Only in Nashville

It’s another dreary day and after being out and about all day yesterday, it wasn’t a day I wanted to go anywhere.  We went for our walk around the campground this morning.  We spent some of that time talking with our new neighbors, Tony and Dianna.  They were on their way to the greenway.  We enjoyed that brief visit and look forward to exchanging stories with them again.

I had laundry to do, but just couldn’t get motivated for that chore this morning.  As it turned out, I am glad I waited.  After lunch I loaded up and headed to the laundry room.  To my surprise, there was a guitar leaning against the wall in the corner and pages of hand written notes spread out on the folding table.  There was no one present, however.  I went about putting my clothes in the washers and sat down to “attend to the machines” as the sign on the wall says I have to do.  In a few minutes, a gentleman comes in and takes a seat in front of all those pages of notes.  He sings a few bars under his breath then takes up the guitar to play.  Apparently, as I was attending to my laundry, I was witness and audience to a fledgling song writer.  I’m sure, only in Nashville, would this have occurred.  What a privilege—and he wasn’t so bad.  Perhaps I should have gotten his autograph.

While I was busy with the laundry and show, Gene was getting new tires installed on the truck.  That certainly wasn’t cheap and right here at the holiday gift buying season.  Oh well, better to be safe than sorry and there is, in my opinion, never a really good time to buy tires.

We are in for a treat tonight—pizza and a movie.  The pizza is ordered and should be here any moment.  We rented a movie from the campground office this morning.  We rarely watch movies.  Gene likes to say the last movie we saw was Ben Hur.  That’s not really true; I think it was actually the second Lord of the Rings film.  But you get the idea—we don’t often watch movies.  We rented Cold Mountain for tonight.  They have several at the office that we want to see.  Maybe we can start a trend while we’re here.

Tomorrow we’re planning to hike with Tennessee Trails Hiking Club.  We’re looking forward to that and seeing our friends.

The First Harper in Tennessee

The weatherman announced that the rain would be ending this morning, so I gathered up my uncle and mother and we headed to Perry County.  Since my last trip to the country I had found a little more information about the location of the old Dudley Cemetery and was more confident we would be successful in finding it today.

Myself with my Grandmother and Grandfather

We met at my mother’s house and managed to drive about 5 miles before stopping for Cappuccino.  An overdose of sugar and caffeine is sure to help any search.  With the aid of the GPS and having been down Lost Creek Road a couple weeks ago, we were able to go right to the vicinity of the cemetery.  There was a country lane along the edge of a cow pasture which seemed to be the way to go.  However, there was a locked gate and a well placed “No Trespassing” sign between us and where we wanted to be.  After knocking on the door of the nearby house and getting no answer we decided to jump the fence.  The barbed wire was a little inconvenient and we had to be careful where we put our feet so a not to get in a cow pile, but we managed to avoid falling, cutting, or squishing.  But we also managed not to find the cemetery.  As we were making our way back to the truck, I noticed a clump of trees behind the house that looked like a swell place to put an old cemetery.  We hit the jackpot and found the marker of my great, great, great grandfather, the first of our line of Harper’s to settle in Tennessee around 1800.  Surprisingly, the stone was in really good shape.

Here we go--up...

and over.

Wiley V. Harper, my ggg grandfather.

From there we drove to Hickman County and past the farm my grandfather owned.  I can remember him telling me for years that the new road was coming and eventually it did, cutting his farm in two.  Well, it wasn’t his farm by that time because he did not live to see the new road he spoke of for so many years.  Their old log home had been sold and the new owner had taken it apart log by log and moved it to Georgia.  The barn which I played in as a child along with many of my cousins, has fallen down into a heap of decaying wood.  There is now a partially finished block house on the site of the long gone chicken coop and car house.  Nothing much remains of the place of so many of my fondest childhood memories.

We drove past the homestead without even stopping and continued on toward Wolf Creek Cemetery.  This short 3 miles or so took us past where my mother and uncle had both gone to school (that building is also long gone) and the grist mill where Edd, as a boy, had brought corn to be ground into meal. At the cemetery we found the tombstones of two women who were cousins of my grandmother, but we were unable to find the one I was most interested in—my grandmother’s aunt Josie.  Again, like in all the old cemeteries, there are many tombstones which are weathered beyond readability. Hers must have been among that group.

Wolf Creek cemetery

Our stomachs were starting to growl, so our next search was for lunch.  In our opinion, there is no better food to be had in Hickman County than at Breece’s Cafe on the square in Centerville.  It is good country cooking and today I had pulled pork BBQ, coleslaw, mashed potatoes, turnip greens, and white beans for a mere $4.99.  My lunch was less than the cappuccinos we’d had at the beginning of this adventure.  While I was eating, I noticed a statue of Minnie Pearl in front of the courthouse.  Minnie grew up in Hickman County so to end our day it seemed appropriate to have our picture made with this famous fellow Hickman Countian.

Us and Minnie

Geocaching In The Rain

We have a new toy.  My parents gave us a GPS for our birthdays.  In between work and chores, Gene has been getting it charged, reading the instruction manual, and programming a few “favorite” places.  Today, we took it out for a test drive.

He found it!

For some time now, Gene has been talking about taking up a new hobby—geocaching.  Now that we have a GPS, he can pursue this new activity.  What better first run with the GPS than a first geocache?  He was able to find several on the geocaching website,  HYPERLINK "http://www.geocaching.com" www.geocaching.com.   He chose 5 which were located fairly close together and printed out the clues.  With clues in hand and our new GPS mounted on the windshield, we were off on a new adventure.  The GPS worked great.  Now Mr. Curp has someone else to tell him how to drive besides me and  I’m happy to share that responsibility.

James Buchanan House

Perhaps the kitchen behind the main house

Our first geocache was at the home of James Buchanan who built this 2-story log house about 1807.  The single story addition was built some years later to accommodate his growing family of 16 children.  Looks like it would have still been pretty crowded to me.  This was an easy geocache to find and only took us a few minutes.  After looking around this old homestead we went on to the next geocache.

The back door

Signing his first geocache

This one was at the American Legion in Donelson, a mere half mile from the Buchanan house.  It, however, was more difficult and, though we spent some time with the clues and looking in every nook of the tank, it still eluded us.  The raindrops were heavier and more frequent so we finally gave that one up for the time being.  Our third stop sounded like it would be very easy to find, and it was, but by that time it was really raining so we opted for coffee at McDonalds instead of continuing our searches.

Reading the clues

For our first experience with geocaching, we liked it even in the rain.  One stop we made was in the parking lot of a small strip mall.  I was especially uncomfortable roaming around the parking lot obviously looking for something.  It seemed like the kind of suspicious activity someone might call the police for.  We didn’t stay long there, but it did teach us that we want to stick to caches that are not in commercial areas.

It looks like the rain has set in for the rest of the day.   This seems to be a good time for a pot of soup for dinner. Oh, and cornbread.

Getting It Done

As I have said before, we are in Nashville for a couple months with two goals in mind--visiting family and friends and to get service and repairs on the Montana, the truck, and ourselves.  One by one we are checking things off our list.  We have taken the Montana in for its yearly check up and to have the slides repaired, we’ve had the carpets cleaned, and that unscheduled, out of the blue, refrigerator thing.  Gene has an appointment to get new tires on the truck on Friday.  We’ve been to Camping World to get new hoses, levelers, and several other items that are in need of replacing.  We have only one more thing inside the trailer which needs to be repaired and we will have the truck and trailer maintenance issues taken care of.  We are now finished with our personal maintenance.  We have both been to the dentist and have gotten physicals.  Today was my turn at the doctor’s office and I ran around getting a bone density, mammogram, and chest x-ray.  The only thing left on our list is visiting with family and friends.  That should be easy.

It was cold when we got up this morning and only got up to about 50 this afternoon.  It was a cool day, but sunny with rain in the forecast beginning tonight and lasting for a few days.  Gene decided to take advantage of the sunshine and sweep the leaves off our roof (again) and wash the trailer.  He also took the truck for refueling and was very excited to pay only $2.93 for diesel.  These chores and his job kept him busy all day.

I had originally planned to go with my uncle and mother to Perry County tomorrow looking for the cemetery which we were not able to find a few days ago.  With the forecasted rain, we decided to postpone that trip until Thursday.  I’m not sure what I will do tomorrow, but Christmas shopping is pretty high on the priority list.

Exploring on the Greenway

This has been a cold, drab, overcast day with a forecast of freezing temperatures tonight.  That didn’t stop us from taking a walk along the greenway this afternoon.  This is the same section we did on Friday, but were interrupted with a work call so we didn’t get to go as far as we wanted.  Today was our day, though, to see if the greenway has been continued past the Stones River.  To our surprise and enjoyment, an additional mile or so is not open past the bridge over the Stones River where the Stones River meets the Cumberland.  With this new section you can now bicycle or walk all the way from the Percy Priest Dam to Shelby Park near downtown Nashville with the exception of a very short distance at Lebanon Road.  It was a nice walk past the soccer fields, crossing the Stones River, along the bank of the Cumberland, and between a cattle pasture and golf course.

Bridge over Stones River

With the overcast skies, cool temperatures, and a pretty brisk wind I got cold.  I’m planning to snuggle up with an afghan in front of the heater (if Peanut will share his space) and enjoy a relaxing evening.

Ready for deer season, I guess.

Stones River meets the Cumberland

Tomorrow is another doctor’s appointment day.  My turn for a physical.  No breakfast for me.

A gator fan yard decor.

The Return of the Weekend

I cannot remember when we have had a weekend experience like we had today.  There were no interruptions, no phone calls, and no trailer repairs.  It was reminiscent of the years when we worked the week and went hiking on Saturday.

A beautiful fall trail.

Acorns of Black or Bur Oak, I don't know which.

The day started out clear and cool after yesterday’s rain.  We donned hiking clothing, unearthed our packs from basement storage, and struck out for our local city park.  I wish I had kept track of the number of times I have hiked Mossy Ridge at Warner Park.  It must be in the hundreds. The Warner Parks in southwest Nashville are really two parks—Edwin Warner and Percy Warner.  They sit side by side with Old Hickory Blvd as a boundary between them.  For the real hiking enthusiast, a twelve mile figure 8 can be created by using the connector trial between the parks and doing one loop in Edwin Warner and 2 loops in Percy Warner.  This 12 mile trek has been our standard training hike for high Sierra and Appalachian Trail expeditions.  For real training efforts, we have been known to be out here 3 or 4 times a week.  Today we did the 4.5 mile Mossy Ridge loop in Percy Warner.  In peak condition we can do this loop carrying 30 pounds in an hour and 45 minutes.  Today, we strolled along making the trip in just under 4 hours.  We stopped often to take pictures, we had a short banana eating break, and a leisurely lunch (including making coffee).  We ran into fellow hiking club members and spent several minutes visiting with them.  It was wonderful.  I don’t think I’ve ever noticed so much along this trail.  We even stopped to investigate the Vaughn’s Gap Cemetery.

A new cemetery sign

A simple grave marked by an old field stone and an orange tassle

This old cemetery is located just inside the park boundary very close to Hwy 100.  In the early part of the 1900s the railroad was being built into Nashville.  Many of the men working on the rail line were stricken by a fatal disease—yellow fever, scarlet fever, small pox.  I’m not sure which, but deadly, no matter what.  Those men are buried here just across the road from the rail track they were laying.  The graves are marked only by field stones and now the park has added a plastic orange tassel to indicate each grave site.  The remnants of a stone wall can be seen which probably marked the entrance to this place of rest.  In the winter, with a light dusting of snow, you can actually see the indentations of the grave sites from the trail and in spring there are a few scattered tulips which bloom each year.  As we were making our way back to the trail, a train passed, blowing its whistle at the cross street; a mournful tribute to the men who died laying the track into Nashville a hundred years ago.

An old stone wall.

Hearts a burstin'.

This was the first hike we have done since we were in the Adirondacks and we enjoyed being outside, in the woods, and on the trail again.  Tomorrow is supposed to be another pretty fall day.  I’m sure we will find something to do outside.

Out With The Camera

This has been another beautiful fall day in Nashville.  The leaves have not been especially pretty here this year.  It has been very dry.  I suppose that may have something to do with the lack of vibrant color.  But occasionally there will be the lone tree that is doing its own little fall color show.

After the rain ended this morning, we went for a short walk along the Greenway.  Today we parked at Two Rivers Park and walked the opposite direction from our trip last week.  We saw very few people so we were mostly alone.  It was a very enjoyable walk and I found a little color at which to point the camera. Otherwise, it has been a day to get a few things done around the Montana and just relax. Gene is sweeping the leaves off the roof as I write this.

I rarely go anywhere without the camera, so I am getting a collection of odd and in things.  I have included a few I especially like.