We held our traditional Sunday morning devotional service, led by Roger at the hotel. Most people were able to attend before going our separate ways. Roger's theme was about what we should teach our children (how much we and God love them) and how we should be humble in working out our differences.
After the service people and stayed and talked for about another hour. It was as if no one wanted to leave! By the end of the day, we had already set the date for next year's 31st anniversary event. These events are a highlight of the year for Hank, who grew up pretty isolated from half of his siblings. We drove at greatly reduced speed through a heavy rainstorm, but eventually landed at our campsite at Lake Powhatan in the Pisgah National Forest. We learned that Pisgah was the first national forest east of the Mississippi River. The land was sold to the US government by Edith Vanderbilt in 1914. The ranger warned us that a mother bear and two small cubs have been frequenting the campsite along with papa bear, travelling solo. We'll certainly be keeping our dogs on a close leash during this visit.
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Only Roger beat Hank and Angie to the reunion site - a pavilion at riverfront Bisset Park. The husband and daughter of Hank's late sister, Edith (Ken and Kandy) arrived next and we began arranging and preparing the picnic tables and grills.
In addition to the above attendees, there was: - Hank's oldest brother Douglas' son, Doug, and his wife, Jamie from Texas - Hank's oldest sister, Eleanor's daughter, Cathy, with her husband Todd and daughter, Callista from Kentucky - Hank's brother Butch's daughter, Heather and her husband Rabiou from Pennsylvania - Edith's granddaughter, Amber, her husband, Mikeal, and young children Kennedy and MJ from Pennsylvania - Hank's cousin, Jim and his wife, Jeanne from Richmond, Virginia - Family friends Pearl Dobbins (age 103) and her granddaughter Sherry from Radford, Virginia - Family friend Bernice Phillips from Radford, Virginia For most of us, this is the only weekend in the year when we see each other. But we picked up right where we had left off the previous year. We get closer and have more fun each year. Hank's ancestors on both sides date back to pre-Revolutionary time. Floyd County was home to his mother's side from 1780. We actually found the gravesite of John Duncan Sr, a Scots-Irishman who was a veteran of the French and Indian War and the Revolutionary War. It was located just a few miles from the cemetery where Hank's maternal grandparents are buried. Angie stopped in at the Historical Society in Floyd and found property maps and other records of these early Duncans.
Then it was time to drive to Radford, the site of the 30th anniversary Duncan/Hypes family reunion. Our campsite for the night was the Wilderness Road Regional Museum, where we got a tour before setting up the trailer. We met our family at a hotel in Radford to finalize plans for the reunion. Roger, Hank's older brother, is the MC for this annual event. After the meeting he delivered the important package that Hank and Angie had been waiting for. We had a private moment unveiling and placing the ring on Angie's finger. She loved it! Whew. The wedding is on! Angie could hardly contain her joy and pride. Roger's wife missed the reunion because she had to have a medical procedure done. Hank and Angie took Roger out to dinner and were regaled with stories of Roger's courtship adventures leading up to his marriage to the beautiful, sweet and wise Rose. They recently celebrated 53 years of marriage. We got up early and did a long paddle board trip with the dogs to uninhabited Turkey Island. We saw a burst of color in the midst of the sea of green forest and paddled in to investigate. We found a beautiful flowering mountain laurel bush. Hank decided it was the perfect time and place to pop the question. After all - our first date had been on paddleboards. And the dramatic beauty of the laurel bush that popped out of the green background seemed symbolic of the beauty Angie brings to Hank's life.
She said "Yes!" Hank had already ordered a ring, which was delivered to his brother Roger's house in Locust, NC, the previous day. Roger is bringing the ring to the family reunion in Radford for the weekend. We packed up and headed to Floyd, VA, 50 minutes away. The campsite in Floyd was a pretty isolated spot in a large, open, hilly field in a former farm about 10 minutes to town. We drove into town in time to see some live music - first at a brewery and later in the city park - part of summer series on alternate Thursday nights. We were treated to fun Cajun two-step and waltz tunes from a mostly girl band from Louisiana - The Daquiri Queens. The token male was the accordion player. The people of Floyd love to dance. The dance floor was full for every song, right from the first tune! The crowd ranged in age from a few weeks to people in their 70s. Someone at Philpott Lake had told us that Floyd was a bit of a "hippy town". We certainly saw a lot of tie dye and tatoos and even a girl with a braided mohawk! Who would've thought we'd find this in rural Southwest Virginia! Long drive over the Blue Ridge mountains on I-64 to I-81 south, which traverses the old Wilderness Road for post-Revolutionary westward migration down the Shenandoah Valley toward Cumberland Gap. We stopped for lunch at our favorite Virginia Barbecue joint - Foothill Mamas in Lexington, VA. We had smoked Andoullie Sausage and pulled pork, cornbread with honey butter, collard greens and cole slaw. Yum! Chased with a couple of locally brewed IPAs.
We got off I-81 at Roanoke and took back roads to an amazing campsite at a lake created in 1948 by the Corps of Engineers for flood control and hydroelectric power generation. It was 12 miles from the nearest grocery store or gas station over windy, hilly, narrow roads. But was it ever worth it! Philpott Lake was quiet, calm, warm, clear and beautifully pristine. There were only a few campgrounds and parks around the 100-mile long shoreline. We inflated the paddleboards and enjoyed the calmest wind and wave conditions we had ever seen on a large body of water. After a leisurely morning, we enjoyed a 90-minute tour of the Monticello Visitor Center, followed by a Southern buffet at Micheys Tavern, established in 1747. We did not tour the inside of Monticello, since we had each done so previously. Instead, we drove to the campus of the University of Virginia to see Jefferson's academic village.
Our route took us through about 30 miles of the Skyline Drive, with the Piedmont Valley to the East and the Shenandoah to the west. The views were awesome. We saw many deer. We stopped at Upper Hawk's Bill for a short hike to the highest spot in the park. We met a young data scientist from DC who is preparing to move to Seattle.
Thirty miles of 25- to 35-mph curves was tiring to drive. We jumped off Skyline Drive at Swift Run Gap and finished the trip on I-64. Our campsite was lovely - a shady, flat gravel pad with a small creek running behind us. The dogs loved playing fetch there. And Hank and Angie enjoyed happy hour on the banks. We worshipped at a United Methodist church in Harper's Ferry. The sermon was on the importance of relationships and how Satan seeks to separate people from each other and from God. It was the clearest explanation of Satan that Hank had ever heard. It was another good reminder for us to focus on our similarities instead of our differences in these divisive times.
Angie had always wanted to cycle on the C&O Canal. Today was our golden opportunity. After the American Revolutionary War, George Washington was the chief advocate of using waterways to connect the Eastern Seaboard to the Great Lakes and the Ohio River. In 1785, Washington founded the Potomac Company to improve the navigability of the Potomac River. His company built five skirting canals around the major falls: Little Falls, Great Falls in Virginia, Seneca Falls, Payne's Falls of the Shenandoah, and House's Falls near Harpers Ferry. These canals allowed an easy downstream float; upstream journeys, propelled by pole, were harder. As early as 1820, plans were being laid for a canal to link the Ohio River and Chesapeake Bay. The C&O canal eventually covered 185 miles between Washington, DC, and Cumberland, MD. The canal didn't reach Cumberland until 8 years later than the railroad. It operated from 1831 until 1924. It was a lifeline for communities along the Potomac River as coal, lumber, and agricultural products floated down the waterway to market. Boats also carried mail. The canal was one of the first large-scale civil engineering projects. Seventy-four locks were constructed along its length. Although we didn't see the Georgetown end, the Park Service still operates canal boat experiences at Great Falls and Williamsport and several of the lock houses offer interpretive experiences. Check out this video. We cycled up river to Shepherdstown, WV, (population 1,700) about 16 miles away. The tow path was hard packed gravel - a very smooth surface which lay between the river and the canal. It was well shaded, peaceful and scenic, with only light traffic. There were a couple of cyclist camp grounds along the route. We had to climb a steep ramp and cross the river on a highway bridge to reach Shepherdstown. The first thing we saw was a massive Bavarian-style Inn on the high riverbank. Next we saw Shepherd University - a private liberal arts school of about 3,200 students. We passed a beautiful old Episcopal Church that was completed in 1859. It's tower features one of the original stones from the Episcopal church in Jamestown. We enjoyed a delicious lunch and cold drinks in the air conditioned comfort of Lilah's Restaurant before returning to Harpers Ferry. We stopped on the way for a short hike along the Potomac River at Great Falls. These wide, beautiful falls drop 75 feet over about an eighth of a mile. We were lucky to catch a lone kayaker descend the falls over drops as high as 15-20 feet at a time. Angie got great video. On the last drop he got slammed sideways against a wall and had to roll the kayak.
There were also some rock climbers playing on the steep walls of the canyon. Turkey buzzards soared overhead. The two-mile hike was dog friendly. They scrambled over rocks at the overlooks and were rewarded with a swim in a back eddy at the bottom. We walked back along an old carriage road that looked like the ambush scene from the Mel Gibson movie "Patriot". We camped at a large KOA campground above the town of Harper's Ferry. We coasted two miles down the hill to town and explored the old streets and buildings. During his surveying years, George Washington discovered this spot at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers and decided that it was perfect for industrial water power. After the Revolutionary War, he commissioned the armory to be built there. It was this armory that was the target of John Brown's attack in 1859. He and his sons had fought in Bleeding Kansas, where he had liberated some slaves and helped them get to Canada. He felt that he was an instrument of God in the crusade to end slavery and the time for attempts to achieve this peacefully were over. His capture and execution helped galvanize the North in opposition to slavery and bring the country one step closer to the Civil War. The timing of our visit, just after Juneteenth, added weight to our reflections. Frederick Douglass believed that Brown's "zeal in the cause of my race was far greater than mine – it was as the burning sun to my taper light – mine was bounded by time, his stretched away to the boundless shores of eternity. I could live for the slave, but he could die for him." Harriet Tubman—also knew and respected Brown. Tubman thought Brown was "the greatest white man who ever lived,". And she said later that he did more for American blacks than Lincoln did. Being strategically located along the railroads and the C&O Canal, there was a lot of action here during the Civil War. The city changed hands 8 times. It was here that Lee's Army crossed the Potomac on the way to Gettysburg. A Union detachment spotted them and the report led to Meade's pursuit with the Army of the Potomac. We woke up to more disappointing news - our dog nanny cancelled our reservation at the last minute. We had planned to put the dogs in day care so we could have a long day touring the sites in DC. We could not find a last-minute replacement, so we decided to leave the dogs in the air conditioned trailer while we enjoyed a shorter half-day of attractions in the National Mall.
Because parking is expensive in the city, we parked at a Metro station and rode the train downtown. We walked about six miles to visit several monuments, including: - The World War II Memorial - Vietnam War Memorial - Lincoln Memorial - Korean War Memorial - Martin Luther King Memorial - Jefferson Monument We had lunch at an Indian restaurant near the Navy Yard on the way home. The war memorials were a stark reminder that "Freedom isn't free." Hank found the name of one Wysong who died in March 1969 - Joseph Walter Wysong from Indiana. He was only 20. Angie found the name of her uncle's best friend who was killed while they were serving together in Vietnam. The Martin Luther King Memorial featured several quotes. Hank's favorite was: "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." These are important words to remember in our divided, angry culture. |