winding down/finally home

Hello, all!! As I write this, we have been back home for 4 1/2 days. We've rested, run an errand or two and rested some more. I'm sorry for the lateness of the final vacation post, but it took that long for me to even WANT to work on this thing!

As you might have noticed, there are ten pics posted here, instead of the usual five. They didn't end up in chronological order, so I'll try to explain them before reporting on the last few days of our vacation.

The scenic ones were the last day of travel. We stayed our last night just two hours from home in a small NY town called Watertown. The fall colors on the way home were amazing. These pics are decent but they don't do northern NY and southern Ontario justice. Some were taken while we stopped on I-81 just before crossing the border into Canada. The ones on the water were taken on the Thousand Islands Parkway, where we started our vacation pics on Friday, Sept 26th. It seems like a long time ago now.

The "Hey Y'all" "Bye Y'all" t-shirt pics were taken on our front porch the day we arrived home. I saw this shirt being worn by the serving staff at a restaurant we ate at on the way home...more later about that place. It's got "From Tennessee" under the larger letters.

The Varsity is a very well known landmark in Atlanta. We ate chili dogs and onion rings there. I can taste them now.....

The red sign with me standing next to it is the sign for my family's home town in Tennessee. Of course, none of us lives there now! Notice my orange t-shirt. It says "Summittville Basketball" on the front and "Dynasty Lives Here" on the back. heh heh...we are a confident bunch of fans, no?? Anyway, Bradford, as you can read, is the Doodle Soup capital of the world. Doodle Soup is the broth taken off a boiled rabbit. You pour it over crumbled up crackers. Ate it many times as a child.

And lastly, I just CAN'T pass up the Bucksnort exit on I-40 between Jackson and Nashville. It's a classic!!

Now for some more travelogue....here we go.

When last we blogged, we were about to leave Atlanta. We left last Wednesday around lunch time. We had breakfast in Atlanta, with a good friend, at the Flying Biscuit. I had wanted to eat at this place the whole time I lived in Atlanta and never did. I should have! They have really good food, some of it healthy, too. Our trip from Atlanta to Huntsville, AL was in some pretty hard rain but had cleared up by the time we reached Huntsville. We visited with my best friend from high school, ate at the Macaroni Grille, and visited with kids and grandkids and loveable Husky dogs. The only flaw was not enough time. There's a feeling you can't really put words to when you're with friends you've known that long. Of course, you love them, but the richness and depth of love you feel....that's the indescribable part.

And that goes for many of the friends we saw.

We left Huntsville on Thursday morning and stopped in Florence, AL for a quick ten minute "hug and how are you" with another cousin. She was at work and couldn't get away, but a few minutes is better than passing through without seeing her at all!

We then carried on to Memphis, where I lived for 21 years. We stayed and visited with one last cherished friend. As always, there is never enough time, is there?

On Friday morning we took care of some business with my retirement money where I worked in Memphis for 11 years, then started the long journey back....but not without some detours along the way.

The detours were all on the first day of the return trip. We had none on the second and third day other than stopping to eat, sleep or take a few quick pictures.

An hour and a half northeast of Memphis is Jackson, TN. There is a restaurant on the highway there called "The Old Country Store." It's the best country food buffet you can imagine. All you can eat for $8.99 on the weekends and a dollar less than that on weekdays! There's bar-b-que and mashed taters and homemade yeast rolls and turnip greens and banana pudding and fried chicken and pinto beans and corn and okra and.......you get the picture. It was my last chance to eat like a pig....and I did. Tree Hugger elected to order something but did have a bite or two of my food. It was awesome.

This was where I saw the wait staff wearing the cool "Hey Y'all" "Bye Y'all" t-shirts. Some were navy blue, some were orange. I wasn't about to walk away without one. This shirt has already gotten stares and favorable comments from strangers in Canada. I love it. They love it. I think I will wear this shirt out.

We left the restaurant and headed north for Bradford, TN, the small town where my father's side of the family comes from. My paternal grandmother died this past October and I wasn't able to go down to Tennessee at that time, so we went to the cemetery to pay respects to Nanny. The pic I posted above was as we were entering the town. I have many childhood memories in that town, on my grandparents' farm and exploring that graveyard. I remember thinking, as a child, that my grandparents would be buried there, but actually seeing it in reality was something else again. I felt a sense of belonging and of being home and, of course, sadness. I'm deeply glad I took that time out to go up there.

We then pointed our trusty GPS friend, Garmin, in the direction of home and started to haul a--!!

We went just beyond Louisville, KY that night to a town called LaGrange. We ate, watched tv and fell into deep, deep sleep.

Saturday morning, we ate at....where else?? Breakfast at the Cracker Barrell. Our motel was next door so it wasn't rocket science to know where we were headed for breakfast. My last CB breakfast for a long time.

We left LaGrange, KY at 10:30 that morning, with a goal of stopping in Syracuse, NY that night, a three hour drive from home. It would be a very long day, but we thought we could do it. We snacked on the road for lunch. We stopped in Buffalo for coffee and a quick good memory. We had visited Buffalo many times while living in Toronto, so it was good to see our old friend, the city of Buffalo again.

We got to Syracuse and whaddya think???? There was not a hotel room in the whole city! Some big race that weekend. We were told to drive up the road another ten miles and try again. We did....still nothing. We were told there that the nearest vacancy was Watertown, which was another 50 minutes away. At this point, we had been on the road for almost 12 hours and were about to lose the ability to perform basic functions like thinking or talking or staying awake! We got fish sandwiches and fruit at McDonald's and headed on to Watertown.

Now Watertown is a military town. When brigades come home and ship out, the families all come in and stay...where else?? Watertown hotels!! Guess what weekend it was in Watertown?? You guessed it. Well, the concierge at the Hampton Inn called a locally owned inn and he had two rooms left and said he'd save one for us. We drove there and the other room had indeed been taken while we drove there, so we got what may have been the last room in town. Can you believe that??

The motel was owned by a very lovely Indian man who couldn't have been more gracious. The room was on the second floor and the steps bowed as I walked up them with our suitcase. At least there was internet access!! The tv in the room didn't work and the room was very small, but it was clean. We both read a little while and slept the sleep of the dead.

We left that little room around 10:00 the next morning. We had coffee at Border's bookstore and.....lunch at the CB. What can I say?? See, we had eaten at several CB's over the course of the trip, but I hadn't eaten my favorite meal yet. I really, really wanted to have that roast beef before I left the states. And I did. It melted in my mouth, let me tell you. I enjoyed every morsel.

Then, as you have seen, we drove home and took some pictures along the way. We got home around 3:30, unpacked the car and immediately left to go pick up our beloved furry children. We were so glad to see them! They weren't 100% sure about us....absence always does that....but they warmed up to us fast.

So since we have been home, we have done very little. We've rushed to take some autumn pictures while the leaves are still on the trees. I'll post them soon. We've slept a lot and caught up on a lot of tv. I go back to work tomorrow night...ugh. Life hits.

So now....posts might not be so interesting as a travelogue was. Normal life might be downright boring. I don't know. I just know that I have enjoyed this. We shall see. Vacation lends itself to fun. Every day stuff can be interesting if blogged by the right person. I don't know if that's me!

More later.