The sweet tea-tastic Carolinas

So after the wonderfully colourful Colorado, I was off to Greenville, SC. I've said it before but I love, love, love flying internal US flights. I really don't know why. Maybe it's the airports, maybe it's the destinations, but they are brilliant.

From Denver, I flew to Houston, a new airport for me. It's actually called George Bush Intercontinental Airport. Not quite as good a name as Will Roger's airport in Oklahoma City but I was still on the look out for George Bush (41) paraphernalia. I wasn't disappointed.

Actually the only disappointment was to statue pose this one would have required a fan. And a person to take the picture.

Never having been in the airport I was excited to see destinations in my little spoke as varied as Mexico City, Mobile, Pensacola, Baton Rouge, Corpus Christi and Little Rock.

My gate looked exactly like a airport gate from a movie. Seriously, is this not where Rachel left for France in Friends?

My plane on to Greenville was little, so I was delighted to get a full can of Coke and two packets of pretzels. Score!

Arriving in Greenville. I think our flight was the last in that night. It showed.

The next morning, I had breakfast with Jose at IHOP, stuffed French toast combo (hash browns, sausage links, eggs sunny side up and french toast and fruit stuffed with cream cheese. I get my blueberries on the side). Nothing tastes as good in the morning! Then I was off to North Carolina.

This is one of my favourite parts of the journey north. Straight, open road, mountains and sometimes blue sky.

In Asheville Maggie showed me a new development (shops, cinema, restaurants, houses and apartments) which, I promise you, looked exactly like Hill Valley from Back to the Future.

I also noticed new things in Hicksville.

Like these. I definitely would have remembered these. And perhaps made fun of them.

But enough new, there must visit places to go back to, like Mast General Store. A relic of auld decency.

I love this store. It sells everything and nothing. It has clothes, camping stuff, sweets, garden stuff. General is right.

And Whitman's Bakery. No massive Napoleon this time, due to it being just before lunch.

Just a pre-lunch snack instead. I have no idea what is was called now, but it was like a donut twist. Actually, that might have been what it was called now that I think of it. Better not send my idea to the patent people now.

Before you judge me, you've got to go to Whitman's. Just look at the quality.

These cupcakes were tempting.

Olde worlde bakerye shoppe.

After lunch with Roma and Wayne and more visiting, it was time to do it - run the lake again. Time was really against me because I had to get back to SC that night after dinner with Maggie but they were calling for a snow storm across eastern Tennessee, western NC, southern Virgina and northern SC and northern Georgia! Pretty much everywhere. They had had snow right before Christmas and by the news reports I saw it was bad, and they thought this one would be equal, if not worse. So to save time, I ran with my camera so I won't have to drive around taking pictures of the usual spots. This was a good plan, except that you couldn't really see much of the lake because of the snow, but worse, I think I broke the spinny menu options button on my camera. I mean, it still works, just not really how it used to.

This is the one lane bridge that goes over the lake. It's made of wood and even in slight rain cars have gone over the edge. Good plan to close it when they're calling for 18 inches of snow then.

A different view of the cross.

Thankfully I made it back to Maggie's in decent enough time for a shower and to get packed. The snow was getting worse and worse and with the news on talking about how people got stranded on the interstate in December during the last big snow, we decided that it was best I leave sooner rather than later.

It wasn't long before I got stopped on the interstate. The driving conditions were terrible. The snow was piling up and the roads were icy.

After being stopped on the interstate for about twenty minutes with no clue why, I decided to get out and talk to my fellow commuters. The girls ahead of me said there was an accident (not surprising) and the ambulance (oh dear) had gone ahead of them as they were driving down. But the longer I spent there and the more snow that fell, the less likely it was I was going to make it to Greenville.

Thankfully I was right beside an exit. Where exactly that exit could take me to was a bit unclear. If you remember, I have driven the route from Asheville to Greenville a fair number of times, but only on the interstate. I knew what was off some exits for a mile or two, but that was it.

This is where my phone saved my life! Ok, maybe not, but it got me out of a hole. With no map, I turned on the data roaming to see where I could get to without the interstate. It turned out there was a way through. So despite the cost, I figured it was worth it. I left the interstate and set out with a few other cars to get around the pile up. The roads were even worse than the interstate, the snow was piling up, but I knew the longer I drove the better it would get and the longer I sat the worse it would get. So I did it.

It was a fairly straight shot down, there was one tiny road I had to drive on which was probably six or seven inches in fresh snow and that was the trickiest part. By the time I made it down to another exit, the interstate was as quiet as you can imagine. There was no way that accident had cleared.

The snow continued to fall all the way past the NC/SC line. I followed a UPS truck most of the way and that was good, because the visibility was so poor. My usual route would be to come off the interstate, and down a fairly steep slope into Greenville, but I thought it best to stay on and head to Spartanburg, then to Greenville. I have no idea what that other road would have been like, but it didn't seem a good plan. Not too far out of Spartanburg the snow stopped and the rest of the drive to Jose and Lindy's was a breeze. Oh yeah, except for never having gone that way before and not exactly knowing which exit to come off at. In the end, it took me just about four hours to drive what should take an hour and a half.

The next morning the snow and ice had hit Greenville. It kind of changed our plans for the day, but that was ok.

There were even icicles on the fun bus!

We stayed in Saturday night instead of going out. The snow that had melted turned to ice and not only would some of the group not make it, there was a chance places would be closed because workers hadn't made it. So what did we do instead?! The only thing a group of late-twenties to early thirties would want to!

Dominoes! Oh yeah! Do we know how to have a good time?! Playing Mexican train dominoes with the Greenville group while being snowed in is really the most fun you could ever hope to have!

The weather cleared the rest of the weekend and we were able to get out on Sunday to downtown Greenville, which you'll be relieved to hear is as brilliant as ever! Sadly Monday rolled around and it was time for me to leave.

But not before a visit to the SC Botanical Garden! Oh yeah! I felt it was more an arboretum but I shan't split hairs with them. It was a gorgeous day and I enjoyed it very much.

So all in, even in the snow (and maybe even because of it) a great trip to the Carolinas! I do heart them.