Out of the Clouds into Asheville, North Carolina

    It rained all night - sometimes hard, sometimes just a drizzle.  I was pretty discouraged when I looked out the window this morning and could only see about 50 feet.  We turned on the weather station and heard that the rain would continue all day, perhaps for several days.  Although we were snug and safe in Raccoon Holler we need to get the mirror replaced on the camper before we drive home and to do that we need to get to a bigger city.
      I proposed a new idea  - drive directly down off the Blue Ridge using the state highways and get low enough to get away from the thick fog.  We put a plan together that gave us a couple places to stop again if the fog continued even after we got somewhat lower.  We geared up into our rain coats and pants and hit the road.  We drove out of the campground and very very slowly headed to a gas station that was described to us by the campground host.  We were probably 10 feet from the entrance before we were sure that we had found the gas station.  I was not optimistic that we would get much farther, but we took off down the mountain.
     It was encouraging to see several big trucks head down the same road that we had chosen to take us into the valley.  It was a 7 mile long, winding road with speed limits of 35 mph in many spots, sometimes 20.  The grade was often 8% and sometimes 9%.  If you don't drive an RV you may not pay much attention to the steepness of a road, but this one was STEEP and for a long ways.  The encouraging note was that the fog began to clear very quickly.  By the time we got down 8 miles it was still raining, but we could see several blocks ahead - a great improvement.
     We wandered about rural North Carolina as we worked our way to this campground just outside Asheville. We have a pretty stream that is full from the rain running just behind our camper - it drowns out some of the noise from the train across the highway.  We aren't in wilderness heaven up on the Blue Ridge Parkway, but as we sat in the sunshine we were very grateful to be safely down out of the fog.
     The part for our mirror replacement will be shipped tomorrow.  It is supposed to get here on Friday with expedited shipping.  We are looking for a place that can do the work for us - a truck repair place next door to the campground may be just the spot - we will find out tomorrow.  I just checked the weather where we were this morning - still misty and foggy.  I am glad that we took the chance and left.