We didn't know where we wanted to go, so I just started searching Airbnb for places in the NC mountains. At the time, it was really hot here, so we thought we'd look for cooler weather. There just wasn't anything affordable that looked decent, so I decided to look in Virginia. We haven't been there very often, but when we have, we've always thought the scenery was beautiful. We did some hiking in Grayson Highlands State Park once and really enjoyed it, so I searched for some place near there. I found a cute house with a gorgeous view in Fries VA (pronounced "freeze"), so I booked it. More on that later.
We left early on Fri morning and went to Callahan's in downtown Newton for breakfast. It's quick, it's good, and it's not expensive-- our kind of place. So after our eggs, grits, toast, etc, we made a quick stop at the ATM and we were off. We headed straight to the park to do some hiking before checking in to our house.
It takes about 2 1/2 hours to get to Grayson Highlands State Park, and we were able to take Hwy 16 almost the whole way. The last 10 miles or so were particularly beautiful and would be spectacular in the fall.
Here's the entrance to the park:
We hadn't driven too far into the park when we stopped at an overlook. We needed to stretch our legs. Just look at this view. I love the Blue Ridge Mtns!
We took advantage of the viewfinder. Tim couldn't see out of it at first. It took a real photographer (me--haha) to show him how to use it.
Because we were there early in the day, we were the only ones at this overlook. I love it when that happens. The last time we were at this park, it was a Sun afternoon and it was very crowded. This was a completely different experience.
We drove on up the road and stopped at the Visitor Center for the same reasons everyone stops at a Visitor Center-- to use the restroom and look at t-shirts. There were also some displays of animals and some antique furnishings and equipment.
We asked for directions to the Rhododendron Trail. We knew from the research I'd done that there are wild ponies on this trail. Wild ponies!!! So off we went.
This is what the trailhead looks like. That's the start of it off in the distance.
We liked this trail a lot. It wasn't very hard, and it had a lot of different terrain. Some of it looked like this...
We had an interesting encounter with tree roots...
Yep, that's part of the trail. We also crossed a little stream, even though Tim jokingly called it a river.
We took advantage of opportunities to photograph the little bit of color we saw along the way.
We hadn't gone very far before we saw a sign about the wild ponies. Yay!
The trail was very picturesque...just really beautiful.
I should tell you at this point that we had seen no ponies. However, we had seen a lot of evidence of the ponies...meaning pony poop. We saw a TON of it! You can't see it in the photo above, but there were parts of the trail where we had to be on high alert because it was everywhere. Just piles and piles...everywhere. Ugh. By the looks of it, I figured there were about 5,000 ponies on this trail :)))
As we were walking along, Tim imitated the sound of a horse to try and draw the ponies out, if they were anywhere near. He said he used to do it when he was younger and his family had horses. Didn't work this time, though.
I was getting a bit perturbed about not seeing the wild ponies because they were clearly around there somewhere, if all that poop was any indication. Finally, Tim saw them among the rocks at the top of this photo:
He was using his super duper zoom lens and was able to see them. You can't see them with the naked eye. He let me look through his camera, and sure enough, there were a bunch of ponies up there. And there were people with them. Well, that made me even madder. What were they doing way up there? I had been so looking forward to seeing them along the trail. I resigned myself to the fact that we would miss the ponies. 😭
I should also mention that we did not see a lot of people on the trail. There were certainly people at the trailhead, but we saw very few once we'd hiked up the trail a bit. Again, that's the way we like it!
At this point, we came to an intersection of trails. The Rhododendron Trail continued straight ahead, renamed the North Horse Trail. And the Appalachian Trail (yes, THE Appalachian Trail) crossed the trail we were on. We were kind of excited that we were at the Appalachian Trail, so we took a selfie.
We decided to turn right and hike a bit of the Appalachian Trail. I wanted to preserve this historic moment, but as you'll see, it was a comedy of errors, proving once again that I am so stupid when it comes to technology.
The Appalachian Trail was very comfortable hiking. It was basically a path through grass. We had consulted a map and knew that we wanted to hike to a spur trail off the App Trail, and then take a different trail back down to the parking area. There was pretty scenery, being photgraphed by Tim, along this portion of the App Trail.
We passed a trail going off to the right that we thought might possibly be the spur trail, but it wasn't marked, so we kept going. Up until this point, the trails had all been very well-marked. We eventually stopped because we felt like we should've reached the spur already, but we weren't sure. I walked on ahead for a bit to see if there was any other trail that could be the spur we were looking for, but I didn't see anything. So we went back to the path we'd seen earlier and decided to take it.
As we continued down the spur, we could see over to where we had just been at the intersection of the Rhododendron Trail and the Appalachian Trail. And guess what we saw at that intersection? Two wild ponies! They were standing right at the sign where we had taken the selfie. We'd been there about 15 minutes before and had seen nothing. Now they were grazing there, with several folks around them taking pictures.
I'm using the zoom in this picture, so it makes them look closer to us than they actually were. We decided to just cut across that open area and see if we could get to them before they wandered off.
We figured they'd be gone by the time we got there, but they were still there.
Tim took a lot of pictures of them. (Well, I did too.)
We could get very close to them. They weren't skittish at all. I guess they're used to all the people on the trails.
I actually petted that horse. Guess I forgot about this sign:
There was so little grass to nibble on. I couldn't believe they were actually eating, but they were. Look how sweet he is.
And this one was clearly pregnant. Notice that all the other people had left. It was just us and the ponies!
We got so close to them, and they acted like we weren't even there. It was great! When other hikers began to show up, we finally left, but we really, really enjoyed getting to see these wild ponies.
We walked back down the Rhododendron Trail, figuring we'd just go back the way we came, but we came across a horse trail that we thought might go back to the parking area, so we took it. It had totally different scenery because it went through the woods. It actually looked kind of spooky at first...
But then it opened up and it was a pretty hike.
At the end, we came to a gate which I was afraid was locked. Thought we'd have to climb over that fence, but when we got closer we could see that the lock was just hanging there on the loop-thing. Tim took it off and we went through. You can see the parking area in the distance.
After we got back in the car, we drove the main park road loop, looking for the rental cabins. We had read that the park had them, and we thought it might be fun to rent one sometime. We never did find them, but when we looked more closely at the map, it appears that they're off the road a bit, and you have to carry your stuff in. Uh...no.
We were really hungry after our hike, but there wasn't any place to eat nearby. Tim ate a protein bar, and I decided to just try to make it to whatever restaurant we could find. Fries was about an hour away, and I thought, "Surely we'll pass something." After about 30 minutes, we came upon the Log Cabin Restaurant. We actually pulled into the parking lot, but there were hardly any cars there and we just didn't know. So we went on.
The town just before Fries is Independence VA. The drive there was very pretty, with lots of nice scenery. By the time we got to Independence, though, we were starving and decided to just stop somewhere. This place didn't look so hot outside or inside, but pizza sounded good, so we pulled in.
We ordered breadsticks and a pepperoni and mushroom pizza, because there was a coupon in the menu for this pizza. While we waited, I went to the restroom, which turned into about a 25-minute ordeal. Here's the story:
First, I had to thread my way through a section of the restaurant where the owner(?) and two females were putting together and setting up tables. When I say putting together, I mean literally putting tables together. When I got to the restroom door, it was locked, so I waited. And waited...and waited...and waited...and waited. I could hear someone in there, but they wouldn't come out.
Eventually, a little girl came up and stood in line with me, or should I say, she got in line in front of me. I didn't say anything, thinking that if the person inside ever did come out, I'd just go on in. So now it's me and a 6-yr-old waiting. Her mother was one of the females putting the tables together, and she told the kid to knock on the restroom door, which she did. Again, we waited and waited and waited.
FINALLY, a teenaged girl comes out and just walks by us as though everything was normal. I have no earthly idea what she was doing in there. I thought at one point that she might be changing clothes, but she didn't have anything with her when she came out. So anywho, she exits and the kid runs right in and closes the door. Irritated does not even come close to how I felt, but I tried to stay calm since the mom was right there. And our food hadn't come out yet, so whatever. But I was aggravated!
Again, I waited and waited and waited. I could not believe it was happening again! What was she doing? At one point, I could hear her playing in the water from the sink and singing. Finally, I had had enough, so I knocked on the door and said, "Let's go!" When I knocked on the door, it swung open a little bit, and I saw her sitting in there on the toilet. Oh geez. So I closed the door and waited another 10 hours for her to come out.
She finally bee-bops out and I go in. When I got back to the table, Tim looked at me incredulously like, "Where the heck have you been?" Right about then, our breadsticks came out. This is a picture of them. And yes, this is what an order of breadsticks looks like at this restaurant.
It was basically pizza dough (not crisp, but dough-y) with about a gallon of cheese on it. The server brought us ranch dressing and marinara sauce (which was unexplainedly cold) for dipping. Let me tell you something, before you judge me, this was freakin' awesome! When you are famished and tired, hot "breadsticks" really hit the spot.
We had barely gotten started on the "breadsticks" when the pizza arrived. We could barely get everything on the table!
I thought the pizza was a little greasy from the pepperoni, but Tim liked it. I liked the "breadsticks" better. We couldn't eat it all, so we got a takeout box. Our server was very friendly. I had told her that we were starving because we'd been driving in the middle of nowhere for a long time and couldn't find anywhere to eat. She asked where we were from, and we just said Hickory. It's easier. She said we were the third people to come in that day from Hickory!
She asked what we were doing in the area, and Tim said that we were headed to Fries to spend the night. She just looked as us, not saying anything. Finally she said, "Is there a hotel in Fries?" I said we were staying at an Airbnb rental, a little house by the river. She still looked a bit unsure, which made US a bit unsure. We thought, "Is Fries some crazy backwoods place that we shouldn't be going?" But it turned out to be fine.
While we were eating our pizza, a little girl and her dad came in to pick up a to-go order. The child put money in a gumball/prize machine right behind our booth. Apparently, she didn't get the prize she wanted, and she got mad. She puffed up, stomped her foot, and said angrily, "This place ain't good for NOTHING!" Or something like that. Then she stomped out. Tim and I started laughing, as did her dad.
They went out the door, and the waitress, who was behind the counter, looked at us. She was laughing and said, "Did y'all hear that?" We said yes, and we all laughed some more. I guess you had to be there. I put it in the blog because I don't want to forget it happened, as it was really funny at that moment.
When we checked out, the server rang us up for $18 and some change. That didn't sound like enough, so I asked, "Did you include the drinks?" She said, "No, it doesn't matter." I said, "Oh, I was going to ask for 2 teas to go." She went and got 2 teas, didn't charge us, so we tipped her $5.
The drive from Independence to Fries was another interesting route. We kept going further and further into nowhere, it seemed. Finally we got to Fries and found our house. Fries is an unincorporated mill town with a population just below 500. There's not much there. The mill that once employed everyone in the town is no longer open. But all the mill houses remain. Just a few of them are on the river. All the houses in this small town are jam-packed together on very small lots in one section of town. (I keep calling it a town, but it's really not. We did see a post office and a bank, though.)
We drove by our house at first because we weren't sure where to park. We turned onto the road behind the house, going very slowly, trying to determine if we should park back there. We were backing up and almost ran over a man who was approaching our car. He was the husband of our host and told us to park on the street in front of the house.
Here's our little mill house:
It doesn't look like much, but here's the view when you're sitting on the front porch:
That's why we rented it. We were happy with it.
We stayed on the porch a lot of the weekend.
By the way, you usually have to make arrangements to pick up a key for your Airbnb rental. Our instructions were, "The key will be on the kitchen counter." The front door was unlocked! I think the owners lived somewhere behind us. They told us that some folks from Miami had been staying in the house all week. They had come up to escape the hurricane and had left at 11am the day we arrived. So the owners had to get the house cleaned and ready for us by 4 pm. Apparently, it had been hectic for them. I really didn't have any sympathy. I mean, they make the rules. If you can't get everything cleaned and ready, then change the check-in or check-out times, or don't rent. They were actually very nice, and the house was very clean.
We had no complaints. Even though the house was old, it reminded both Tim and me of houses our grandparents lived in. Here's what it looks like as you walk in the front door.
The main bedroom:
From the windows of this bedroom, you could see (and hear!) the river.
The house had mostly older, antique-y furnishings, as in the second bedroom:
Here's the kitchen. Look at the old stove!
As we were unloading the car, I noticed an older lady sitting on the porch of the house next door. She had a cute dog on her lap. I walked over to say hello, and this is what I learned: Her name is Melva, and she has lived in that house (which was very cute, and nicer than ours) for 50 years! There is only one other person around town older than her, and that's a 90-yr-old woman who lives down the street. "Everybody else is dead," she said. She got married in a house just down the street, then lived in another house on the same street for a few years until she moved into her current house. Her husband died 4 years ago. That is a lot of info!
After we got all our stuff moved in, we took a bunch of pictures of the house, then sat out on the porch and ate some Rice Krispie squares that I'd brought along. We just sat there, enjoying the view. There were binoculars in the house, so we brought those out to look at birds on the river. There were big, long-legged birds sitting on rocks in the river. They looked like egrets or something. I don't know the correct names, but we enjoyed looking at them and saw them several times during the weekend.
We decided to walk down to the river.
There is a trail that parallels the river for about 30 miles. It's very popular for biking and walking. They've turned the entire trail into a state park.
The trail starts in town, goes by a little park by the river and in front of our house...
Then disapperas into the woods...
On our walk, we saw the only restaurant in town, The Cafe. We saw the park where the "Festival by the River" would take place the next day, and we met our neighbors on the other side. They were out walking their 3 dogs. More about this couple later.
We tried to sit out on the porch again when we got back to the house, but the sun was really bearing down on the front side of the house. We tried to pull down the shade installed for just this reason, but it blocked the view of the river. We decided to get in the car and go get some milk and soft drinks, and also look for the kayak outfitters since we were considering going kayaking the next day.
We took the main road out of town but never did see the kayak place, so we turned around and went back to a Dollar General that we had passed. Fries has no grocery stores, so this is apparently where everyone shops. We got some beverages-- Coke Zero, Power Aid, milk, and beer (the essentials!) and got in line to pay. There was a woman checking out at the other register, using about 25 coupons, and I am not exaggerating. When we got to our car, she was loading all her stuff into her trunk. She must've had 25 bags. I guess she was doing her weekly grocery shopping. Man, I'd hate to have to do that at the Dollar General all the time. Oh, and her kid had a gigantic Paw Patrol pillow that she had bought him.
After we got back to the house, we decided to walk downtown, and I use that term lightly. There was supposed to be a band playing at the Community Center from 7-10 pm. I saw this on the town's website, and people on Trip Advisor had mentioned a "foot-stompin' good time" at the Friday night gigs at the Community Center.
Well, we couldn't find the dang building. We walked all over the place, backtracked, tried to get Google Maps on our phones but we had no service. It was getting dark, and we were getting frustrated, when we finally saw a building up the hill that I recognized as the Community Center. We walked up there, and no one was there. The Comm Center houses a theater (where the music was supposed to be), a library, and some other stuff. The theater was dark, but the library door was standing open, so we went in. We could hear someone moving around in the back, but we just went back outside.
We were standing on the sidewalk when a man came out of the library and introduced himself as Denny Brooms. We asked about the music, and he said he thought that was the night before (even though that's NOT what the website said!). He asked where we were from and if we'd come to Fries just for the music. We explained that we were spending the weekend at an Airbnb by the river. He said, "Oh, Riverview Place" which is the name of our listing on Airbnb.
He then asked if we'd like a tour of the theater. We looked at each other, shrugged, and said, "sure". I mean, what else did we have to do? Apparently, Denny spear-headed a 2-year renovation of the space, and he was quite proud of it. Here's the main area inside, where the music would've been if they'd had it.
Those floors used to be grey, but they refinished them. The seats came from a school, except for the ones in the back with slatted backs. They came from the courthouse. The chairs up front are for musicians who jam there every Thur night.
He told us sooooo much history about the place, some interesting and some not. He told us all about Mr. Fries, the man the town was named for, and I mean ALL about him. There were portraits of people on the walls, and he told us who everyone was and why they were important. Most of them were country music people we had never heard of, but they had a connection to Fries. He also said that Bristol VA was the birthplace of country music. I remember thinking, "Huh?" But I didn't dare ask a question for fear of a long-winded response.
He lowered the new projector screen that he had just purchased. It hangs right above the front of the stage and they show movies on it. He needed a projector but they cost several thousand dollars. He said he found one on Ebay for $200 and bought it. The bulb for the thing cost $600 and lasts about 1500 hours. The bulb in the projector from Ebay has about half that left. He said you're supposed to keep up with how many hours you use it, but I don't think he's doing that.
It was very hot in there. He said they'd installed new central heating and air, and I wondered why it wasn't on, because we were roasting! This flag hangs on the back wall of the theater.
It's so old that it only has 48 stars. Someone donated it to the theater.
As we left, I asked his name again, and he said, "Denny, like the restaurant." Here he is, locking up the theater after our tour.
He said he'd see us at the festival tomorrow, which apparently he also organized. He said there might be 200 people there or 2 dozen. He just didn't know. (As it turned out, there were lots of people.) He said 3 bands had backed out on him. We told him we were thinking of kayaking or canoeing and he told us all about the owner of the outfitters, what a good guy he is and how hard he works. As we started to leave, he told us we could see the rest of the building if we wanted, but we just went on down the street. It was very dark by this time, and we had been in the theater for a long time. Tim said it felt like an hour, but it was probably 30-40 minutes. We weren't up for another tour!
As we walked back to the house, we talked about how Mama would've loved this guy. She would've been in there for hours. I actually like learning about the history of places, and interesting facts about them, but even I got bored after a while. The problem was that he wasn't a good storyteller. He knew all the history, all the facts, but he was not a good storyteller. He needed the skills of Regis Philbin, the greatest storyteller of all time!
We got back to the house and sat on the porch for a while, looking at the river and the stars. Then we went inside where I wrote in my travel diary (which is an old composition book) and Tim watched golf and part of a Harry Potter movie on TV. I texted Kim to see how Pete was doing, and she sent me a picture of him lying beside her on the loveseat. She said he had barely moved all night. He clearly wasn't too stressed about us being gone. Later on when we got hungry, we had some of the leftover food from the pizza place as a snack.
We did a LOT on this first day! We were tired and turned in around 11 or so.
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