Gullible's Travels VI: Mountain Pit Stops

Thursday morning.
We get up at the ass-crack of dawn to have one final breakfast/goodbye with the sib, sib-in-law, and the neph.
Too early.
For no reason.
By the time we actually finished getting gassed up and on the road it was about 0930 hrs.
We were hoping to be on the road before 8.
Welcome to traveling with TM.
No matter how hard I try, I'm always late.
For everything.
I've embraced that fact.
Anyway, we begin our southward trek.
Before leaving in the morning, we decided to go an hour or so out of the way and visit Grandfather Mountain in North Carolina, the highest peak in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
While driving through the backwoods, piss-ant towns in the foothills of western North Carolina, we came across Mystery Hill in Blowing Rock, NC.
In doing my research on activities in the area, I remembered seeing information on Mystery Hill.
They claim it is a "mysterious vortex" that alters the state of gravity in the general vicinity.
All that is fancy code for "optical illusion."
At this point my curiosity lies in whether it's a good optical illusion, or a bad one.
I'm entirely familiar with bad optical illusions, as is anyone else who has been to Spook Hill in Lake Wales, FL.
If you haven't been to Spook Hill, they claim an old Indian enchantment on the area created the "mysterious vortex" that makes things "roll uphill."
You're supposed to drive up to a white line, put your car in neutral, and watch as your vehicle magically rolls uphill.
This is the worst piece of crap optical illusion I have ever seen.
There is not one moment where it appears that you are rolling uphill.
You can clearly see that you are traveling downhill the entire time.
But I digress...
We went to Mystery Hill.
As I was speaking to the lady behind the counter, I stealthily took a look around and then proceeded to ask her about the illusion.
She was sticking to her story, though.
"It's a mysterious vortex that toys with the law of gravity."
a little club soda will get that out...LIAR!
Yet another lie. When will the lies stop? *sigh*
I will give credit where credit is due.
It was a very impressive optical illusion.
Check it out:

Look at Steven.

He's so gay that he can't even stand straight.





Drink V8.
Get your body straight.

(Does anyone remember those commercials?)



Amazing! Watch how things roll uphill in the Mystery House.

(Except that if you tilt the angle so that Steven is straight up and down, you can see things are rolling downhill. But hey, it's still a good illusion.)

Now that we're done with that foolishness, it's on to Grandfather Mountain in Linville, NC.

At 5964', Grandfather Mountain is the highest peak in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The other big draws in the park are the animal habitats and the Mile High Swinging Suspension Bridge.
We got to hand feed peanuts to the black bears.
They were so talented that they would catch the peanuts in their mouths, crack them open, eat the nuts, and spit out the shells in about 3 seconds. It was neat to watch.

This cute puppy would wave at you when he wanted you to feed him.
I ask you, is there anything more precious than that?
Well, I don't know, but the otter, deer, and black bear cubs will give them a run for their money.
Then we continued up the mountain to the Mile High Swinging Suspension Bridge. Out of all the places I have traveled to, the only other place I have seen fog roll in so fast was in San Francisco. It was crazy. We went from cloudless sun to complete gray-out fog in about 10-15 minutes. Nutsicles.
The jagged peak of the mountain would be visible, but it is hidden behind the fog on the far side of the bridge.

On a clear day they say you can see the Charlotte skyline, which is about 90 miles away.

Too bad we couldn't have gotten up there half an hour earlier.

The Mile High Swinging Suspension Bridge, at 5305' above sea level, spans a huge gorge on the mountain, and you can actually feel it bouncing and swaying in the wind.

Not for the faint of heart.


From here we continued south and saw on the map a town called "Little Switzerland."

We thought that maybe it would be a quaint little alpine town modeled after "Big Switzerland."

From what we could tell, the only thing remotely Swiss was the twisting, turning, bending, winding road to actually get to Little Switzerland.
Oh, and they had a couple of Swiss flags hanging on the two buildings that comprised the downtown area.
So we stopped in the General Store, which was the only thing open, and it was run by a nice little lesbian. She gave us some tips on where to go for dinner, but at that point we were over it all and decided to head for Asheville.
Larry Marty has mentioned Asheville a few times in his blog.
He loves it, and is considering moving there.
He says it's beautiful and thinks everyone is so friendly.
Our experience was slightly different.
We were just hoping to do a drive-by of the Biltmore, but this was the closest we got to it:
This sign appears in the "Biltmore Village" and states that you are still 3 miles from the actual Biltmore Estate, and the only way you can see it is to pay the $40 admission to get in to the grounds of the estate.
$40 ...a piece! Screw that!
So we went downtown to eat dinner, and as I was making a right hand turn onto a street and immediately pulling into a parking spot on the street, I got nailed by a bicyclist who proceeded to curse me out and insist it was my fault that he hit me.
That was nice.
We ate dinner at a Chinese restaurant on the corner of Redneck Lane and Bakalakadaka Street.
The waitress insisted that the fried tofu appetizer that I ordered was not spicy.
I ate some of it, and my mouth proceeded to burst into flames.
It was one of the most horrible feelings I have ever had. (See previous post: Death By Radish)
It was probably the closest to actual crying I have come since before I died on the inside.
I had to shovel a bowl full of white rice down my throat to curtail the burning.
Other than that the food was good, though.
I just don't like liars who tell me the food isn't spicy when it is.
(And do you see how the lies continue?)
I think she did it on purpose because she sensed the yankee in me, and we all know that all Southerners are still bitter about the Civil War and hate all Yankees.

So we gassed up again and by the time we got on the road to head back to Orlando, it was about 2100 hrs.
We drove all night again because, you know, once wasn't enough.
We did break out the DVD player this time, and watched some Will & Grace, Season 3. Nothing eventful happened on the way back home and we rolled up the driveway and poured ourselves into bed at about 0530 hrs.
We were just as exhausted then as I am now of telling this story, so on that note, I'm going to bed.

Fin