Friday, March 5, 2010

Highlands, North Carolina


David and I traveled to North Carolina to deliver his artwork to Highlands. It wouldn't be a trip in the pumpkin if something didn't go wrong... Above, the pumpkin is pictured in it's "ditch spot" on the side of the highway in Commerce, Georgia. We later grew to dislike Commerce immensely... more on that to follow... Our gas gauge doesn't work and unfortunately we pushed it too far.
I stayed with the car while David walked with the gas can - what a gentleman. :) While sitting on the side of the road, a guy pulled over next to me. Feeling concerned, I yelled to him "Thank you, but my fiance is already walking with the gas can - we have it under control... Thank you!" The guy nodded and got back into his car. I was glad to have kept him 30 feet away from me, since "you just never know in this day and age." It couldn't have been five minutes later that this guy returned - with David and the full gas can in the car with him. He gave a "God bless you" and was on his way. Okay, so I was wrong about judging the guy as "sketchy".. but we've all watched the news.


In our Pumpkin travels we always meet really cool folks who have their own stories of Westphalia ownership. It almost always starts out with "Are you guys the ones in that VW?". While strolling through Ace Hardware in Highlands, taking advantage of a brown bag sale, we met our new friend Peter. Peter drove a Westphalia in the early 70s (if memory serves accurate) while working as a youth minister. His Westie had cartoon characters painted on the side. He continued traveling in it with his family, and we loved a story he recounted about taking a photo of his small children on a camping trip, diaper-clad, in front of his cartoon-covered Westie. It's always so awesome to watch people get that far-away look as the recall their great memories from their Westphalia days.


Here we have Peter with an Ace coworker, who has a vintage VW bug. They both came out to inspect the Westie and share a smile. Awesome people!



And then on the ride back... the accelerator broke... in Commerce, Georgia. In total McGuyver fashion, I pulled out a clear plastic ponytail holder to pull back my hair, but realized that we could use it to fasten the two pieces that were broken. It held all the way home.. with the exception of one slip outside of Conyers on the interstate. But we reattached the ponytail holder and were on our way!

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