Day Three of our Spring Break trip to NC

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

We awoke to a rainy, drizzly day. Ray made pancakes while I showered. The circuit blew again. "Been there, done that" we learned that lesson yesterday.

Then we were off to Biltmore House. Unfortunately Betsy had some unusual ideas about how to get to the Biltmore house. We traveled neighborhoods? and side roads? But she got us there.

At Biltmore we spent several hours walking through the rooms. This was a good test for me. We wanted to see how I would do with my chronic fatigue on a walking tour type thing. I was pleased that I actually did fairly well. The 4th floor has been opened since either Ray or I had been there. The boys were amazed by the size of this house. They thought our next home should have a swimming pool and bowling alley in it also. We made a stop by the gift shop, the confectionery, and bought the posed picture of us taken in the lobby.

After seeing that a turkey sandwich was $11.50 we all decided to go back to our RV (from henceforth to be known as "The Bilt-Less House") and make lunch there. Then we drove around to the farm area to buy the boys ice cream. We wandered the petting area for a while in the heavy drizzle. A table-top goat greeted us while he attempted to eat a sign. Bert and Ernie, older draft horses, enjoyed our affections. There was the usual assortment of chickens, sheep, donkeys, etc. We then decided we had had enough of the drizzle and we would skip the garden tour.

I decided I had "roughed" it long enough and a Starbucks Carmel Macchiato was needed. "Betsy" directed us into a downtown area. It was a tight squeeze in an RV. We found the Starbucks and decided it would be easier to park across the street at the gas station and let me walk across to SBs. Ray gassed up ($100 this time) while I made a mad dash. Time for another lesson?? Yep. This lesson has to do with pulling out and swinging wide. RVs just don't swing wide very well. Neither Parker nor I was spotting Ray when he pulled forward. As I mentioned we were in a crowded area. Ray was going to pull out to the right which required a wide swing. Oops as he pulled around he clipped the bumper of the RV on a concert pylon at the gas station.

We stopped by Ingles and picked up a rotisserie chicken for dinner. We are getting wiser! We heated leftover mac n cheese, made chicken sandwiches, microwaved some veggies and had fruit for dinner. A big improvement last night's fiasco.

It really rained most of the day today. There was a short break for about an hour or so when the boys took a walk but other than that is has been a yucky, messy day. But it is good experience. When we get out in the Washington area we are likely to encounter lots of wet weather.

The boys have their own version of "roughing it" as well. Both boys forgot their GameBoys and Parker forgot his Ipod. These are staple things in their worlds. Somehow they are managing to exist with the Wii and DVDs of the Andy Griffith Show but it has been tough.

Neither Ray nor I slept well again. It is interesting that when we are at home we aren't as aware of the weather. Boy, we were really aware of the weather this night. We had strong winds and rain as a cold front moved in. Finally at 3:42am since both of us were still awake we decided to remake the bed. We striped the bed, put our top blanket on the mattress to act as a mattress pad cover then remade the bed. MUCH better!! This was actually somewhat comfortable. We both finally managed to get a few hours of sleep. Temps dropped about 20 degrees or more over night. I told Ray I think I felt each degree as it dropped.

Tomorrow we turn back toward home.

Lessons learned today:

-Spotters are a good thing when driving an RV

-The Vanderbilts had/have WAY more money than we do

-The Biltmore House is a really, really big house