Blue Ridge Mountains

A few months ago, my sister-in-law called me and asked if Josh and I would like to go up to the Blue Ridge Mountains with she and her husband this fall. Matthew's family has a cabin there (actually, it is called a chalet). The two of them went this past June for their anniversary and enjoyed it so much they immediately started planning another trip. Fortunately, we were considered in that planning! So of course we accepted the invitation and it was this past weekend that we all went.

This is our chalet on Beech Mountain in Banner Elk, North Carolina.

When we woke up the first morning, there was a light dusting of ice/snow.


It was chilly, but we were prepared for it and we headed into town for the Woolly Worm Festival anyway. "The what?" you say...

The Woolly Worm Festival! Okay, we hadn't heard of it either, but apparently it's a big deal in Banner Elk. It's just a good ol' festival with crafts, bluegrass, and booth upon booth of scrumptious festival food (turkey legs, gyros, philly cheesesteaks, corn dogs, roasted corn, chili cheese fries, hamburgers, fried mushrooms, barbeque, polish sausages, funnel cakes, fried peaches, hot apple cider, etc., etc.).

All that plus the Woolly Worm race! Kids from all over bring their woolly worms and they have heats all throughout the day in which the kids (and adults) put their worms on a string and see whose will get to the top first.

Here, Josh and I are standing in front of the big Woolly Worm Race stage.

Lauren and Matthew, also in front of the stage.

I don't know if you can tell from those pictures, but it was snowing the whole time we were there. Pretty chilly, but very nice. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

When it came time for lunch, it was so hard to decide on what to eat! Well, it was hard for all of us except Matthew. He had his heart set on a turkey leg.

After the Woolly Worm festival, we headed over to Valle Crucis where they were having another festival. We checked that one out for just a little while; it was just about over when we got there. Thankfully, they were still serving up funnel cakes. Just like Matthew and his turkey leg, Lauren and I both would have cried if we didn't get to enjoy a funnel cake. And oh, did we. Yum.

We also went to the original Mast General Store in Valle Crucis, which was an awesome place that must have had everything you could imagine. It was in an old farmhouse and the place was packed! We enjoyed looking at all the neat gift ideas, sipping samples of hot cider, and listening to the bluegrass band that was set up right in the middle of the store. Pretty neat.

The next morning, it was time to leave (we were really only there for one full day), and we were delighted to see that there was a little more than a dusting of snow then.

Our drive down the mountain was so beautiful. Actually, from where we were, we had to go up to the top of the mountain and then back down.

At the top was Fred's General Mercantile, where we stopped the first night and got some breakfast stuff and rented a movie to watch (Gran Turino - highly recommend it).

We slip-slided into their very icy parking lot so I could get a picture of these gorgeous trees. Does that not just scream Christmas? I love them!

And across the street, some more.

As we continued on, we saw some little friends crossing the road.

We stopped to try to get a good picture of the view from the mountain, but it wasn't working out. So Josh just took a picture of me instead.

It was pretty amazing how you could drive around just a few curves going down the mountain and the climate seemed totally different. At the top everything was covered in snow and ice. A little ways down, the fall colors were as vibrant as ever with just a very light dusting of snow. Then at the bottom, no snow at all, just beautifully colored leaves and warm sunshine.

From the road down there, you could look up and in the foreground you see mountains speckled with red, yellow, orange and green, and in the background, taller mountains that were silvery white. As Mama said, we got the best of both worlds.

Not exactly the weekend we were expecting, but in a good way. I loved it and so enjoyed the company of Lauren and Matthew. Guys, thank you so much for the opportunity and for all your love and support.