Sometimes you just don't need words.....

....but I am a writer - so I have plenty of words! And these words in my head are begging me to try to describe this beautiful day Jim and I spent in the mountains of North Carolina.

Jim had to drive to the French Broad River again today to complete an engineering job. I packed a picnic and we headed for the river this morning. It takes almost 2 hours to get there, so we arrived right about lunch time. We decided to drive towards Hot Springs North Carolina and on the way passed the Wolf Creek Trail Head. We followed a gravel road for a couple miles and ended up at the creek shown above. We unfolded our lawn chairs parked them by the creek, filled our glasses with ice tea and enjoyed our lunch.

We headed to Hot Springs which ended up to be a really small town on the French Broad. We talked to a guy who guides white water rafting (no thank you - I did that once and I'm still alive and I want to keep it that way) but we also found a good place to kayak the same river.

Jim (who loves to talk to everyone) got a tip from a Hot Springs local to go check out a different river - so we headed further into North Carolina. And, actually, we did not make it to the river until about 7 p.m. We got side tracked with a side road promising a hiking/bicycle trail . We just can't pass checking out something we haven't seen, and in the end, Jim and I hiked 4 miles to the top of Mill Ridge Trail, and of course 4 miles back down. All the rest of the pictures are from that wonderful hike. We had one little "startle". Jim almost tripped over a snake and I just reminded him that NO one has died of a snake bite in the Smokey Mountains. (I read this in our trail book) He reminded me that we were NOT in the Smokey Mountains - Ooooops! So we tossed him (the snake) back into the woods to find a new home.

But really, the words that are in my head can not really describe the beauty, the tranquility that we experience walking through the woods. The breath taking views as we crest a mountain, the breeze gently moving the trees - making us think a water fall must be close by. The butterflies, the flowers, the birds, the air, the clouds, the trees.....I could go on and on and yet it still leaves me feeling like I have not conveyed what we experienced today.

I think that what we really experienced today is God - Source - Love - Divine Beauty. And there are no words in any of my many dictionaries that can define or describe this. But Jim and I will know every time we look at the pictures of this day that what we experienced really was spiritual. Therefore no words are needed.

Here's to the Ride!