Day 2 - 6/4 - Roan Mountain to Nolin Lake State Park

June 04, 2023

After a few more middle of the night rain showers, we woke up to sunny skies. With the rays of sunshine sneaking through the canopy and the sounds of birds, especially woodpeckers, it sure felt like a great way to wake up.

Since we were near the Blue Ridge Mountains, we thought we would take advantage of seeing the sights. So we had a quick breakfast of oatmeal before heading out to see the sights of the mountains. We drove over to the park headquarters, saw some raptors, and then headed up the hills. It didn't take us long before we were gifted with some magnificent mountain views.

We then proceeded to the Rhododendron gardens. While they were still a week or two away from full bloom, it was still a great place to hike. We were at 6,000+ feet so hiking was a bit of a challenge. At the end of the trail was the overlook, but with the Cloudland trail living up to its name, the view wasn't so spectacular.

It was getting close to checkout and so we headed back down into the valley and stopped briefly at the river before heading to camp. As we stood by the river with the mountain water flowing by, we could almost feel our blood pressure dropping. It was just so peaceful.

From there, we started towards Kentucky. The first three quarters of the drive were easy and included some time on the Kentucky parkway which was laughably devoid of cars. We also ended up unexpectedly crossing into Virginia on our way through the Cumberland Pass. Bonus state!

Our late-ish start was starting to catch up with us and so we decided to stop for some dinner. We picked up some Cook Out and heading to a roadside park in Columbia, Kentucky. There we met an incredibly friendly city worker who told us all about the park and made us feel so at home. Great place to visit. Unfortunately, we discovered that the tool box door had come loose. Not knowing how to fix it out there, we just removed it and decided to deal with it later. Two days, two maintenance issues - this isn't a great trend.

From there we embarked on our last quarter of the drive. It was a great thing that we had the opportunity to drop the blood pressure earlier in the day because the drive over to Nolin Lake was anything but relaxing. Google Map's routing took us through a LOT of backcountry roads. We ended up on roads that didn't even have a middle stripe. Not so fun with a big trailer.

Eventually we arrived at camp. It was a nice camp and we arrived right near sunset. The sun set while we were setting up camp, but it still looked amazing. Surprisingly, there were still embers in the fire pit so we decided to use them for a campfire before bed.