Farewell to North Carolina!

Tomorrow I'm leaving North Carolina. I'm going to leave a piece of my heart down here. I think there was still a piece here from my very first visit, which occured almost 30 years ago! Steve and I weren't even married yet. We came down here with some friends and camped on top of Mount Hibriten in Lenoir, NC, about an hour and a half northeast of here. That's when I think this area took hold of my heart!

When the kids were fairly young, we came down again. We were visiting Gatlinburg, TN with some friends, and they suggested we come to Asheville for a night. They wanted to visit the Biltmore. We couldn't afford for all of us to go so we let Megan go with them, and Steve, Danny, and I did a little site-seeing in Asheville. We remember eating at a really good Mexican restaurant and walking through a quirky toy store. We also visited the Folk Art Center, which I thought was the neatest place I'd ever seen!!

I finally went there again today! It's still a real treat! We were doing some geocaching on our last day and one of the caches required visting the Folk Art Center and decoding information from some of the plaques to help us determine the GPS reading for a couple of caches. It added a new element of fun to the whole treasure-hunting scenario!

So after a day of hiking and caching, we came back to the campgrounds and fixed dinner and sat at the picnic table on one of the premium campsites that wasn't occupied, and enjoyed the sunset. It was a pretty good one for my last night. I took a picture of it......

I'm going to end today's blog with the lyrics to a song that's become very dear to me. It's written by Steven Curtis Chapman and it's based on the verses in the Bible about Moses and his journeys up and down Mt. Sinai when he was leading the children of Israel to freedom. Exodous 19, I believe.

The Mountain
by Steven Curtis Chapman

I wanna to build a house up on this mountain
Way up high where the peaceful waters flow
To quench my thirsty soul
Up on the mountain

I can see for miles upon this mountain
My troubles seem so small they almost disappear
Lord, I love it here,
Up on the mountain.

My faith is strengthened by all that I see
You make it easy for me to
believe up on the mountain
Oh, up on the mountain

I would love to live up on this mountain
And keep the pain of living life so far away
But I know I can't stay
Up on the mountain

I said I'd go, Lord, wherever You lead
For where You are is where I most want to be
And I can tell we're headed for the valley

My faith is strengthened by all that I've seen
So Lord help me remember what You've shown me
Up on the mountain

You bring me up here on this mountain
For me to rest and learn and grow
I see the truth up on the
mountain And I carry it to the
world far below
So as I go down to the valley
Knowing that You will go with me
This is my prayer, Lord
Help me to remember what You've shown me
Up on the mountain
Up on the mountain

I cherish these times up on the mountain
But I can leave this place because I know
Someday You'll take me home to live forever
Up on the mountain

(You can listen to this song on youtube, click here if you'd like to hear the music.)