Some Interesting Southern Juju

As I dug into my breakfast yesterday I had my eyes on patio bird feeder and trees. I spotted something huge flying and got excited - a HAWK!  As the bird flew over my cabin, and I snatched up my camera and raced outside. The bird had a broad white band on its tail & it landed in a tree just behind the cabin. Yay! A Broad-winged Hawk!

Looking grumpy from being harassed by the small fry

It sat in a tree, and moved a few times because every annoying little bird on Black Mountain came out to harass it. I got a couple of shots of it in the tree, but almost immediately it took off, bless its pinfeathers, it landed in front the cabin, in a great position for me to get a shot or two. When it flew off it had a long branch in its bill. I imagine it is into nest building, so it can have lots of lovely babies and will feed them with lots and lots of annoying little birdies. Revenge is sweet.

My neighbor, the Eastern Phoebe

Looking around I then saw a little female Purple Finch. The little Eastern Phoebe that hangs around the cabin was present too. I noted the Eastern Phoebe may be nesting across from me, in the cabin's gutters, on the corner. They like platform nesting and what better little platform than a nice sheltered gutter with an eve over it?






A couple of days ago in the cabin, I heard what sounded like a high pitched squeaking wheel that needed oiling and knew there was a Black & White Warbler around. I went outside, and briefly played its call on my iPhone and the bird hurried over to peer curiously at me. Now it is a daily treat as it squeaks and squeaks near the cabin. 

Black & White Warbler, singing it's 'squeaky wheel' song

Today Ila and I painted in the Yonts building which is a dormitory for seasonals who work at the Blue Ridge Assembly YMCA. Our job for today, and tomorrow is to paint bright white dorm room walls a dingy, dirty diaper brown. Each room had a lovely pecan wood paneling, which Ila and I paint over with a sort of drab olive paint. In other words we converting somewhat bright rooms into depressing cells. We wondered who decided on the paint choices, but we weren't consulted on the issue so we obediently paint away.

We finished up for the day around 2PM and came back to the cabin. Dave, a YMCA employee who acted as our supervisor for our painting assignments dropped by. He showed us photos of his children, who turned out to be a pretty pair of dogs, a Lab and a cute brown Boxer mix.

I decided to return the favor and show Dave some of my birdie photos of the past week. I turned on my laptop, but it froze on the opening screen. I turned the laptop on and off maybe a half dozen times, but it refused to start up, freezing up on the first screen. Perplexed and annoyed I grabbed my Canon 60D and pulled up this morning's hawk photos to show Dave. Almost immediately the camera screen went black. I turned it on again, and again it just died, weird as I'd put in a fully charged battery after photographing the hawk this morning. So, I fetched a second freshly charged battery, which also promptly died. Puzzled, I gave up.

We chatted with Dave and the room grew warm as it was in the 80s today. I got up and started to raise the lower windows to get a cross ventilation breeze going. Finally I reached a window on the far wall, and lifted it - WHAM - and it crashed right back down! The glass cracked in front my eyes, forming a big oval crack & making a 3 feet wide solid circle of glass. It popped out of the main glass pane, but did not fall - it just hung in its glass matrix, poised as if to keep me guessing.

Later when Dave took off, I asked Ila if she noticed how nothing worked when Dave was around. I mean, as soon as he left my laptop and all of my electronics started right up again, no problems. She had noticed was as intrigued about it as I was.

As the afternoon drew on, Ila was bored so she drove us into Black Mountain for a little shopping.  We hit the yarn store and I got some goodies at the local hardware store, including an inexpensive DVD of Disney's Song of the South. Shhh! That title is not supposed to be available in the United States! When I saw it you could have knocked me over with 2 choruses of Zip A Dee Do Dah, whatever the heck that is.

 

a view of downtown Black Mountain, North Carolina

Birding AND window shopping!

Another view of Black Mountain

As we walked around the little downtown, I realized I was exhausted; no clue why. I didn't exactly exert myself at work today, but tired I was. Maybe it was the temperatures which were in the 80s or maybe I was just weary in general. I only wanted to go back to the cabin and lay around. I was surprised when Ila confessed she was just as exhausted as I was. Maybe electronics aren't all that can experience an energy drained, eh?

Up the Chimney Rock

Had a totally busy day off today. Began by attempting to visit the Biltmore Estates but once there, decided we didn't want to spend the $59 each necessary to access that hallowed ground. We did see a quick movie on the Biltmore in the ticketing building, that didn't tempt us, and then we moved on.





Next we headed over to the Asheville Visitor Center, where we bought tickets for a trolley tour of Asheville at what now seemed a bargain price - comparatively - just $19.  Must admit, I am now in 'full to the jowls' mode for history of southern cities, so only intermittently paid any attention to our tour guide with his North Carolina accent. The trolley took us up one street and down another, many places we'd driven through on our own last week. I enjoyed myself, sitting in the back row of the trolley, enjoying the cool Spring breeze & birding along our route.
 

After our trolley tour of Asheville we peaky, so we headed to  "Piggies" BBQ. On the tour we learned it was a great place for BBQ so we dined there. Our verdict, as out-of-towners was 'just tolerable'.  On the plus side, I learned all about the southern staple called  'Hush Puppies'; round, deep fried cornmeal balls. Perhaps as there are no noisy dogs about to lob the greasy dough balls at, I fail to get the point of them and left most of mine behind on the plate as the flavor didn't seem worth the heart-attack-on-a-plate calories or fat content. Sorry south - If it's is any consolation, I loved the BBQ at Cheddar's Restaurant where we took ate several meals this past week.

Next after a brisk round of  'where do you want to go next?', 'I don't know, where do you want to go?', I pushed for a visit to Chimney Rock State Park - good choice. The route there wound along a pleasant country road. As we sped down the road both of us caught sight of a woman - she was dressed in shabby old clothing, that would have been familiar in 2013, as easily as 1913 or come to that, 1813. She stepped out of a small cabin, no more than 500 square feet to it - as caught up in time as it's occupant. I muttered some explitive under my breath, just as Ila was muttering something similar.  That woman was stuck in my mind and Ila's all day. I think that glimpse of that woman's life is as close as I'll ever come toward proving Einstein's theories on time travel.

Soon we reached the tiny town of Chimney Rock and in the center of the main drag found the park entrance. It wound up hill to a big parking lot, at the end of which was a towering spiral of rock, on top of which we could see the namesake chimney rock. It kind of looks like something else too, but happily it was the name Chimney that stuck.

Chimney Rock from below

The top of Chimney Rock

To the left of the gift shop above we found a daunting tunnel, cut through solid rock.

Looking back to the tunnel entrance

At the end of the nearly 200 ft tunnel, is an elevator

The rocky walls would make anyone with claustrophobia go ballistic. There were informative signs along the rock path to let you know you were surrounded by Henderson Gneiss (a rock type). My first thought was how long ago must the tunnel have been put in to avoid the b'jillion environmental impact statements that must be necessary to complete these days, to destroy/burrow into natural bedrock. I think the tunnel was put in way before the place became a state park. 

At the end of the tunnel was an elevator! I would not have hated to have to walk up the 26 stories the elevator traversed. The elevator was operated by a twenty year old guy whom I bet was a bit claustrophobic himself after a bit. He - and the elevator - took us up to where we exited the elevator into another gift shop. Crossing the gift shop, I stepped out onto a patio and a long walkway.

26 stories UP!

I looked over the edge to see where we had come up from and thanked heavens I don't have the least trace of acrophobia. I decided as long as I came up so far, I might as well climb the final forty-odd steps up to the top of the Chimney Rock overlook.

The climb up to the Apex of Chimney Rock

The View from the Top - Lure Lake in the distance

It was an impressive & sweeping view from the top of Chimney Rock. I spent maybe ten or fifteen minutes up top of Chimney Rock, taking photos of the scenery & assisting other tourists in getting pictures of themselves against the backdrop of what seemed to be all of Appalachia.

Chimney Rock platform up top

View from the Chimney Rock stairs

GAK! There are stairs to the top of Chimney Rock after all!

When I was done taking in the views from atop Chimney Rock, I decided I might as well dig into a nice cup of Blue Bunny Ice Cream that was sold in the sky high gift shop. While I ate my ice cream on the patio, I watched a Black Vulture - only the second I've seen on this entire trip - circling the sky. It is fun getting to look down on a bird one normally only sees up above.

How often does one get to look down on a vulture in flight?

Puffing up his red pouch for 'the ladies'

I wasn't quite done with my yummy butter pecan treat when I noted there was something a bit unusual, slinking about on a pine tree above my head. Lizard! Not just any lizard, but an Anole - lots of them. They're the little 'chameleons' I used to buy at Ringling Brother's Circus for pets when I was a kid. I've seen wild Anoles in Florida and had no idea they occur as far north as North Carolina.

As I tossed my ice cream cup into a bin, I spotted a bird flashing up into the lizard tree, but it was gone before I could get more than a glimpse of it. Rats! 


I'd been hearing a bird calls all the time we were in Chimney Rock Park. I could make out the calls of the usual American Robins, and the ever-present 'Peter! Peter! Peter!' of the Tufted Titmouses. There was one call though that I couldn't quite place - then it hit me - The Mikado! I was hearing the Spring song of the Black-throated Green Warbler, which always sounds to me like the opening notes of Gilbert & Sullivan's Mikado. I now had my long lens at the ready and was not too disappointed.

A curious Black-throated Green Warbler

Awww! This fellow sang for me, but his perch was too shady for much of a shot

I chased after Black-throated Green Warblers for a good bit before Ila and I decided to head in the general direction of home - downhill. Along the way we stopped briefly at a 'Grady's Animal Den', a place for scout troups and other kiddie groups to gather for instruction. I found out Grady himself is a lovely & fat woodchuck who dwells at the cabin with several of his fellow woodland creatures on display.

On the way out of Chimney Rock Park I was teased by an elusive Eastern Bluebird that momentarily sat on a road post. I also spotted a small flock of ground feeding Chipping Sparrows. I listed the birds in eBird. Was disappointed I couldn't find any Blue Jays or Thrushes at all. Oh well. I should be happy for finding the lovely little Mikado soloists.

A Day Off to Visit Smokey Mountain National Park

Hurrah, it's our first day off after a whole five days of volunteering at the Blue Ridge Assembly YMCA. We headed towards Maggie Valley, which is a small mountain town west of Black Mountain. Maggie Valley was about the size of a town we though Asheville would be. It was mostly composed, or so the whole region seemed, of little gift shops selling Appalachian goo-gaws. We also passed through the town of Cherokee, which is on a Cherokee reservation and we discovered has a humongous casino.
 

Male Cardinal at the Overlook

We shopped in a couple of little touristy shops. At the first place we visited there was a 9 story metal tower that looked like a fire look out tower (sort of) which we opted not to climb. Nearby, looking over the valley a male Northern Cardinal sung and I got a few photos of it.

We decided to head for Gattlingville in Tennessee, but we learned the pass to get over there was closed due to a bad mudslide that took out much of the highway. We were disappointed, but found something to make up for it. We were not only in the vicinity of The Great Smokey Mountains National Park, but to my delight we discovered the Park's Oconaluftee Visitor Center was nearby and open. I crossed my fingers that my National Parks Passport was safe in my back pack. Score! I picked up date stamps for The Great Smoky Mountains NP, the Blue Ridge parkway and The Trail of Tears.

I enjoyed touring the Visitor Center which gives an idea of what life was like for the Cherokee natives and the Johnny-come-lately European settlers that enjoyed living in these amazing Appalachian mountains. 
 

I particularly liked a little area with photos of Appalachian setters, that told how they lived via their own words. Click on the picture on the right to learn what it would mean if I said 'I lit shuck to the Mountain Farm Museum'.

A View of the Mountain Farm Museum, from the Oconaluftee Visitor Center Porch

The Oconaluftee Visitor Center is next to the Mountain Farm Museum, a real farm that once kept a large family in food and shelter in the 1800s. There is a cute and modest main farm house with a big porch and loads of out buildings.

The Davis Cabin with its big porch where I imagine lots of corn was shucked

There is an  Apple House to store fruit year round, a shed sized Chicken Coop and an impressive & huge Barn with many stalls. There are no animals or crops currently on the farm, but if you're lucky enough to visit at the right time there are living history days when the farm springs alive if just for a day. The farm also has a meat house for storage, a mini-blacksmith shop, a Spring-house from which they could dip for fresh water, a cane and molasses shed where sorghum was cooked into molasses, and a huge corn crib, again for storage.

The Corn crib/gear shed and barn in the background

Inside the barn; feed & fodder storage up top, lots of animal stalls below

A peek into the tiny Blacksmith Shop

In the rear of the blacksmith shop, you can see the big bellows that kept the fires hot enough to smelt metal. That's a pretty big anvil on top the log to the front. I imagine they made horse shoes but also made and repaired their own farm equipment, plows & bucket handles alike.







When we finished visiting the Farm and touring the Visitor Center, we drove as far as we could get on the New Found Gap Road; it was closed due to a blockbuster of a landslide a couple of months back. We then headed back home. Along the way, I decided I had to photos of as many art Bears as possible.  Being named Claire Bear, could I have passed these lovely bruins by? They were all over the town of Cherokee.

A Forest-y Sort of Bear

An American Wildlife Sort of Bear

A Warrior Bear

An I-Have-No-Clue-What-He-Is-All-ABout Bear

King of the Bears: The Cherokee Alphabet Bear