Wobbly Bonk sans Brad Pitt
Greetings from Wobbly Bonk! (otherwise known, on saner maps of North Carolina, as Rocky Mount (ok, so we got a bit giggly last night)). Day three of our Great American Road Trip has just dawned, and we’ve ticked almost all the boxes of on our road trip list: we’ve stayed in a seedy motel (ok, so it’s actually a not at all seedy Best Western, but it is a motel), we’ve crossed several state lines (ok, so not while being pursued by the police, but we did get passed by a police car complete with flashing lights and sirens at one point on the road, so we reckon that counts), and we’ve been to a convenience store (ok, so we didn’t actually rob one like you’re supposed to according to all the movies, but Buffra thinks she might have gone over the speed limit once or twice, so we decided that was sufficient law breaking for one trip). All we need now is to pick up Brad Pitt, and we’ve had the perfect movie version of a road trip.
Unfortunately, Wobbly Bonk, despite the promising name, seems sadly lacking in Brad Pitts, and the receptionist at the motel told us she’d never seen him lurking around here, so we might be out of luck on that count. But otherwise a successful trip so far 🙂 And though we might not have met Brad, we did meet CRRCookie, ResQGeek, and LilGrover when we stopped to pick up Otakuu in Manassas yesterday. Actually, I think meeting them was much more fun than meeting Brad would have been 🙂
It rained for almost the entire trip yesterday, so sightseeing was a bit limited, but although we missed out on the grand views and sweeping vistas, there was plenty to see at closer range. We mostly stayed off the interstates, which meant we saw a lot more than we would have otherwise, passing through cute little towns that were exactly as you imagine small town America to be, plus other settlements that were less picture-perfect, but still just as interesting, filled with rundown shacks and “trailers”. Then there were the huge houses with pillared porches (we’re definitely in the South now), proper red brick schools, log cabins tucked among the trees, and a million other “ooh, look at that” moments. We drove across the Appalachians, along roads lined with dogwoods and redbuds, bright splashes of colour amongst the bright green of the new spring growth, and watched the season advance as we came further south, until last night we began to spot swampland on the sides of the road, deep dark pools among the trees floating with weed, that looked just right to be the home of an alligator or two. We’ve seen turkey buzzards, and a heron, and the squashed remains of the odd opossum (no better at avoiding cars than their southern cousins, it seems), but the only sign so far of larger fauna have been the deer lying dead by the side of the road (those warning signs with the outline of a leaping deer are accurate, it seems). We’ve driven through Ohio, West Virginia (three times! It’s a very strangely shaped state), Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and now North Carolina. We’re having fun!