Raleigh

Raleigh
Weekly travel

It was a quick trip home for 48 hours and it was time to head back to the RV in Atlanta. We were able to have a visit with family and friends and of course with my crazy little Robbie man. The dog that never stops entertaining. I can still hardly believe we are finished with the northeast part of the tour. It was a very fast and furious pace and we are both looking forward to slowing it down a bit when we get back to travelling in the RV. We both missed the RV. It is a really neat way to travel. Everything you need is with you. And you don't have to lug your suitcase in and out of a hotel every day. Yes, it will be nice to slow down a bit. We arrived back in Atlanta on February 5 by mid afternoon and by supper time had picked up the RV and were settled at an RV campground. We had been at the same place before Christmas, so we didn't have to go looking for a site. It was nice to attend another Thrasher's game on the 6th and visit with special friends Michele and Scott. We also made a visit to the Children's Outpatient Clinic at Emory Hospital. We were invited to read to some children at an afternoon clinic. Some were waiting to go in for appointments and some of the kids were siblings. A special thank you to Sarah, Brook, and Kris for arranging our visit. The children come to the clinic for any number of different treatments related to their illness. I was honoured to be a guest reader and they were good listeners, and seemed to enjoy hearing the Robert Munsch story, Thomas' Snowsuit. It was always a favourite bedtime story at our house. It was especially memorable for me because Dan had a brown snowsuit and he, like Thomas, did not like to wear it. We had many a struggle getting that brown snowsuit on. It was always a joke at our house over the years. We finished up with a rousing game of red light green light. We stayed in Atlanta for three days and then made our way towards Raleigh for the next game. The Hurricanes are the only team we have yet to see on our travels. Some teams we have watched three or more times, but we haven't yet crossed paths with the Hurricanes. We were finally able to travel at a more leisurely pace. It is about a 5 to 6 hour drive from Atlanta to Raleigh. We took four days to get there! An hour or so a day. That wasn't too bad. Along the way we got to stop here and there and see some of the Carolinas. We drove through the upper northwest part of South Carolina on the interstate to get to North Carolina. We made our first stop near Anderson. We were at a campground out in the woods. Way out in the woods. We went into town the next day and found a couple points of interest. One of them for me was a home and garden show. It was in the local Civic Centre and was obviously a well attended event. We got free tickets at the local visitor information centre. There were some interesting exhibits and we managed to come away with some amazing wire strippers, much to Graham's dismay (doesn't everyone need some wire strippers) for a mere twenty dollars. A good buy I thought. Then there was the magic indoor stovetop bbq. They were two for the price of one, so what the heck, we got two. And believe it or not, it works great. We drove for a bit and stopped at an out of the way flea market. Now that was interesting to say the least. It was a fairly large flea market and there was a good cross section of merchandise available. Depends on what you are looking for I guess. We drove on to Charlotte and stayed at one our more interesting spots. We were at the Lowe's Nascar Speedway RV Park. It is directly beside the Racetrack at Concord NC. It was of course pretty empty at this time of year, but it was neat to see the track where one of Nascar's main races takes place. The park has over 400 sites and on a race weekend, forget about getting in unless you reserve in advance. The Carolinas are the largest producers of furniture for North America. We saw lots and lots of furniture stores featuring locally made products. Just northwest of Charlotte is the town of Hickory which is a large furniture producing area. By now it was our third day on the road and we stopped just outside of Raleigh-Durham at Chapel Hill. This area has a large grouping of universities and colleges. Duke, Wake Forest, UNC and NC State are just a few. The sporting rivalries are very intense with their close proximity to each other. We arrived at Raleigh the day before the game and Graham attended the practice. They were well prepared for our arrival and had a spot for us to hook up to in the arena parking lot. Raleigh also has one of the best ice makers in the league. Donny the ice man. He conveniently lives behind the arena in the loading dock area in a RV. Hard to get away from your job though. Best of all he drives an Elmira made Olympia ice machine. Check out the pictures in the picture blog. That evening we were invited to speak to the Canes Booster Club and enjoyed talking to one and all. They also gave us a very generous donation to the Memorial Foundation for which we are very grateful. We attended the game on Tuesday the 13th of February. The Canes improved our winning streak to 18 and 10 with their 2-1 victory over the L.A. Kings. It's getting close to the end. This is game number 28 for us. Two more to go.

Graham's Game Report

Feb 13, 2007
RBC Center
Los Angeles Kings vs. Carolina Hurricanes

The Southeast Conference has produced the last two Stanley Cup Champions and tonight we saw the defending champs. Just as Tampa Bay did last year, the Hurricanes have struggled with consistency this year. They currently hold down the eighth and final playoff spot and this game was one they needed to maintain their standing. The Kings are playing out the string with no real hope for a playoff spot but they hung tough tonight. The Canes struck first on a goal by their leading scorer Ray Whitney. L.A. answered back halfway through the second to tie it but less than three minutes later ex-Owen Sound Plater and Cambridge WinterHawk Scott Walker notched the winner for a 2-1 Carolina victory. Ironically Walker was assisted on the goal by former Sault Greyhound, Josef Vasicek who had been traded to Nashville for Walker in an off season trade and just last week was dealt back to the Hurricanes. You really never know who you might be playing with when the trade wheel starts spinning in the NHL. It should be an interesting couple of weeks leading up to the trade deadline on Feb 27. The Canes will be a force I'm sure but it looks to be a dogfight for the last few spots in the east.