It has always been a bit of a quandary that our anniversary falls on July 6, only two days after the Fourth of July. That has its disadvantages (difficulty in making hotel reservations, crowded venues) but also its advantages (Fourth of July festivities and fireworks displays). One of the other advantages is a Fourth of July race; we have run races in Brevard and in Bryson City on the Fourth, and this year Martha found one in Asheville. We had already been looking at staying at the Echo Mountain Inn in Hendersonville, a little over 30 minutes away, so the race fit in perfectly with our 43rd Anniversary.
This was the third time we have stayed at this beautiful, hidden gem on a mountaintop only minutes from Hendersonville. It is family-owned and was originally built in 1896 as a private residence, then used for years as a girls camp – “Camp Happiness.” We drove over on Sunday and stopped along the way for a picnic lunch and two places we have been meaning to see over the years. One was “The Pretty Place,” AKA the Fred W. Symmes Chapel, one of the buildings that make up the YMCA Camp Greenville.
The other place is only a mile or so from the Echo Mountain Inn, higher up the mountain – Jump Off Rock, named after an old Cherokee legend, a love story turned tragic. A Cherokee Chief left his lover to go off to war and was killed in battle, and she threw herself off the rock in despair.
It is a beautiful view, and we could see thunderstorms building in the distance over the mountain and hear the rumble of thunder. We arrived at Echo Mountain and spent, unfortunately, a restless night, disturbed by some revelers who did not heed the sign in the lobby asking for quiet after 10:00 p.m. But we rarely sleep well, anyway, the night before a race, and in this case the alarm was set for 4:30 a.m.
We arrived for the Independence Day 5-K in plenty of time, pulling in to Carrier Park at the so-called “Mellowdrome” along the French Broad River. The place is on a Greenway and is a hub for various fitness activities, including a large circular track for bicycle racing, formerly the site of the Asheville Speedway, which closed in 1999. I remember that I lived nearby in West Asheville 50 years ago, before I met Martha, and I could hear the sounds of NASCAR racing on Saturday nights. Little would I have expected that all these years later I would be entering a 5-K race here!
It was hot and humid, and the well-attended event got off
without a hitch, starting and finishing on the track. The Greenway, initially a shady asphalt-paved
surface with only the occasional tree root obstacles, soon turned into a
sidewalk and then deteriorated further into a gravel path and finally, on the
return, a single-track path across a grassy field, before coming back onto the
track. Martha had been hoping to break
30 minutes – her time at the very hilly (but entirely paved) Braveheart 5-K only
two weeks earlier had been 30:47. I
struggled through the humidity and rough terrain to a time of 40:56, almost
three minutes faster than two weeks earlier, and was happy with my time. Martha, waving at me from high over the track
when I crossed the finish line, announced a little later that her time was 29:20. So it was a good day for both of
us as it always is when we meet or exceed our expectations. On top of that, Martha placed 2nd and
I placed 3rd in our respective age groups.
Now that the race was finished, it was time for good food and good beer! We returned to Hendersonville, showered, and found both at Hubba Hubba Smokehouse in Flat Rock, where we both had the brisket sandwich. We are not frequent consumers of barbecue or beef these days, but it tasted very good after a hard race, especially since we were able to sit under an umbrella on the terrace out back.
We returned to downtown Hendersonville later in the afternoon and enjoyed watching the Fourth of July festivities on Main Street, which had been closed off, but we returned to Echo Mountain Inn well before the fireworks were scheduled. We could not see any fireworks, but we could hear them clearly from our room, where we sat outside and enjoyed Proseco and a charcuterie board ordered from the dining room.
The next day was filled with more activities in the area. A great
advantage to staying in a location as nearby as Hendersonville and remaining for several days is the opportunity to visit so many interesting
places. We visited the nearby Carl Sandburg home in
Flat Rock, first; the house itself was closed but the goat barn was open to the public – the goats
there are descendants of those owned by Lilian Sandburg. From there we began a tour of vineyards,
starting with Burntshirt Vineyards, which happened to be the N. C. Winery of
the Year, where we enjoyed eating a delicious box lunch – again, outside under
an umbrella – and a good white wine from the vineyard.
From there we continued to nearby St. Paul Vineyard, stopping at a Cidery on the way back, and finally late in the afternoon ending up at a spectacular mountain-top events venue and vineyard called Point Lookout Vineyards, featuring gorgeous 30-mile views.
Wednesday, our anniversary day itself, we began with a visit
to Historic Johnson Farm, ca. 1876, donated to the public several years ago by two
unmarried brothers. It includes a very
nice brick house, barn, and outbuildings, and is now operated as a heritage education
museum.
There was an apiary behind the barn, and we met the head
beekeeper himself, who was just suiting up to join some other enthusiasts who
were harvesting honey from the hives. He
gave us an interesting impromptu description of beekeeping, and among other
things we learned that honeybees are not native to North
America, but were imported by the Pilgrims.
The main feature of the day was attending a matinee performance at the Flat Rock Playhouse of West Side Story – music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and a musical we had somehow never seen before, although we recognized almost all of the songs. The performance was excellent, although like the Cherokee legend that inspired Jump Off Rock, the Romeo-and-Juliet-based story of star-crossed lovers ended tragically.
Our Anniversary Dinner was enjoyed in the Dining Room at Echo Mountain Inn; it was very good, and we toasted our 43rd Anniversary, happy that our own love story has not been a tragic one, grateful that we found each other and that our marriage has endured for so long.
One of the interesting people we met at the Inn was a 92-year-old woman who was the “Matriarch” of the family now running the place. A widow, she and her husband had celebrated 60 anniversaries before he died of Lou Gehrig's Disease. We had spoken with Marcy many times – she lived permanently in one of the detached rooms across the parking lot, and she would make her way back and forth to the Inn every day with some difficulty but with great determination. What a beautiful and interesting woman! On our final morning, as we were packing up our Mini (on our way to yet another attraction, the Bullington Botanical Gardens), we were putting the top down and preparing for the fun drive ahead of us when she stopped to talk to us again. “You’re just kids, really, aren’t you?” she said.
I told her that we were, and that we
hoped to still be kids when we were her age.
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