The prerequisite things for Halloween to come have now happened. The viewing of
Night (Curse) of the Demon? Check! The viewing of
It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown? Check! The trip with Ms. B. to the
Blue Ridge Parkway for breakfast at
Mabry Mill, roaming the countryside and grabbing any stray geocaches we can find, and
having wine and a picnic at
Villa Appalaccia Winery? As of today... check! Now, this is not to say other things aren't going to
happen—such as picking up pumpkins for jack-o'-lanterns, maybe getting in a bit
of decorating, watching some more scary flicks, and having a Halloween party.
They will. But with these most necessary of necessary things now out of the way,
Halloween can actually occur with our blessing.
Brugger and I went to Martinsville last night and took Mum out for a pleasant,
slightly belated birthday dinner at
Rania's
restaurant. Then, well before dawn's early light this morning, Ms. B. and I hit
the road for the Blue Ridge Parkway and arrived at the mill/restaurant a bit
before 8:00 a.m., their usual opening time. But how nice—we now come to find
they're open at 7:30 a.m., which is a first (a very welcome first), so we were
able to walk right in and get seated. Historically, there have been some very
long, very cold pre-dawn waits, as the staff would not unlock those doors till
the striking of the hour, no matter the bitter elements patrons might face. An
autumn trip to Mabry Mill has been tradition in my family for just about as far
back as I can remember, and I love nothing better these days than keeping it
going. You know, for the longest time, I've said Halloween is my favorite
holiday, and I reckon it is, but the best day of the Halloween season is the one
where Brugger and I make the Parkway Pilgrimage. Due to weather and other
conditions, things worked out a little differently than planned today, but it
still turned out to be everything we hoped it would.
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A wee bit blustery on the mountaintop
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Brugger talked me down from Lover's Leap.
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Pretty, but not much fall color yet this year. The peak is about a week
late.
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Breakfast was basically my typical favorite: three pancakes—one buckwheat, one
sweet potato, and one traditional—with a side of sausage and flowing rivers of
hot coffee. Ms. B. enjoyed eggs, sausage, a biscuit, and hot cocoa. From there
we had intended to hit the trail head at the western end of Rock Castle Gorge,
which we've hiked several times, but always from the other end. Today, however,
the road leading to the trail head was closed off, and the weather was looking
somewhat menacing, so we opted to make other plans. There was a geocache at the
nearby Floyd Fest site, adjacent to Villa Appalaccia, so we popped over there,
wandered the grounds for a while, and made the cache find (
"Got Wild?"
GC7TA5Y). Afterward, since we had plenty of time before the winery opened at 11:00
a.m., we drove into Floyd and wandered one of the shops Ms. B. had enjoyed on a
previous outing. Then, as the 11 o'clock hour struck, we hastened back to Villa
Appalaccia to do those things that had to be done.
We were the first customers to arrive, so we ended up having an excellent
tasting and some entertaining and educational conversation about Italian wine
with our hosts. After the tasting, we carried a couple of glasses with us down
to the garden terrace area, which is the best place we know to drink wine, and
there... we drank wine: delicious Sangiovese and Toscanello for me, and a fine
Aglianico for the nice lady. Also following tradition, we had packed a picnic
lunch, which we destroyed in a fairly spectacular feeding frenzy.
After all that, we had thought to perhaps check out some wine at
Chateau Morrisette winery, which we frequently include in our plans, but once we arrived there, we
ran into an all-but-impassable wall of humanity (mostly engaging in
sweet wines, it appeared; oh, ye poor unsnobbish souls), so we opted to
forego the Morrisette experience and return to Casa de Rodan for a couple of
episodes of Netflix's
The Haunting of Hill House, which we have been enjoying. We both love the restaurant at Chateau
Morrisette, but I'm afraid we haven't had many stellar experiences at the
winery. It's generally mobbed, the wines are fair at best, and the service is
hit-or-miss (we've had at least as many misses as hits). So though we cut the
outing a little shorter than anticipated, our alternate plan worked out much
more to our liking.
And what all this means for you, ladies and gentleman, is that Halloween may now
come. We accept donations via cash, Paypal, and all major credit cards as tokens
of your appreciation.
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Stopping for a little love on the way to the cache
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Waiting for the dead to perform
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Waiter! Where's my wine?!
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Oh, there it is. And a nice lady in the bargain. Happy horrorween!
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