Blowing Rock

We spent the week-end with Matthew and Lindsay, who drove up to our house Friday night. Then we all headed up to the mountains for a fun filled overnight.

We drove up to the top of Grandfather Mountain and Matthew, Lindsay and I crossed over the mile high bridge and climbed on the rocks for the impressive view. The heights proved too much for Miran who waited for us in the gift shop. It was very windy and we were all a little nervous and not very sure footed. The weather was actually great all week-end, but it was quite chilly on the mountain top.

On Sunday Matthew spent the day skiing, which was the primary purpose of the trip. The rest of us kept busy by going on a short hike and by panning for gemstones. Below you can see Lindsay and Miran sifting through their buckets of dirt. And below that you can see what Miran found (in a large bucket) and what I found (in a small bucket). They had staff who went through our findings and identified everything. 

After identifying everything we decided to have a couple of the stones cut, including a not very valuable but pretty amazonite as well as a ruby and a amethyst. The ruby turned out a bit dull, but the amethyst is really lovely.

We explored the very close together towns of Blowing Rock, Boone, and Banner Elk and discovered a number of fudge shops, which seemed to be a thing in the area. We had great burgers for dinner Saturday as well.