A Hard Rain Is Gonna Fall

Actually, hard rain did fall for several days the week before last, and everywhere we looked there was water. Where usually there is a trickle of water in the little stream beside Manville Road, waterfalls appeared, tumbling over mossy rocks, and echoing through the hills like a raging river. All of these photos were taken right along Manville Road and Copper Creek Road - well, we did make a quick trip up Double Ford Road so Lexi and Cait could have a look at their swimmng hole. It looked a lot different last week. Above, near Smith's Chapel

This is near the top of the bluff where Tom and I had our big snow adventure.

This is farther down the bluff

This is the stream that comes down from Peters Hollow and crosses under the road at the Gooseneck. Tom and I have hiked up here several times looking for the Peters-McDavid Cemetery with no luck so far. Next time we're going to attack it from another route.

This is the dam at Copper Creek at the bridge. Usually you can see about 4-5 feet of the dam itself. One day after all the rain, the creek was running level over the dam, and only the churning water showed the dam was there. This photo was taken a day or so after that.

We had never noticed the stream behind this pretty old barn on Copper Creek Road. The design on the barn is a quilting pattern, and lots of the barns in Scott County sport them.

This is the first ford on Double Ford Road and usually it's an easy little drive across Copper Creek at this point. But not on the day we took this picture. There are pictures in an earlier post of our Craley granddaughters tubing here in the summer.

I promised I'd tell you our Snowy Bluff Adventure......

We moved into our new house on a Saturday in early December. My cousin, Randy Penley, and his wife, Linda, came to help us. A light snow was falling, and after two trips the men called a halt, as the road was getting covered. Randy and Linda headed for home, and Tom and I watched the snow falling. We saw three V-DOT trucks go by spreading salt, cinders or stone, and the road in front of our house looked pretty good.

Now the Gate City Christmas Parade was scheduled for that night at 7 o'clock, and I had my heart set on going. Nothing daunts Tom, and as we knew the trucks had been working on the road, we ventured forth in the van. There was some snow on the road, nothing too bad, and we made it at least five miles, almost to Smith's Chapel, without any trouble at all. Right below the church we passed a couple walking down the bluff.

"Did you come up the bluff?" the man asked incredulously. "Yes," we said. "Did you have any trouble," he asked. "No, none at all," we said. "Well, they're not gonna let you go any further, there's a state police car over the bank," he said. "Uh-oh," we said.

Sure enough, a few yards further on, there were people in the road with flashing lights, and we could see a state police car standing almost perpendicular with its front end down in the little ravine at the first waterfall picture above. (We learned later that the police car was on top of another car that had already gone over the bank. Guess he was coming to, ahem, help...)

So now we were stopped in the middle of a snowy road on a pretty good incline with no place to go but back down. Tom put the car in reverse and at that moment, we spun around 180 degrees so we were suddenly facing down the hill. "I tried that," Tom said. I think I said, "Oh boy."

We passed the folks who were walking and offered them a ride. "No thanks," said the man. "I've lived here my whole life, and I'd just as soon walk down the bluff in weather like this." This time I know I said, "Oh boy."

Having no choice, we began to inch our way back down the bluff, knowing that going down was going to be trickier than going up. Thankfully, we got past the point where there is no guardrail, which is a good thing, because just about as soon as we were at the guardrail, we spun around again smashing into the guardrail, and ended up with our back bumper stuck on the guardrail. We slid a few more feet, scraping all the way.

At this point Tom (my hero) told me to get out of the car as he was going to try to get it off of the guardrail. My first thought was, no way, if we go down, honey, we're going down together! But then I came to my senses. The drop was not more than maybe 30 ft., lots of trees to stop the car, he had a seatbelt and an airbag, and chances are he wouldn't be hurt even if the van did crash trough the guardrail.

And, I would be standing safely in the road, ready to scream for help. So, with one last lingering look at my brave, brave boy, I climbed out.

A few more feet of scraping, and Tom had yanked that old bumper free. It was even still attached to the car. Whew.

I climbed back in and we inched our way along, trying to stay in the rough right beside the guardrail. We stopped to collect ourselves and plan our strategy before attempting the gooseneck which curves sharply to the right.

Tom smoked a pipe. I took deep breaths. And, thank the Lord, a V-Dot truck came by, spreading cinders. We followed him down through the gooseneck without any trouble and slowly made our way home.

Naturally, as we told this story, the natives thought we were crazy to attempt the bluff in the snow. But, we were innocent! We were naive! We didn't know the perils of the bluff. We saw V-Dot trucks and thought, naturally, that all must be well.

But now we know. At the first snowflake we look at each other and say, "Guess we're not going anywhere today!" And so we sit and watch the flurries fall, maybe tip-toeing out on the front walk with a broom, but no further. It'll be a cold day in December before we venture out towards the bluff again on a snowy day. We've learned our lesson. Lost our innocence. And now we know to stay home when it snows on the mountain.

And, of course, the parade was cancelled.