It’s no secret that I love driving. So much so that my car is actually starting to fall apart (can we have a moment of silence please for the PDJeep). But she’s somehow still kickin’ and putting up with my desire to drive everywhere and anywhere, drive anyone, and drive at anytime. I promised myself at the beginning of this summer that this would be the summer of road-trips. It wasn’t a serious statement, nor did I sit down right then and there and plan out my entire summer’s travel plans, but kind of just a thought to myself that I somehow knew I would be driving a ton these past three months. And drive I did. So far this summer I have been to Connecticut and back (via train so that doesn’t count), Clemson, France and back to Clemson (okay obviously I didn’t drive), home from Clemson, Charleston, SC and back, Charlottesville, VA and back, Charlottesville and back again, Culpepper, VA and back, and just this past weekend I drove to Lexington, VA then to Spartanburg, SC then to Tuxedo, NC and then back home sweet home. That’s an ass-load of driving, if I do say so myself (sidenote: a majority of the time I was all by my lonesome).
Since I’ve kind of missed talking about each trip immediately after they happened, I’ll keep it to just this past weekend so none of my readers (my hundreds upon hundreds of them) fall asleep at the computer screen.
Thursday I got the PDJeep all packed up and ready to go for my weekend excursion to go see some of my best friends in the world and my boyfriend. Just this past Sunday was the first day of Camp Lachlan, the place I called home to every summer since I was 10. This year marked the 2nd year that I would not be able to return as a counselor, but I knew I had to get out there at any opportunity I was given. Although it’s just 3 short weeks out of the summer, I have made some of my closest friends there and it truly holds a special spot in my heart. I arrived in Lexington, the closest civilized town near camp, just in time to join my girls for dinner since it was their night off from being counselors. It had been a year since we had all been together, so we chatted and caught up with eachother and then made our way to Buffalo Bend. The Bend is something we all have come to love; it’s a little shack in the middle of the woods built right next to a creek that served as our getaway during those three weeks. Every year, we will still go back there at least once. To get an idea of the shenanigans that go on at The Bend, I’ve included a couple of pictures from our 2008 stay.
I’m sure you get the idea. Continuing on, I went back to camp with the girls and spent the night in an empty counselor’s bed, thus scaring the bejesus out of the campers the next morning. In all seriousness, I woke up to people whispering about which counselor I was until finally a small child the age of 9 tapped me on my shoulder and asked me to my face. I spent the morning there reminiscing with my friends and stepping in to help the dance counselors as always (I just can’t seem to get away!). Lunchtime came and I had to be on my merry way, leaving behind my dear Jump Mountain.
Roughly 6 hours later, I made it to Spartanburg where I was greeted by my boyfriend and his family’s new puppy, Lily. I cannot tell you how good it felt to be back in the South. I looked out to the backyard to see tractors, trailers, boats, and dogs only to walk in the door and immediately smell the crockpot cookin’. Needless to say, it felt great to be back. The next morning Powell and I headed out to Tuxedo, NC, where his family has a house on Lake Summit. Now, we all know how I feel about water. This was no exception. Everything about the area was perfect: the lake was situated in the valley of the mountains in Tuxedo. Their house was absolutely precious and was just right: it was Powell’s grandfather’s lakehouse that his dad had gone to as a little boy (I’m such a sucker for old buildings!). There were 2 summer camps situated right on the lake so we were able to watch them have sailing competitions throughout the weekend. Powell, being the big boater that he is, took me out on their boats several times during the day. He knows how in love I am with nature and water, so he’d oftentimes stop the boat and let it float while we laid back and just enjoyed the moment (cheesebucket moment, pardon me). To divulge into our schedule of events would be way to much more effort than I’m willing to put in right now, but I’ll leave the post with some pictures highlighting what an exceptional weekend it really was.
paiges and pages of nonsense 