There was about five weeks between when I moved out of the house and my last day of work so I needed a place to go. The motorhome when to my contractor’s house while he built a custom computer desk and the cats and I went to my friend Claire’s house. She has a mother-daughter room with private entrance that worked out perfectly to bridge my housing gap.

Friday, May 26, 2017 was my last day of work and four days later, I hit the road. I stopped by my employer’s for one last “goodbye” and so my coworkers could see my new home.

Stopped by the office on my way out of New Jersey.

I designed a custom-built desk to house my iMac in a padded compartment (behind the drawers) and have drawers for files, etc. The bottom drawer holds a small printer/scanner. The face of the drawer drops down to allow access to the paper tray. The desktop is hinged and becomes the lid when closed. The removable legs and folding chair have a storage spot to the far right side.

I had a terrific contractor in New Jersey who did a lot of work on my house over the past few years. He’s also an RVer so he understood my needs for a lot of function in a compact space.

Tillie likes to watch me work on photos at my custom-built computer desk.

My journey began with a trip to Florida to establish residency. I’m using my sister’s address so she can get my mail and do any necessary banking for me. The fact that Florida has no state income tax doesn’t hurt, either.

I took two weeks to travel to Florida, stopping at National Parks and Civil War battlefields in western Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia along the way.

I’m also working as a freelance photographer for my former employer, PL Custom Emergency Vehicles. They manufacture ambulances and rescue trucks and I have spent several years photographing these vehicles in their local communities as I travel the country for my lighthouse  photography.

I spent the first night on the road in a Cracker Barrel parking lot in Hagerstown, MD. The next day, I visited a customer in Clear Spring, Maryland on my way to Shenandoah National Park.

Next stop was Manassas Battlefield. I’ve always been an American history buff and I hit several Civil War sites on my way south.

Stayed in another Cracker Barrel near the park then moved west to Front Royal, VA, at the northern entrance to Skyline Drive that runs north-south through Shenandoah National Park.

The access road to Front Royal RV Campground is actually a mile-long single-lane driveway that goes through a dairy farm with the campground beyond. The locals don’t always move out of the way for traffic.

Front Royal RV Campground outside the north entrance to Skyline Drive in Virginia.

My neighbors here were a father and adult daughter from Arkansas and Pensacola, FL, respectively. Nice folks who I spent some time having a Margarita with.

I spent two days driving the northern half of Skyline Drive, stopping for several hikes to waterfalls.

I was going to try for a selfie with the sign but a hot guy on a motorcycle offered to take my photo.

As anyone who has been here can attest, the views are breathtaking.

From here, I moved south a couple hours to Waynesboro, VA and the Waynesboro North 340 Campgound for two more nights.

Waynesboro Campground offers beautifully shaded sites with lots of room between. It’s a real treat when you’re not packed in like sardines.

From this location, I was able to explore several historic sites and do another customer photo shoot in Lynchburg.

Appomattox Courthouse, VA: Lee was heading into hiding in the Blue Ridge Mountains and Grant, suspecting as much, got to this location first, surprising Lee, who had no choice but to surrender gracefully.

The house in Appomattox Courthouse where Robert E. Lee surrendered to U.S. Grant, bringing an end to the Civil War.

The court house that gives the town its name. It had nothing to do with the events here but is a focal point in the center of town. The road through town makes a circle around it.

Monticello is the home of Thomas Jefferson. There are numerous examples of his engineering and design genius here as well as beautiful grounds and gardens.

Natural Bridge is what’s left of a cave that had a stream running through it a million years ago. My father says that one of the first road trips his parents took him and his brother on was here. They went on to do many more road trips and my grandparents continued the tradition with us when we were kids. My parents kicked it up a notch by taking us on cross country camping trips every summer through much of the 60s. I guess this travel thing is genetic.

One week in and it was now time to move on towards Great Smoky Mountain Nation Park. I had decided I wanted to explore Boone, NC because I’m a huge fan of the Diana Gabaldon book series Outlander. During much of the saga of Jamie and Clair Fraser, they live in the mountains of western North Carolina. Although the books are fiction, Gabaldon has stated that the location described in the books is based on a place near Boone that she had seen.

Based on the physical description, I searched a satellite map and found a spot that closely matched my vision of Fraser’s Ridge. Then I went in search of a place where I could see it. This may not be it but I got a kick out of the possibility that I found it.

The location I suspect to be the inspiration for Diana Gabaldon’s Fraser’s Ridge in Boone, NC.

Located behind a shopping mall, it was difficult to find a good vantage point to photograph it.

I stayed in the Cracker Barrel here and moved on the next day for the Smoky Mountains. As I headed south out of Boone, I spotted a sign for The Blowing Rock. It piqued my curiosity, so I pulled in and paid a small admission fee to see and learn about this interesting geological formation. The views across the valley were spectacular!

The Blowing Rock, where the winds blow up from the valley below. Even snow blows upwards.

 

Upcoming post:

The Great Smoky Mountains, Georgia, and my arrival in Florida with no air conditioning.

 

My name is Lindsay Reed and I’m a photographer and graphic artist with a passion for both lighthouses and road trips. I am living as a full-time solo RVer in my 31 foot Coachmen motorhome and plan to spend the next few years traveling the U.S. and Canada photographing not only lighthouses, but everything else there is to see in this wonderful land. I hope you enjoy my blog and will follow my adventures in the months and years ahead.