NC State Fair No. 6

Every year I look forward to the North Carolina State Fair.  It’s only a 20-minute drive from our home; I go alone so I can do what I want to do and come home when I’m ready.  And it’s free for senior citizens.

This year I didn’t think I was going.  I got into some bad food on vacation a few weeks ago and have not been feeling good.  But on Wednesday, I woke up feeling better and decided to go to the fair. 

Promoting the fair, the local newspaper had several articles about new foods this year.  It seems to me that most people go to the fair to eat.  Most everything is fried, slathered in butter or has BBQ sauce on it.  In other years, I bypassed the food.  This year I could barely look at it.

I walked around, watched some judging of some steers, checked out the biggest pumpkin (1,500 pounds) and watched kids enjoy the animals.  I did ride the Skygazer, the tallest ferris wheel to ever hit Raleigh (so they say).

Last year, I didn’t pay attention to where I parked, and I spent an hour looking for my car.  I learned my lesson and this year went right to it.

My only problem was walking.  I haven’t had any exercise in weeks, and I suffered from being on my feet for a couple of hours.  I did take a break and sat and listened to some bluegrass music.

I’m already looking forward to the North Carolina State Fair next year.  Maybe I’ll be in the mood to eat some fried fat.

Seasoned Man

stevelem117@gmail.com

Mountains-To-Sea

The Mountains-To-Sea Trail is a long-distance (1175 miles) trail for hiking and backpacking that transverses North Carolina from the Great Smoky Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean.  Aloma and I did it in six days.

No, we didn’t hike.  We drove.  We enjoy spending a week in the mountains in late July to get a break from the summer heat.  This year, Jennifer planned a beach outing to celebrate Ben’s starting college.  Since it was at the same time we had scheduled the mountains, we rescheduled for September.  We already had reservations for the beach in September, so we returned home from the mountains and six days later drove to North Myrtle Beach.

In past years, our week vacation at Cashiers, NC included daily hikes to the many waterfalls in the area.  Now, we mostly sit on the deck of our condo enjoying the cool mountain air, enjoying lunch at different restaurants and taking short walks.

At the beach, we lay by the pool but mostly sat on our ocean-front balcony watching the ocean and people on the beach and the pool.  I love to swim in the ocean and did get in a few times.

While we were gone, summer continued in Raleigh with temperatures in the nineties for most days.  So we did get a break from the summer heat.

Seasoned Man           

stevelem117@gmail.com