South Carolina – Page 29 – Random Connections

Nation’s Bakery

January 16, 2010 Tom 6 Comments

Restaurants

NOTE: This restaurant location has closed. The restaurant has moved to Inman, SC, and a Mexican restaurant has opened in this location.

It started with a box of cookies…

A new bakery opened just down the road in Lyman. Its signs touting “gourmet cuisine” have been taunting me for the past couple of months. I’ve even stopped by twice, only to be told that they were not yet ready to serve lunch, but soon… The smells of fresh-baked goods made it hard to walk out the door unsatisfied.

Then this morning one of my tech team brought a selection of cookies from Nations Bakery and told me that they were now open for lunch. The cookies were excellent, and I knew I had to give this place a try.

Background

Once upon a time this used to be a popular ice cream shop. Many years later it found new life as Don Pedro’s, a Mexican restaurant with fairly good food, but a scary interior. It didn’t fare so well, and the building has sat empty for the past couple of years.

As previously mentioned, work began remodeling the empty restaurant a couple of months ago. The bakery opened first, and the restaurant opened just after Christmas.

Warrior Mountain

January 12, 2010 Tom 3 Comments

Local

Growing up in the little two of Gray Court, SC, there were two prominent geographical landmarks that always fascinated me. Two small monadnocks, the Big Knob and Little Knob, dominated the landscape just three miles south of the town. As a child I was fascinated with geology, especially volcanoes. I imagined that these small mountains … Read More “Warrior Mountain” »

Exploring L. A. (Lower Anderson)

November 29, 2009 Tom No Comments

Local, Photography

I hadn’t been out on a photo ramble in a long time. So, Saturday morning I grabbed my cameras and headed out. I only had a vague target in mind (as usual). I knew I wanted rural scenery so I could capture some old farm houses. I wanted to try some new post-processing techniques. My route took me down across Southern Greenville County and finally into Lower Anderson.

This time of year the lighting is always oblique. You don’t have to wait until the “golden hours” just after sunrise or right before sunset to get some interesting shots. The day was clear and bright, and it looked like the lighting would produce some interesting shots.

My first stop was in Connestee at McBee Chapel (Map). I had photographed it many times before, but I thought I would see what other angles I could bring to it. I don’t think they are still having regular services here, but I would love to attend one when they have a special service.

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November 2, 2009 Tom 1 Comment

Music

In case your Cyrillic is rusty, the title of this post is from Psalm 104, “Praise the Lord, O My Soul”, and is one of the pieces that make up part of Rachmaninoff’s All-Night Vigil. This weekend we performed the piece with the Greenville Chorale on Sunday afternoon at First Baptist Church.

This was a real challenge. The music itself wasn’t so hard, but there was so much of it. We did in an hour what we normally stretch out over two, when you add in soloists and orchestra. Throw in a layer of very difficult language, and you have a nearly impossible task.

I had done parts of the Vespers before, so I was somewhat familiar with the music. The sixth movement is the “Hail Mary” section, and I had done it several times with both the Latin Ave Maria text and the Russian. Even so, I found myself stumbling over music and text, even in the final performance.

Paddling South Carolina’s Rivers

October 28, 2009 Tom 22 Comments

Geocaching and Maps, Paddling

File – Paddling South Carolina Rivers (KMZ, 1.5 MB)

Google Earth has been one of the best resources for planning river kayaking trips, especially on new routes with which I’m not familiar. I’ll scan the route, locate put-in and take-out points, and put placemarks for certain landmarks such as rapids, powerlines, bridges, tributaries, or other interesting locations along the way. I would then use GPS Babel to convert my Google Earth files to GPX files then upload the data to my GPS so I would have it with me on the paddling trip.

Pretty soon I had a nice little collection of river trips in Google Earth. I began to wonder if anyone else was doing this. It seemed like it would be an excellent resource. There are some excellent books out there, such as Able and Horman’s Paddling South Carolina, and while the maps in these resources are fine for giving driving directions, there is no GPS information. SCTrails.net has started putting Lat/Long coordinates for some of their paddling trails, but not for all of them. So, I decided to make my own collection.

Autumn Paddle on the Enoree

October 25, 2009 Tom No Comments

Paddling

Kayakers – 3

Weatherman – 0

This makes three trips in a row where there was an iffy weather forecast. In each case, if we had followed The Weather Channel’s advice and canceled the trip, we would have missed out on a fantastic day of paddling. You’ve got to pay attention to the weather, but a 60% chance of rain doesn’t necessarily mean a bad day on the river.

Following on the heels of our last successful Enoree trip, David and Rick wanted to paddle another stretch of the river. They had done some scouting, and found a stretch starting at Whitmire that had great river access points. Add to that the fact that David had a new kayak to try out, and we had to put together another trip.

This was going to be a much smaller group than last time. Since the paddle route was longer, this just made sense. We would be joined by Dave W, a good friend of Rick and David’s, bringing our number to four.

Two Rivers for the Price of One

October 11, 2009 Tom No Comments

Paddling

This time our Lowcountry Unfiltered group got two rivers for the price of one, plus a few ghosts and goblins thrown in for good measure. On Saturday we paddled a portion of the Enoree River to its confluence with the Broad River, then down to our take-out at Strother’s Landing.

Planning this trip proved to be a challenge. The group wanted to paddle an Upstate river, but didn’t have the boats for whitewater. There was also the matter of distance. These guys would be driving for 3-4 hours just to get here, so the paddling trip couldn’t be too long. If they’re driving that far, then the trip needs to be worthwhile, and not a drag through the mud.

My first plan was to paddle a stretch of the Tyger River. It had all the elements I needed – it was remote, full of history, and even a ghost story. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much water when Bob and I paddled it last month. It was more of a muddy hike while dragging boats.

Fortunately, I was able to find a suitable route. We would put in at Keitt’s Bridge on the Enoree near Maybinton and float to its confluence with the Broad River, then paddle down to Strother’s Landing at the Highway 34 Bridge. According to Google Earth, the route would be about 7 miles. This route takes us through Sumter National Forest, so it’s suitable remote, and there’s even a ghost story – The Hound of Goshen.

Move Over Lizard Man- Bigfoot’s in Town

September 29, 2009 Tom No Comments

Weirdness

South Carolina’s most famous cryptid is the Lizard Man of Scape Ore Swamp in Lee County. With the first reported sighting in 1988, the Lizard Man has since become an unofficial mascot of the Lowcountry swamp lands. However, the Lizard Man isn’t the only mythical critter inhabiting the remote areas of our state. I was … Read More “Move Over Lizard Man- Bigfoot’s in Town” »

Scouting the Tyger

September 21, 2009 Tom 3 Comments

Paddling

Our friends from Lowcountry Unfiltered wanted to do an Upstate River this fall. Since I’m the only one in the area that regularly paddles with them, I was tasked with finding a suitable trip. I had scouted the put-in and take-out points on a section of the Tyger River that flows through Sumter National Forest, and thought it might make a good trip. Today Bob Donnan and I scouted the section to see if it would, indeed, be a good paddle. Long story short – it wasn’t. However, it was a good day on the river, and that is always better than a day doing just about anything else.

I had my doubts about this trip. It had been raining all weekend, and when I got up Sunday morning there were flash flood warnings for Oconee County. However, I had the boats and gear already loaded onto the truck, and a phone call to Bob reported that they hadn’t received much rain. We decided to head on down to the river and check out conditions before committing to the trip.

I met Bob at our rendezvous point and we drove to the put-in at the Rose Hill Boat Ramp. Both of us remarked that this area seems “ancient”. There is very little development, and it seems remote. Sumter National Forest covers most of the region, and large hunt clubs have bought up huge tracts of land. The area seems almost mystical, as if just about anything beyond the realm of reality could happen.

LDHS Class of 1979 Reunion

September 14, 2009 Tom No Comments

Miscellaneous

This past weekend Laura and I attended the 30th reunion of my high school graduating class. It was the first time that I had seen many of these folks since we had graduated. It was great re-connecting with these folks.

About 100 people attended the event – that number including both alumni and spouses. You could pick out the non-alumni spouses very easily. They were usually the ones sitting in a corner off to a side, while the rest of us laughed and caught up.