A while back still in Knoxville, I was taking a walk downtown. It was during the winter when the sun set around 5 o'clock in the afternoon. On the way back to my apartment, I snapped a picture with my phone and posted it on a Tennessee-based Facebook page. I don't really maintain an active Facebook profile, but have one to get hiking ideas and participate in events.
A few days later, somebody reached out to me from the company of the boat photographed, and told me she was in charge of Marketing for Volunteer Princess Cruises. She wanted permission to use that picture in the marketing materials. I asked for some compensation, and in exchange she promised me tickets to their sunset cruise. She later mailed them to me to my home address. I tried to schedule it early in the spring, but a friend of mine was not able to make it, so we had to reschedule for May.
The cruise was quite an interesting experience with beautiful views of the Tennessee River and surrounding neighborhoods. I arrived at the parking lot to discover that my small umbrella might not stand up to the wind and pouring rain. My dressy attire was soaked in a few minutes as we proceeded to the dock. After looking at the weather forecast, I was reassured and quickly enough the weather cleared up. The clouds actually made the views even more spectacular.
The following week was quiet and peaceful. During the work week, I tried to get out to go to the gym, and the days I did not, I started to just walk around in the cabin to get my 10,000 steps. On the weekend, I decided to explore a bit more and a bit further than I would normally and to go to Virginia. Sand Cave and White Rocks trail was the trail I wanted to hike. It was a moderately hard trail of about 10 miles round trip with 2,300 ft. elevation gain. I enjoyed both the view from White Rocks and the Sand Cave.
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| View from White Rocks |
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| View into the Sand Cave |
I then ventured to the Pinnacle Overlook just 20 minutes away from the trail. The views were spectacular and did not require miles of hiking, just 0.2, to be exact.
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| View from Pinnacle Overlook |
As tired as I was, I decided to finished the day hiking Tri-State Peak trail to the site where three states converge in one spot. It was so hot that I was very resistant to do this final trail, but I pushed myself and was glad I did. An hour and a half traveling back went by quickly as I honestly earned my dinner.
As much as I enjoyed the hiking nearby, I wasn't too fond of the neighborhood and in general country life here. Each neighborhood had abandoned properties wherever you went. The nicer areas of towns frequently showed confederate flags or some sort of religious messages. People were nice, but there was something about them that made me suspicious of them and them probably suspicious of me. It felt like behind the niceness there was standoffishness as if they were looking at you as a stranger. I definitely did not feel southern hospitality that I was hoping to experience. I hated loud trucks, people having disregard for animals, neglected properties. I thought I could live in a conservative state, but the more I did the more I realized that it will get a lot to get used to this.
The the last full week in this Airbnb was spent driving back and forth to Knoxville to get two of the medical tests done. During the weekend, I was planning to go back to Knoxville to drop off the books I took from the library, meet with a friend of mine for lunch and figure out what things I needed to bring to North Carolina from the storage. I also managed to accomplish some hiking. I hiked the White Rock trail (yep, another White rock), which was very nice, but I wanted something bigger and better.
I found a hike that had over 1,000 positive reviews, and although it was about an hour and a half away, on Memorial Day, I decided to take make the drive. I definitely did not regret. I hiked Grassy Rich Bold near Roan Mountain and finished with Cloudland trail. Both were truly spectacular, so I had a great conclusion to my Tennessee stay.
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| View from Grassy Rich Bold trail |
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| View from Cloudland trail |
On the day of the departure I had my last doctors appointment in Knoxville, drove back and headed to North Carolina. Originally, my plan was to stay overnight and drive there in the morning, but I ended up returning from Knoxville much sooner, and definitely didn't want to spend another night in that cabin. It wasn't bad, but it was definitely not what I expected. I cleaned the cabin, emptied the refrigerator into my cooler and loaded the car.
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