We finally ended our western odyssey of these great United States and Airstream "1" is now docked in Memphis, Tennessee at the Graceland RV Park across the street from Elvis' famous home.

  
My good friend Ken Guthrie has agreed to assist me in driving the airstream across Tennessee to Asheville, NC where we will begin our trip up to the Eastern part of the States. He met me in Nashville at the famed Blue Bird Café where good fiend Bobby Dipiero got us a seat at the bar for a packed house presentation of local writers and singers performing their best stuff. I have always loved this musical café as some of the very best song writer savants and performers do their special thing.

  
We were camped at the Opryland KOA Park and left the next morning for the trip across one of the most beautiful drives through the valleys and smokin' hills of Tennessee across the I-40 Interstate. We camped our second night at the Newport, Tennessee KOA just west of the beginnings of the Smoky Mountains for a nice evening of grilled steak, corn and my best baked beans out on the grill of a warm evening campfire as the sun sank into the side of a beautiful East Tennessee mountain range where the temperature dropped to a nice 65 degrees.

  
We arose the next morning to a campfire breakfast of eggs and bacon, hot coffee and orange juice before heading over the mountains and down into beautiful Ashville, North Carolina and to Lake Powhatten National Park. We set up camp, went to the farmers market just over the hill and 5 minutes away and purchased more fresh vegetables and cooked fresh mountain Rainbow trout over the grill with a fine libation of Brunello Montelcino to wash it all down with and two nights of much lingering, sometimes meaningful conversation about every subject men are want to talk about, don't you know.
We were also able to visit the surrounding city of Asheville and the downtown section that has turned into a very hippy type environment that is attracting a new younger artistic crowd and has revitalized this beautiful mountain town that George Vanderbilt discovered over 125 years ago because of its ideal year round temperatures that would ameliorate his asthmatic condition and built the most beautiful of all European castles that took over 5 years to complete. The Biltmore House is now operated by his grandchildren. He brought in the most skilled of artisans and Frederick Law Olmstead who developed Central Park in New York among other things and established the Pisgah National Forest from his over 1 million plus acres; which was, under Olmsted's' guidance, the beginnings of the National Forest Service of the United States as a result of the great erosion and planting control techniques they developed as a result of caring for the Biltmore House and its vast estate. Mr. Vanderbilt later donated that vast area to the Federal Governments forest service division.
Over one million visitors a year go through this incredible creation of this entrepreneurial visionary who very tragically died at age 35 only 3 years after the completion of the estate, from a simple appendicitis infection.

We then docked Airstream "1" at the Dixie Self Storage facility and made our way down the mountain and back to our home of Atlanta, Georgia while I plan our next peripatetic adventure with Patty and some of our wonderful grandchildren, namely Jack, Maggie and Little Charlie "II". Thank you Ken Guthrie for attending me on this wonderful Airstream adventure.

Camping on the Blueridge Parkway