Discover America 2025

So I ended the Day 1 post saying, “It can only go up from her.” I obviously jinxed myself!

Day 2 started well. I left the WalMart parking lot and drove five miles in the rain to the New River Gorge Bridge in West Virginia. This offered the first few of my “top discoveries” (i.e., things that are the longest, highest, lowest, oldest, prettiest, or other “est” of their kind in the U.S.). When it was completed in 1977, the NRGB was the world’s highest bridge carrying a regular roadway. It is still the third highest bridge in the United States and the longest span bridge in the western hemisphere. The New River itself is one of the five oldest rivers in the world geologically, and arguably the oldest in the United States (one of three, all crossing the  Appalachian Mountains, that are roughly 320 million years old). One more fact, not quite as boring, is that Ashleigh tells me this stretch of the New River is rated as one of the top ten paddleboarding locations in the country. I posted a picture of the bridge, surrounded by the fog from the rainy weather.

Since it was too wet to hike the local trails, we took off for the Cumberland Gap National Historical Park, driving down from WV, through Virginia, across to Tennessee, and up into Kentucky to the Visitors Center. From there, the dogs and I took a two mile loop hike, with the dogs pulling me up the hill for the first half and me struggling to hold them back on the way down. We then drove three miles up to the Pinnacle Overlook. The pictures here show that Gipper was very interested in the scenic view; Madison, not so much.

Then the trip took a drastic turn. In the parking lot before we left for the night’s campground, I turned on the engine so the car would cool off for the dogs. I went to throw away some trash, but the car beeped because I had the key fob in my pocket. So I put the key on the hood of the car and went to the trash can. When I returned, I forgot to pick up the key, and drove off. A few minutes later, no more than a mile from the campground, I heard a small noise and saw through the rear view mirror the key flying off the car. Before I could retrieve it, another car ran over it and smashed it.

Not being able to start the car, I had to call AAA to get towed to a nearby hotel and wait for someone from home to ship my spare key to me. Since all this happened late on a Saturday, the key could not be shipped out till Monday morning, so I am spending Saturday night through Tuesday morning at an Econo Lodge in Middleboro, KY. To quote Forrest Gump, “Stupid is as stupid does.”  Dare I say again, It can only go up from here? Since this impacts my schedule, I will miss campsites in Tennessee and North Carolina. Luckily, I camped in both with my trailer and Gipper last fall/winter, so I can still check them off my list. On Tuesday, I will be back on schedule heading to Mount Pleasant, SC.