We thoroughly enjoyed getting away for a week last week.  As we do most years, we spent time in Saluda, NC, enjoying the mountains, which turns out to be a pandemic-friendly setting.  We don't typically eat out much when we're there, so we didn't miss that (we did eat outdoors at one of our favorite breweries, where the closest table was twenty-five feet away!).  And despite being busy season for tourists, we really didn't encounter many people on the trails we used.  Lest you think we're like so many of the tourists who seem to be visiting St. Simons, we took our masks everywhere and followed distancing guidelines.  There too, it seems to be rare, at least based on the people that thanked us for doing it.  Apparently, people think taking a vacation means taking a vacation from the pandemic.  It doesn't work that way, but I digress.

 

This was the first year we were able to mountain bike as a family.  Our girls both learned to ride since we moved to Georgia, but mountain biking doesn't really offer much around here.  In fact, these were the first "real hills" our kids have had to manage since they lost their training wheels.  I grew up on hills, literally.  My entire elementary school era involved riding uphill from our home that was situated in a small valley between two steep hills.  If you didn't/couldn't ride hills, you didn't go anywhere.