (pugs are really not what one would call rugged). It's also worth noting that Justin actually used a present that I got him - a book on North Carolina waterfalls complete with maps and descriptions -it's nice that the book won't be joining the tranquility fountain and mini zen garden on the re-gift shelf!

We started off with an easy one, Whitewater Falls, that had an easy access path and a great view. Unfortunately you couldn't get too close (although we did see a trailhead that was blocked off) but Justin did get some great shots. But then being the outdoorsy folk that we are, we decided to step it up a notch and head to White Owl Falls. Okay, the trail difficulty was only a five but it wasn't paved like the first path, so we were getting rougher. Kevin Adams, the author of the waterfall book, is not the greatest at giving directions, so we spent some time driving up and down 281 looking for a service road and then spent some time walking up and down along side the road, looking for a trailhead. And it was fun when we found it, working our way through the woods, kind of guessing where we were going until we could hear the rushing of the falls and climbing our way down. White Owl Fall was beautiful and secluded - we spent quite a bit of time climbing around and taking photos and playing around.

Once we hiked back up, we were near some other waterfalls but the directions were vague and we needed to start thinking about getting to a campsite. So we headed to Gorges State Park (where we camped in November) to see about available sites but along the way it was becoming obvious that I was not feeling well enough to pack out. I could probably have made it the 2.7 miles downhill but coming back up was another problem. So we were a little indecisive and started to head back towards Pisgah when on a whim, Justin decided to check out River's End, a RV hookup and campsite area outside of Lake Toxaway. I'm not sure why we headed down that way but our first sign that we were in an unusual spot was the white squirrel. And I'll leave you to wonder about that....it's getting late....I'll finish tomorrow.....I promise.....