Riding the Blue Ridge Parkway

Always some gorgeous scenes to be had.

No matter what direction you look.

Stayed a night up there boondocking.

Boondocking is camping with no hookups.

Its all good if you self contained.

It was wonderfully cool.

Printed a tri-photo photo

And say that 3 times fast. 

Instagram photo.

In the print section in Aperture, there is a choice to do 3 photos

in sequence that I thought was cool. 

It kind of gives you a taste of the photos or in my case 

actually focuses on the best part of the photo.

I printed it on 8.5x11 photo paper and trimmed the sides evenly

since one was wonkier than the other.

Yes, Nick I used Aperture because Lightroom is making me crazy.

I wanted a page that was a bit different than what I posted on my blog 

earlier on boondockin' and use some of the landscape

photos that I take in abundance but don't scrap much.

Why? I don't know.

If you've never been to the Great Smokey Mtns - you really need to

put it on your to do list.

October Afternoon is the background paper from my Studio Calico kit

as well as that tree trunk bole. I'm kinda proud how I worked that in.

Scraps of simple stories made it in there.

The alpha is deja view with some quickutz going on.

I used a background stamp that came out kindof lame and

covered most up.

And I made that tag. I KNOW. 

It's the little things.

AND WEDNESDAY IS THE BIG DAY - I'LL KEEP YOU POSTED.

Cowboy Coffee Camping

In gladly keeping with the noise ordinance in boondockin, we decided on not firing up the generator in making our afternoon coffee. Fortunately, I remembered to pack the old time perculator so that just in case we were going to give boondockin' a go or worse yet, the kerig bites the dust, we have backup.

Pardon the blurry photo, but fill the coffee pot with water up to the line.

Add your grinds. We only had drip coffee and not thinking that far ahead, but perk coffee is what you need. 

Assemble your propane burner by adding the base and screwing on the burner. And then fire that baby up.

 Set your coffee pot on the burner and wait for the perculating to commence. 

(OR use the propane stove inside-which we did in the morning).

Oops. Needed to turn it down and then let it perk for 7 minutes - no more/no less. (same for the stove).

Pour and enjoy.

Boondockin' in the Great Smokies

SmokyMountains

Boondockin' - is RV camping in national or state forests with/without limited amenities.

That meant with our RV we still had shelter that provided fresh water and a bathroom. (Generators could only be run from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.)

We just had to conserve for just one night.

Such a hardship. (kidding)

We close to a river - as in we could hear the river - just not see it from the camper.

Without any ambient noises; no generators, radios nor loud voices,

you could not only enjoy the rush of the water

but also hear the wind brush the tree leaves.

It was very relaxing after a long day.

Fortunately, it was beautiful weather, perfect actually, there was a cool breeze

that actually made with through our open windows

perfect for sleeping.