Days Inn Greenville - Spartanburg Duncan

The rainy remnants of Ida continued to follow us North to Greenville, SC. It was so gross out that I refused to leave my somewhat unsanitary feeling hotel room. The next morning we loaded into a pretty nice theatre at Furman University. Mixed among our regular collection of middle-school and high-school students was a small band of 11 local university students. But ...

Planning Trip-4 weeks til we leave on Trip, Planning how long at different segments of trip.
Itinerary as of today:

Week 1- Arizona and Southern Utah including Grand Canyon, Painted Desert, Petrified Forest, Las Vegas, Hoover Dam, Bryce and Zion Canyons.

Week 2- Eastern ...

I've been 'back home' now for two full days. Weird. I haven't really been 'back home' for going on eight years, so its a bit of a time warp feeling. What's worse is that besides today (since I've borrowed Mom's wheels), I'm still carless. I haven't been carless in this town for going on eleven years! Talk about a strange feeling. Luckily, I've got this upcoming trip to focus on and plenty of unpacking, packing, rearranging, throwing out and donating to do in the next four days to keep me ...

Overall, this was a pretty good visit. The people were hit or miss in both the company I went to visit - as well as the hotel staff. The hotel staff front desk initially was very good. I was asked by the front desk person who greeted me "how was your day?" to which I replied "where is the bar?" He (after checking me in) told me to tell the people at the bar that the first drink was on him! Very nice. The room was okay - semi modern in some respects ...

... hard to tell sometimes. the blood drive did go very well- the people here are all so nice and helpful. I was escorted by Tara Strange who is a district recruiter. she was very fun and helpful. she took me to lunch and then escorted me around Greenville, which is a very cute city. the city has been newly refurbished on the West end where there was a cool bridge, park and trails. I was impressed by the small restaurants ...

... I took a wander out into the car park and got some photos of some of the more unusual sights. We back to the Carolina First Center for another look and left Greg there to shop for a couple of hours while Sue, Jasmin and ...

... for a great Wing-Ding. We spent the rest of the morning and some of the arvo meandering through the throngs of bikers looking at the vendor stalls. The hall in which the displays were set up was absolutely huge - it ...

... place closed for the summer holiday until next week! It is only a 30 minute drive back there so we might go that way on Monday morning on our way to the Smoky Mountains. We went straight to ...

An epic adventure and a perfect start to our travels. Crae and Walt embarked on three hours of solitude and rapids, and had the entire river of tubers and kayakers, Green River Cove Tubing company buses, Mama in the kayak and anyone within cooee searching in earnest. A truly brilliant day from snakes, turkeys, rapids, conversation, relaxation, limitations and blessings. Can't wait to go again!

We had been, sort of biding our time, for our friend Jessica Rolfe to get back from a visit back to Maui. Jessica had worked for our reservations service years ago, she had also been my daughter Sandi's roommate for a while, then she got her Captain's license and worked on the Cinderella and Flexible Flyer sailboats before becoming a Concierge at the Four Seasons Resort on Maui. She and her boyfriend, Steve Wilcox, who had been a pilot for Sunshine and Blue Hawaiian ...