July 21 & 22- Raleigh, North Carolina

After we enjoyed the delicious breakfast at the Hampton, we headed south again.  We were delayed by a side trip to Pilot Mt.......A huge mountain that rises out of nowhere in the wilds of North Carolina.  We drove up and up and up and up and around and up again until we came to a sizeable parking lot and an amazing view.  It was about 99 degrees at 10 am and we watched a group of really stupid people take off wearing their flip flops on a two mile hike, backpacks, coolers, folding chairs and other assorted gear that hikers might carry on a two mile, loss of 2100 feet hike.  These guys must have been pro's....well pro's at visiting the ER for heat exhaustion, battered and bruised feet as well as ego deflation.  Not us!  We got back in the truck, cranked up the air conditioning and wound down and around to Highway 55 again.

Pilot Mountain--99 degrees and getting hotter

Neither of us had gotten much sleep due to the alarm clock debacle, so we traded drivers often and found David and Shelley's apartment.  Such happy greetings!  I felt like I knew them already.  But I was so exhausted I collapsed and took a two hour nap.  Jeff stayed up to visit and meet the kitties.

David and Marshmallow

Jeff and Macy Gray

After waking and letting the pillow wrinkles fade, I joined the rest of our happy group and we went out to dinner at Neo Asian.  It was the best Chinese we had on the whole trip so far.  After frozen custard for dessert, we went back to the apartment (nice, cool, quiet, peaceful, respite!) and went to sleep.  Ahhhhhhhhhh!

David and Shelley

The day dawned with more hot humid weather in store.  One hundred degrees and a 115 out in real life.  Heat is getting to much........we're melting, we're melting, arghhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

  We woke up late and our hosts made us a delicious breakfast with some of that famous Davis Bakery rye bread.   We took our time after breakfast, talking, listening to music and cleaning up.  Shelley and I went to run some errands.  I broke my phone (dropped it on the pavement one too many times) and more importantly, I needed a pedicure.  It was definitely a toe decoration emergency.  After a lovely and relaxing visit to Vietnam's finest nail specialists, we went to Verizon to see about getting a new phone.  I ended up getting the exact same phone I had for one dollar (after rebate).  They transferred my data and we were on our way back to the apartment.

Pretty toes!

We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing in the cool security of the apartment.  Jeff and Shelley went through boxes of pictures while David and I played music on guitar and mandolin.  What a pleasure!  Time passed so quickly as we enjoyed trading songs and memories. 

Music and Laughter--What could be better?

But hunger finally overcame the pleasure of being together, and we decided to brave the heat one more time and go to a favorite restaurant--Mama Dipps.  I would describe the meal if I could, but it was indescribable.  It was down home country cooking at it's finest.  It was so good, that even though we were stuffed, we all got dessert.  It was so good that Jeff even bought her cookbook.  Get ready for some chicken and dumplings with a mess of collard greens with some sweet potato pie

The remains of the dinner at Mama Dipps

We waddled and groaned our way out of there and came back to the apartment for more picture sorting and music. 

Jeff blogging and surround by family photos

Shelley and Hana

How could we go to bed early enough to get up early enough to get to the Outer Banks and Nag's Head tomorrow at a decent time? I can't answer that question.  Jeff's answer, "we've got a full tank of gas, a half pack of cigarettes, it's dark and we're wearing sunglasses......hit it!"