Wytheville

When we return from a long journey, friends are likely to ask us, “What did you see?”  I am often at a loss for words when asked that question.  How to describe, for example, that lovely morning seven years ago in July when we found ourselves at the Grand Canyon.  I wrote this in my blog: 

Sunrise is going to occur at 5:30 a.m., so we awaken early and set out for the rim.  I do my Tai Chi in the darkness, and it is cool and very quiet at this time of morning.  And I want to run very much, so we walk to the path and I am in my running clothes.  On the way, we see this herd of elk, wandering along the railroad tracks.  Other people have gathered to watch he sunrise, too, and some of them are wrapped in blankets and wearing slippers.  It reminds me of the beach, where people will get up so early to see such a simple event, wrapped in the blankets they slept in. Sunrise.  And while the world is still aglow, I take off on one of my most memorable runs, along this path.  And I keep thinking, That's the Grand Canyon, right there! 

Even that description cannot convey the fragrance of the cool morning air, the sudden surprise at seeing that herd of elk, and the enormous silence as I ran.

After every journey we should ask ourselves the same questions:

·       What did you see?

·       What did you learn?

·       How has it changed you?

I expected this road trip to be no different.  Where can I even begin my account of a journey that would ultimately take five weeks to complete?  7,340 miles, 18 states, 14 National Parks.  I began to take notes for this blog on the first day, in a slim book that Martha had given me for such a purpose, and at the same time I began jotting down a few lines of what I expected would be a long poem:

Let us go then, you and I,
across this wide beautiful broken country
America, to see if we can find the lost place
that we remember in our dreams,
our troubled sleep, the nation we once believed in. 

Here in the rolling August mountains

of Western North Carolina and Tennessee,

and then the wide rolling Virginia countryside

so beautiful on a thick humid morning,

so green, as green as we ever could imagine.

 

"Broken country" may sound a little cynical, but it has been seven years since we crossed this country in a little car on its back roads and highways, and much has changed in that short period of time.  We are both older, of course, although still healthy and eager to travel now that we have reached a time in our lives when we can.  Our 2018 Mini Cooper has relatively low mileage (33,000), we had it serviced last month, and like many Minis it has "run flat" tires.  But, more importantly, our country has changed in the meantime, and unlike seven years ago we may find ourselves wondering if it is a “red state” or a “blue state” through which we will be driving.  I was hoping that we would be able to leave that behind for a few weeks, the political signs and the shallow slogans, and simply look for the real beauty in America again. 

We had ambitiously planned that Day One would be a drive to our first National Park, New River Gorge in West Virginia, 325 miles away, five hours and 20 minutes.  We realized that such a distance would be challenging on the first day of a long road trip.  Our rule of thumb in 2016 when we drove to California and back had been to limit daily mileage to 300, if possible, with each of us taking turns every 50 miles or so.  So we decided to break the first day up by driving to Wytheville, Virginia, only 230 miles, three hours and 45 minutes from home.  We had traveled in this part of  Virginia before but we had never made it to Wytheville.  It seemed to be a comfortable place to begin, familiar terrain, a prologue to what we expected to be some strange and unfamiliar places.

We could not have chosen a more beautiful first day of travel, with little traffic on I-26 as we drove through Asheville and continued north, the sky bright blue and the rolling hills of Tennessee and Virginia beautiful to behold.

We stopped at a log-cabin-themed welcome center in Tennessee which was clean and attractive with plenty of picnic tables, features we would come to appreciate more and more since we planned to stop most days for a picnic lunch.  Martha posed next to a cut-out of a smiling Dolly Parton, a woman beloved by all, blue or red, country music lover or not.

Wytheville was a pretty little town that was proud of its history, with walkable sidewalks and plaques and photos everywhere, especially of Woodrow Wilson and his second wife, Edith Bolling Galt Wilson.  I had asked the desk clerk at our hotel if it was safe to walk around (a good question to ask in some places we have visited), and he assured us it was.  We stopped for pizza in a little place not far from the Wytheville Office Supply, known locally for the huge pencil angled over the sidewalk as if preparing to write a very large poem, and I thought this must be one of the few office supply stores left in the day of Quill and Amazon.

Back at the hotel, I realized that we were already a little sunburned despite liberal application of sunblock.  Tonight’s lodging was a Hampton Inn with a reliable breakfast buffet the next morning.  Martha posted an account of our daily travels on her Facebook page, and more than once was asked if  we had planned where to stay ahead of time or were just "winging it."  The answer was yes:  we planned the whole route together back in January, and Martha found and reserved all of the lodging months ago (some of it much more interesting than a Hampton Inn!)  Weary travelers like to know that they have a place to rest their heads at the end of a long day.