In the weeks leading up to our trip to Vogel, I came up with a long list of things to do in the area. Unfortunately, I wrote it down on an actual piece of paper with an actual pencil like in olden times, and then I lost it. But then I managed to mostly reconstruct […]
A Few Days in Vogel State Park, Blairsville, GA: Campground Review
Not to get too political, but I love it when Big Government sends hundreds of thousands of unemployed young men off to build state parks for me and my family to enjoy eighty years later. Vogel State Park, on the southern end of the Appalachian Mountains and about two hours north of Atlanta, is the […]
Elkin, NC: First Stop on our Summer, 2016 Road Trip
It’s finally here! Our big summer road trip: twenty two nights, ten campgrounds, and a whole lot of ice cream. This trip was originally conceived as sort of a practice trip for next summer’s massive road trip, but it’s turning out to be pretty substantial all by itself. As I’m writing, we’re already about two […]
Red Top Mountain State Park and Campground Review; or Continuation of Remains of Industry Tour: THWARTED!
As regular readers will recall, we are, it seems, on a quest to become experts on the history of the iron industry in the Southeastern United States. Or, anyway, we saw a lot of iron-related sites on our recent trip to Birmingham. And we happen to have a state park nearby that hosts an iron […]
Birmingham, Alabama with Kids: The Remains of Industry Tour
There’s something very….American about a city founded with the express purpose of becoming an industrial giant. Birmingham (named, confidently, for the industrial city in England) was founded in 1871 at the site of a planned railroad crossing in an area rich with iron, coal, and limestone–the three materials which, it just so happens, are the […]
52 Hikes in a Year
One time, several years ago, I decided to do a 52 books in a year challenge. I didn’t read 52 books that year. But I DID read way more books than I would have otherwise. Which is not nothing. So. I don’t know that we’ll really make it to 52 hikes this year. I hope […]