The Great Carolina update....

Near Hickory North Carolina.  The site of the filming of The Hunger Games.  We were camped about 2 miles of this location.

The whole town is deserted and looks like life after people.  There was a cotton mill near by which gave people brown lung and made them sick so they shut down the factory and this little town.



While in Charlotte we visited with our our niece's best friend Shelly, who I haven't seen in 8 years.  We were excited to meet her family and hang out with her for a while.  Her children were amazing.   She had wonderful birds in her trees and baby birds in the bird houses.  As you can tell I am totally amazed at the different birds in this area of the country.  Maybe I didn't pay attention when I lived in California, but I am now.  It was so cool to see momma tending to her babies

We finished up in Charlotte with a trip to Richard Childress Racing.  If you are a Nascar fan he owned Dale Earnhardt's car when Dale passed away at the Daytona 500 Race in 2001.  There was a museum with all of Dale's cars and some history.  It was a wonderful tribute.  We were surprised and delighted to find out that Richard Childress owned a winery down the road.  Bring on the wine tasting.

The grounds were beautiful, lush and green.  You could just tell great care has been taken care of those little round globes of gold.  A beautiful Tuscan style building which is a restaurant stood at the top of little hill overlooking the vineyard.  Really surprising to see the grapes in North Carolina.  This place rivaled some of the vineyards we have been to Napa.

When we walked in to the entry it was beautiful.  Fireplaces were on the right as you entered the 3 story high Foyer.  Exposed beams graced the ceiling  with deer hung over the fireplace.  The best surprise was seeing Richard Childress walk into the store which was off the Foyer and head behind the wine tasting bar.  We headed in and Tom walked over and shook his hand, thanked him for the tribute to Dale Earnhardt and we talked for a couple of minutes.  He was really a nice guy.  We tasted his wine and bought a couple of bottles. It was quite good.

We finished up in Charlotte and headed to Pinehurst.  If that name sounds familiar it's because there's a really famous Golf Course there, built in the early part of the 1900's.  A couple of US opens have been held there and another coming in 2014.  Tom's sister lives there so it was a chance to go visit and reconnect with her.  She and her husband Don were terrific hosts, showing us around, having dinner and inviting their friends over to meet us on Sunday afternoon.

While at Judy's she had a bird house with baby's that just burst into the world.  It was a blue bird like at Shelly's in Charlotte.

Now we have landed on Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.  We are staying in an RV park that is on the beach.  It' beautiful here and we get to enjoy walking on the beach and exploring a new area.  We have even got in a round of golf yesterday at an old Plantation that was turned into a golf course.  Our games were pretty good considering we hadn't played in a while.

Thanks for reading our blog.  I'll be looking at getting more pictures of the area.  Personally I think wildlife is more interesting than buildings and people.

Blue Jays are abundant around this place.  I guess he's landed here too like us!!