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| Steve and Thelma-Lou |
This might be my favorite picture of the whole trip! Haha!
Yesterday was a fun day. One of the benefits of staying a couple of nights in the same location is it gives you time to explore a little without the fatigue of having a couple hundred miles of travel mixed in. Our plan for the day was to explore Mount Airy (yep, they spell the word rather than abbreviate Mt. - which if you don’t know that, it makes it hard to find in maps and weather apps.) We were specifically interested in seeing the tributes to Andy Griffith and his 1960s TV show that takes place in the fictional town of Mayberry. Since Andy grew up here in Mount Airy, this small city was the inspiration for the town.
We started by driving past ‘Wally’s Garage’ where Gomer and Goober worked. They were cousins, and it does make me wonder about their parents’ choices in names. Out front was a squad car that was a replica of the one Andy drove on the show, and for $10 a person, you can get a tour guide to drive you around town and show you the sites. We opted to take a photo from across the street and just move on. We then went to the small, but well done, Andy Griffith Museum. It was fun to see some of the costumes, furnishings, and clips from the show. There was even one small display of things from Andy’s time on the Matlock show. I saw the following album in one of the cases and it immediately reminded me of my childhood. My parents had this album and my sister and I would listen to it. There were two tracks in particular that we loved. One was called ‘What it was, was football’ and the other was ‘Romeo and Juliet.’ They are on YouTube so I played them in the car for Steve. So funny!
After visiting the museum we drove a few blocks to the downtown area and walked around a bit. There was the ‘Snappy Lunch’ restaurant, ‘Opie’s Candy Shop’, and closed but opening again soon, ‘Floyd’s Barber Shop. Steve had hoped to get his haircut there. The talk in town (we were eavesdropping) is that ‘some guy from Alabama bought it!’ It didn’t sound like folks were excited about this new purchase, but it looks to us like the new owner plans to continue it as Floyd’s.
It was now late afternoon so we headed back to the RV to let Maggie out. We walked with her back to the vineyard tasting room, and this time I tried a cider and mead flight and Steve had a glass of wine. We had a lovely afternoon sitting on the patio overlooking the vineyard. The only thing that happened that I could have done without was the ‘Bold Jumping Spider’ (thanks Seek for the I.D.) that was on me! At first Steve tried to tell me it was just a fly, but I loudly informed him it had 8 legs! AND, it appeared it could fly! I now know it jumps! Anyway, a lady said we could come sit with them but to leave the spider where it was! I just moved to another chair at our table and the spider settled itself under the arm of the one I was in, waiting for the next unsuspecting wine drinker.
We then went back to the RV where we had burgers for dinner. I then took Maggie for a walk through the vineyard while Steve did the dishes. We ended our day by watching a very old Andy Griffith movie, ‘No Time for Sergeant's.’ After watching it, we think it might have been the inspiration for the TV series, ‘Gomer Pyle, USMC.’
Today we leave our vineyard and head for Asheville, North Carolina. I’m looking forward to hookups for water and electricity. For the past three nights we’ve been ‘boondocking.’