Yes, It's Good, to be Back Home Again

Monday dawned in the Blue Ridge Mountains, somewhere just northwest of Roanoke, VA.  The sky was beautiful, but the light too low to catch anything much but a blur of pinks and blues from the cab of the moving truck.  I did try, but I think I'll spare your eyes from the results of those earliest attempts.

Blue Ridge Mountain Dawn -- Side Window

Blue Ridge Mountain Dawn -- Front Window

The day started out sort of foggy, so even when we stopped at a "vista point" to take in the view from the heavily littered pull-off, we were only able to capture a hazy photo of the valley below.

Hazy View of Valley

While we were doing our standard routine, both of us taking pictures and Joe taking pictures of both of us, a car pulled up, a man jumped out and ran up to us. "My wife told me to help you take a picture of the two of you," he said with a smile.  Joe, tired from nearly 24 hours of straight driving, didn't have the energy to explain that he can capture the photo of the two of us with the fish-eye lens.  Instead, he handed to helpful Harry his camera, we worked up a couple of tired smiles, he snapped the photo, we thanked him, and he was on his way.

Tired Travelers in Blue Ridge Mountains

AFTER he left, I mentioned that the man, though a stranger, had looked very familiar to me.  Joe was surprised because he'd thought the same thing.  I'm thinking he might have been one of the musicians we played with during the summer 2009, at a lovely little "all musicians welcome" jam session in the Blue Ridge mountains.  I will have to look back at the video I shot that day to see whether he IS on that video.

From there it was another 4-5 hours of driving and we were finally rolling along the familiar roads of Gloucester, VA, making our way home to the old Farmhouse in Mathews.  The fall leaves here are offering some decent colors, though the rain, clearly following us, was not far behind and the accompanying gloomy skies did not offer the beautiful backdrop for their colors that the crisp blue fall sky would have.

Fall Colors under Cloudy Skies

More Bad Weather Threatening

Nearing Gloucester, VA... Brief Break in Weather

Road Leading to Our Farmhouse

Back home, the dog and cats were exceedingly happy to see us.  Killian, the "talker" of the trio, continued to voice her enthusiasm about our return for the next several hours.  The cats, simply looked expectantly at their food bowls in anticipation of a mid-meal "snack."  Nothing has changed!

Well, to be honest, the old farmhouse looked rather abandoned when we pulled up.  Under the gray skies, the grass needing mowing, the trees losing their leaves, the grass trying to take over the dirt and gravel roads, screamed to us that they have been neglected for more than three weeks and, that if we don't move quickly, they will simply return to their natural state of field and forest.

Home Again

Gray Skies Return...but We're Back Home!

Flowers are Still Trying

3000 Miles Later, Virtually No Shifting of Load

Still, we were exhausted from the last push, so after taking my conference call for work, unloading our luggage, and eating a small snack, we crashed, taking a four hour nap.  We were tired when we awoke, but we still had much to complete before we could call it a night.  We had to drive to the airport to pick up our car (24 days in the lot there), go to the pond house and verify everything was in order for the open house to be held today, pick up the mail that had been held for more than three weeks, get a LITTLE grocery shopping completed, and unload the pictures from our cameras.  We hit the sack at 2:30 AM, having barely completed all of these required tasks.

John Denver said it pretty well in his song,

Hey it's good to be back home again,
Sometimes, this old farm, feels like a long lost friend,
Yes, and hey it's good to be back home again...

Yep... More Work Ahead

Well, I'd better get to work.  Nothing changed because I was on vacation... my work is piled high and I must attend to it!