North Carolina

The ultimate destination of this winter's escape is Mexico, but our first stop was North Carolina, home to Deborah's cousin Denise. The flight from Seattle connected through Atlanta and landed right on time but, as one fellow passenger put it, “we couldn't find a parking space.” Our plane spent a good hour fruitlessly taxiing around the tarmac in search of an open gate before we could finally disembark, too late to catch the last connecting flight to New Bern, NC. So Delta put us up in a hotel for the night and gave us vouchers for some lovely airport food. It took awhile before we realized this also happened to us the last time we flew through Atlanta, although we couldn't remember how long ago that was.

The following day we finished the journey to New Bern and were joined at Denise's later in the day by Deborah's sister Suzie and her husband Dan, and the next day by Denise's sister Barb. New Bern is a handsome historical city situated at the confluence of two rivers in western North Carolina. Denise arranged for us to tour many of the historical homes that were decked out for the holidays and we also checked out a massive bake sale fundraiser known as the Cookie Walk at which an impressive 12,000 cookies were sold. Sadly we arrived too late, after the best of the offerings were well picked over – not that that completely stopped us from sampling. We also attended an evening celebration at a colonial era governor's palace where actors in period garb acted out their various roles in the household (including hand washing diapers, yuck). There was also music, refreshments, and other entertainments.

The weather here in North Carolina turned chilly just before we arrived so instead of having highs in the seventies we were greeted by highs in the low fifties, which isn't too bad unless the wind off the river is blowing. We didn't really pack clothes for this weather though, so we've had to borrow some clothes from Denise to stay warm, including a frilly scarf that I did my best hide under my collar.

After the various relatives departed Deborah went into Interior Designer Mode and started helping Denise with rearranging furniture, picking out fabric, recovering a pair of chairs, and working on some holiday decorations. Denise had only been in this house for a few months, so was appreciative of the help in getting things in order. I hung up a few things on the walls and manned the staple gun for the chair recovering project, but mostly just stood back and watched the whirlwind that is Deborah.

New Bern, NC

More New Bern, NC

Still More New Bern, NC



New Bern, NC Yet Again




Denise and Deborah