Tag: Blue Ridge

  • Asia-Pacific, Part 5 (Japan: Farther Afield)

    Monday arrived and I had to get back to work. A weekend in Tokyo was nice although I had other plans and that involved getting out of the city. After all, the whole premise for this trip was visiting U.S. military facilities USS Blue Ridge The 7th Fleet of the United States Navy keeps its…

  • Body Parts

    The more I thought about it, apparently body parts influenced an awful lot of geographic names. It seemed natural though. People liked to name things after familiar objects. What could be more familiar than the flesh right there in front of them? From head to feet and practically everywhere in between, I found spots on…

  • Of Of

    Mouth of Wilson. I used it as a waypoint during my recent county counting quest. Otherwise I put it out of mind as I drove through an expansive rural corner of Virginia. It came to mind again a little later. I passed a sign for another town about an hour farther north and east, Meadows…

  • Western North Carolina, Part 2 (Blue Ridge Parkway Loop)

    I’m going to take a little bit of a departure from the usual Twelve Mile Circle travelogue format. I’ll actually suggest a couple of simple one-day itineraries. They mirror actual trips starting from our home base for the week in Asheville, North Carolina. Readers should feel free to customize them at their discretion. Admittedly, they…

  • What’s “Almost Heaven?”

    We examined a song containing a blatant geographic inaccuracy in a recent article, “In Them Old Cotton Fields.” I left a hint for readers when I stated that I too took offense at a song with an equally irritating error, one having to do with the Mountain State. Many of you probably knew the answer…

  • Lazy Blue Ridge Afternoon

    Over the weekend we traveled down the eastern side of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It forms part of an ancient backbone, the Appalachian chain abutting central Virginia. As the crow flies, it wasn’t too far from Shenandoah National Park’s Swift Run Gap and Skyline Drive. We were guest on private land so I won’t give…