Bo  Smith's Blog History

August 15th-September 3rd, 2010
(I'll work on getting the pictures to work!)

 
The Cabin: Micaville, North Carolina

Cabin in Micaville, North Carolina

View of Celo Knob from our back porch
September 3rd (Friday)
Nothing much to say about today; no mine tours, no bridge, no special events. Just lots organizing and preparing for packing.
I made a run to Lud Leiner's place to take some meat from our freezer that was old for the dogs. The dogs are eating well and I am confident that the Leiners will find them a good home. Diana and I are having the last of our great rib eye steaks and a wedge salad tonight. It might be awhile before I'm back up blogging from Jacksonville.
Diana and I wish you all a great Labor Day weekend!

September 2nd (Thursday)
I spent the day today doing errands associated with my prospective initiation of a new business, Bo's Mine Tours. If my friend Lud Leiner who operates Rock Mine Tours (with whom I have been conducting mine tours this summer) decides not to continue Rock Mine Tours next season, I will start Bo's Mine Tours. Today, I met with Bud Phillips, Mike Jaynes who operates the Linville Mountain Gem Shop, Yancey Printing for printing brochures and decals, and Community Bank for financing. We will make the necessary decisions during our next cabin visit in October and November.

Little Bear, King Tut, and Bella made the trip today.

Mike Jaynes is a great source of information.
Diana spent the day getting ready for our trip back to Jacksonville. After I got back to the cabin,  Diana and I went to dinner with Maggie, owner of the Richmond Inn, and her son Ben at the Tin Lizzard. Daniel at the Tin Lizzard and I had talked in Spruce Pine earlier in the day about a couple specials for our dinner. We had a great dinner and enjoyed some relaxing conversation. Tomorrow will be a busy day preparing for our return to Jacksonville on Saturday.

Daniel has done a great job getting The Tin Lizzard with his gormet menu going and has been getting good business both at lunch and dinner.
September 1st (Wednesday)
I guess I tired my self out yesterday. It was a long day with lots of exercise and I stayed up past midnight writing the blog and sending some emails. The result was that I slept until 10:15. I had only a few hours to run some errands in Burnsville before my mine tour. I met the Spitz family just before 2:00 pm.

Richard, Leah, and Marlene Spitz

The Spitz family lives near Marion in season and near Ft. Lauderdale in winter.
I took this picture of a mica crystal in a wall of weathered Feldspar. It reminded me of what it might have looked when it crystallized first floating in a liquid magma of silica rich minerals.
After the tour, I spent a few minutes at Lud's house visiting a couple of dogs that showed up yesterday. They are both female and look like they may be litter  mates. Other than near starvation, they look in good shape and were well treated for awhile.
Lud has maintains a beautiful farm with almost 10,000 box woods and 1,500 christmas trees.

August 31st (Tuesday)
What a busy day!  I was up at 6:45 so that I could take King Tut to the groomer at 09:00. Diana picked him up at 2:00 and had a new bow put in Little Bear's head.
After taking Tut to the groomer, I had a meeting with Bud Phillips to discuss our Foscoe Mine initiative and then went to the Richmond Inn to pick up ferns, tree lights, and tiki torches. I got back to the cabin about 1:00 and then was off for a Rock Mine Tour at 2:00.

From left to right; John Adams, Jessica Adams, Savana (10), Elijah (8), Vanessa (8), and Tucker (6)

The Adams children are home schooled and this was a field trip for them.
I got home about 6:00 and after a gin and tonic, we had a great dinner of Diana's wedge salad and steak.
August 30th (Monday)
Diana and I got a good start this morning and took Interstate 26 north toward Johnson City, Tennessee. We had Tut and Little Bear in a crate in the back seat for a full day trip. Our first objective was to meet Ron Rader at the Panera off  Exit 19 and pick up our landscape window.

Diana with Ron Rader. We actually purchased three windows. We got one for us and one for each of our two closest neighbors; Daisey and Kenny Hoilman, and Blake and Edna Huffman.

This is a close up of our window. I have talked with Patsy Rader and she is going to paint another after I send some suggestions. I want her to make changes to the Black Mountain outline and redo the bears.
As  the weather was clear and beautiful, we took a sightseeing route home via Roan Mountain . We had lunch in the best (and only) food shack on Route 19 in Roan, Tennessee before heading up the mountain on Route 143 through Cherokee State Park.

A spectacular view to the north from Route 143

Want a vacation home with a view? Here's one!
After a beautiful trip up the Tennessee northern side of Roan Mountain, we finally arrived at the top.

Diana with the puppies at 5512' at Roan Mountain.

In case you can't read the sign, the Appachian Trail runs across Roan Mountain.

King Tut and I walked a little way up the Appalachian Trail on Roan Mountain.

Amazingly, the leaves are already beginning to turn, not only at altitude, but also at the cabin.
After  arriving at the cabin about 4:30, we made a quick turnaround and went to the Yancey movie theater in Burnsville to see "The Ballad of Frankie Silver". This special edition DVD is a remake of a movie made 13 years ago which is about the 1831 murder of Charlie Silver by his young wife, Frankie Stuart Silver, the cover up of the murder by Frankie's family, the trial, and her hanging in July 1833. After her hanging, it was determined that she was an abused wife but the proof did not reach the governor in time for a pardon.
August 29th (Sunday)
We had late breakfast of hashbrowns and poached eggs. After breakfast, we listened to the two CD's featuring Brian Gurl and Lenny Ski we purchased at last night's concert. We spent the afternoon relaxing and watching golf and NFL football. Diana gave me a haircut to "clean me up" for tonight's dinner at the "Tin Lizzard", a new restaurant on Locust Street (AKA lower street) in Spruce Pine. We are participating in an ocassion called the "Chef's Table". This group meets every month or so at the restaurant for socializing and a three course dinner. Tonight is the inaugural event at the Tin Lizzard.

Diana outside the Tin Lizzard
The dinner was teriffic and the company was excellent. We are very fortunate to have been introduced to this group. 

Daniel Diel, General Manager and Execultive Chef, talking to our group after dinner. Daniel is the proud owner of Chou Lin. It is rumored that Daniel takes Chou Lin to work at the restraunt ocassionally. 
August 28th (Saturday)
Diana got up with the puppies at 7:00 and then went back to bed. I got up at 9:00 took Panda in tow and set off for Foscoe to check ou the area in preparation to explore Bud Phillips' mine in November. Using my topographic map, GPS and a rough diagram written by Bud, I found what I think is the access to a trailhead to hike to the mine. I also went to an adjacent property owned by the McClean family and talked to Tracy McClean about the mine. He told me a some stories about the mine and I and got a lot of first hand inforation on how to find the mine. I talked to Dana Groover last night about joining in my search for the mine in November when the leaves are down. I plan to meet with Bud Phillips next week and propose a plan to  him.

I think we can get access to a traihead leading to the mine through the Grandfather campground.

The mine is somewhere in those hills.
Diana was not upset in not going on this trip as she had a haircut appointment at 12:00 and is almost finished with her book,
"Memorial Day", a great Vince Flynn book!  On the way back from Foscoe, Panda and I stopped at the Hawk Nest Native American Pow Wow in Avery County.

This dog, River is about half wolf and is being raised by Full Moon Farm in Black Mountain, North Carolina. River is very gentle but weighs 105 lbs.

River is a big, very big, wolf dog!

 

My initial purpose in attending Hawk Nest was to find out if some arrow heads I had purchased in Micaville were authentic Cherokee. This man told me one was hand made from a special agate from India (unlikely Cherokee) and the other was hand made with agate from the southwest.

I spent quite a bit of time with this man, Barry, who made me this arrow head from basalt obsidian in 15 minutes. He used to go to Pow Wows with an Iroquis woman from upper New York State. Barry was familiar with the Raquet River, Long Lake, and Mt. Arab whcih are just east of a boy scout camp where I used to spend a lot of time.
Panda and I got back from our travels about 3:00 in time to get ready to go to the Burnsville Town Center at 7:00 for a performance of "The Altapass Encore Show", a show which featurs several of our new friends from this summer. The show was fantastic. If they have a show next year, I hope some of you can be here to enjoy it.

This is me with my summer beard before the concert. I will shorten it before the dinner tomorrow night.

The show consisted of numerous performnces of local talent as well as some well known performers from southern Florida who spend their summers here in the mountains.
August 27th (Friday)
The puppies slept until almost 09:00 today; amazing. After the obligatory walks, Panzy and I ran some errands in Burnsville and then Diana and I took Panda and Bella to Marion to go to the Verizon store. Due to some contruction on Route 226S to Marion, and the beautiful weather, we took the Blue Ridge Parkway north to Linville Village and then Route 221S to Marion. We stopped by the Linville Gem shop for awhile. After doing our business at Verizon, we took Route 226A to Little Switzerland and had a sandwich at the Switzerland Cafe before taking the Crabtree Road route to the cabin. It was a beautful drive with great weather.

We ended the day with another nice fire in the chiminea.
August 26th (Thursday)
Diana cleaned and I finished my book for most of the day. I sent a favorable email book report to my '67 VA-15 "Valion" pilot shipmates. We all spent the late afternoon and early evening on he porch. The weather has been fantastic with highs in the mid 70s and the low about 58 or so.

Our porch is the center of our activities. It is normally busy albeit a bit messy some of the time.

The cool weather has encouraged us to use our chiminea for the last couple of evenings.

The summer is ending. Some hints of fall in addition to the cooler weather and shorter days are the first leaves which are beginning to fall.

Little Bear (long hair with top knot) and King Tut are beginning to sleep later but are still very much puppies. Momma Bella still enjoys playing with them.
August 25th (Wednesday)
I took Bella on some errands (AKA Hardees) and then spent about an our in the pottery studio.  Meanwhile, Diana was at Ingles.I spent several hours in the afternoon reading a new book "Tripple Sticks-Tales of a few young men in the 1960s" written by Bernie Fipp an A4 pilot in VA-34 on the USS Intrepid during our 1967 Vietnam criuse. It is about going trough jet flight training in 1966 (he was a year behind me), checking out in the A4 aircraft, and the '67 cruise. Diana and I went to our final pottery class for about an hour and then I read more of the book until about 01:00 am
August 24th (Tuesday)
Neither Diana nor I (due to staying up to watch the Jags game) had much energy today. I did complete my porch screen job and then we drove to Spruce Pine for a visit to Don and Ann Wyatt.  I returned some tools I had borrowed from Don for the porch job and Ann had had ear surgery on Monday.  Ann was doing well and we enjoyed a nice visit.  After doing a few errands, Diana and I had a late lunch (linner) at BMA-Que. Diana did not feel too well so skipped pottery class.  I went but returned early as Dean was not there to help out.
August 23rd (Monday)
Today was a bridge day. We had a nice lunch at the Switzerland Inn with our new friend Jan Godell who lives in Linville, NC. Jan has gone on a few hikes to a "quartz mine" near the location that Bud Phillips has mentioned he wants me to check out for quartz crystals with Galena intrusions and metallic sulfide deposits. Jan brought a quartz piece from the mine for me to check out. Diana played quite well today while I was "not on my game" for some reason.  After bridge, we did some errands and came home. I worked on adding some screen to the existing screen on the porch to deter Tut and Little Bear from jumping off the porch from objects they have recently learned to climb on. I stayed up late to watch the Miami/Jaguars game on the NFL channel. Looks like the same old Jags to me; a good group of hard working team oriented young guys with no big time palyers to make them champions. I expect an 8 and 8 season; but with some luck and other teams not playing their A game, the Jags could be 10 and 6 and make the playoffs.
August 22nd (Sunday)
It was a great lazy day today. I got caught up on my emails and watched a little NFL pre-season football.  Diana read some Vince Flynn (Memorial Day) and made a run to Ingles for some olive oil. I'm making "Chicken Austin" tonight with turkey cutlets-should be interesting. I plan to watch Brett Farve and the Vikings on NFL Football tonight. Bridge tomorrow!
August 21st (Saturday)
It was a rainy day today; a great day for sleepng. I didn't get up until after noon! I guess leading mine tours four days this week made me more tired than I thought! In the afternoon, I did some errands and took Litttle Bear and King Tut along. Little Bear was pawing at the rear window so I made a stop next to Young's Mountain Music so that both puppies could have a break. Both doggies started barking loudly and I finally realised that they were reacting to a statue of a lion nearby. It was quite funny. I went to Don Wyatt's and picked up the sieves. I hope that Diana and I check them out this coming week. We were supposed to go to a party at Joe and Kathlene's this afternoon and evening but we cancelled due to the rainy weather. It's been a nice break!

Don with sieve box
August 20th (Friday)
Diana took Tut to the vet to get his nasal surgery stitches removed today. I met Angela Franklin at The Switzerland Inn for breakfast and then took her to The Crabtree Emerald Mine. In the afernoon, I purchased some supplies and then went over to Don Wyatt's house so that he can make some sieve boxes for screening for aquamarine at The Ray Mica Mine. The traffic on Route 19E was bad as they are doing some work on replacing cracked sections in the road. I suspect that we will have several days of this while they are completing the work.

Angela in front of an old truck used at the mine

 

I am learning that the best way to find emerals and other resistant minerals (without extensive digging) is to process the surface gravel  after a good rain.

The water level is low enough that you can see the upper right part of the mine entrance.
 I have made arrangements with The Mountain Area Gem and Mineral Association (MAGMA) so that I can lead tours to the Crabtree Emerald Mine.
August 19th (Thursday)
I did another Rock Mines tour today. We had a big thunderstorm in the afternoon with marble sized hail.
 I took Angela Franklin on a tour of Lud's Martin Mine today (poor picture due to low battery power on camera). The event of the tour was when a gaggle of 6 or 7 Canadian Geese landed on the South Toe River right next to the tailings we were working.
August 18th (Wednesday)
It was another busy day today. I took the Campbell family group to the Crabtree Emerald Mine.  We met at the Switzerland Inn for breakfast at 9:30 and stayed at the mine until about 2:00 or so. It was a very successful day at the mine!

Campbell family with old mine truck

pieces of emerald in matrix and small crystals of aquamarine

nice sample of mica schist with small emerald

very nice partial crystal of beryl in quartz matrix
Diana had a long lunch in Burnsville with our friend Kathlene Stith. After dinner, I went to pottery class to finish one bowl and to continue experimenting with the ground mica with various types of clay.

small bowl with tourquoise
August 17th (Tuesday)
It was a busy day today. I had a Mine tour today from 11:00 to 3:00, went to the Spruce Pine Mica Company from 3:30 to 5:00, had dinner with Diana at the Hilltop in Burnsville, and then we went to pottery class with Diana until 8:30.
 I took Kareen Marcisco (grandmother), and Nicole and Alastair (9) Campbell on a Rock Mine Tour today. We had a good time and plan to do the Crabtree Emerald Mine tomorrow.
I visited the Spruce Pine Mica Company (owner-Richard Montegue) today. I learned about the formation of the company with the merger of Tar Heel Mica and Burleson Mica in 1924, learned about their customers' use for their product, and received some sheets mica samples from India and some ground mica to use in my pottery class. 
I will try to get a picture of this
 One of their most interesting products is used in the medical equipment (xray machines) and aerospace aplications where they apply a gold or platinum garphic pattern (sort of a circuit board) to control the flow of electrons.
I am in the process of experimenting on how to use ground mica in my pottery bowl project.
August 16th (Monday)
Today is Diana's birthday and Diana and my 2nd Anniversary.
 Diana and I had lunch and played bridge at the Switzerland Inn from 10:30 to 4:30.
After going back to the cabin to take the "doggies" for a walk, we went to The Sheppard's Table (a nice "country style" restaurant) for our anniversary dinner.
August 15th (Sunday)
We are spending a lazy day today catching up on email, reading, and sketching in Diana's case. My big objective today is to rest and complete a small rock garden I started a couple of weeks ago.

Well. I completed the rock ring around the Flame Bush!
July 30th-August 14th