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Welcome to Buccees the clerk says at Buccees in St. Augustin. To his reply , I say I never left.
I have had a crazy day and half. About 38 hours or so ago it started a Smoky Mountain rain and didn't stop until yesterday afternoon.
Helene flooded our towns and fields. I woke up yesterday pensive about our flight to Orlando. But before I depart my daughter is calling me in panic as her house in Waynesville is being surrounded by a tiny creek that is now a roaring tempest of brown flood water. I calm her down and she evacuates safely with her husband and dogs to our place in Cullowhee.
Once she is at our place we gather our backpacks and head to the Asheville airport. The allegiant app says the flight is on time. Helene is still not here yet. It's windy and raining. I go by my Dillsboro store to check on things and Front Street is being invaded by Scott's Creek . Our store should be OK.
We make our way to the airport and once there I notice the red radar antenna not rotating . I say nothing to my wife Tonya. We park in the garage and go through security in a largely empty airport. We grab a ridiculous airport lunch. Flight departs at 2.
Then we here an announcement that the airport lost power a few hours ago and they can't restart the ground control and flights are being canceled including ours to Sanford.
So, we just head out and get in our 4Runner and head to Orlando. It's around 1 pm. We get on I 26 and where Cane Creek goes under the interstate just past the airport and before Fletcher it is like an ocean. It's flooded everywhere. Both sides of 26 at least a mile wide and the river is only being held off the highway by the concrete Jersey Barriers, but as we cross the water over tops the barriers and I 26 is being engulfed by flood waters.
We get to higher ground up past Fletcher for about a mile then the road comes to a halt. We sit for an hour or so only to be told I 26 is closed ahead to due flooding. So we turn around and head to Fletcher . We eventually get there and attempt to take US 25 to Hendersonville. Can't it's underwater as if it is lake. We head to Fletcher thinking we can back track to Asheville, but we can't. It too is now part of the inland gulf of Cane Creek.
We hold up at Fletcher Animal clinic for another hour when a NCDOT says I 26 west bound us open. We take it. It's our way off the island we find ourselves. We head back to Asheville, to Waynesville, back home to Dillsboro.
Tonya at this point wants to call it. It's 4:30 and I am like , Did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? No. Did Clark Griswald give up his quest to Wally World ? No. So, we press on. We head down 441 to Clayton , Georgia.
In Clayton we stop by Chick Fil A because it's open! We then pick up US 76 head through the Chattahoochee National Forest as we make our way to I-85. But alas we get to Chatooga River and get this, the bridge is out. That's right ,the river took the bridge out. Tonya is like let's just call it Clarke. She was miserable and maybe I should have heeded her cry of mercy .
I ask the fire fighter is there a close way around with another bridge? He said go up 5 clicks to Cobble Bridge Road . I say sure. We turn down this backwoods SC road and it's a scene from Twister. There are literally trees overhead and across power lines. We weaving in and out and under downed trees and power lines for a couple of miles.
It's now around 7 PM and we get to 85 head north to Greenville to avoid 75 south bound where Helene did her damage . We pick up 385 and take it to I 26 eastbound . We start calling hotels in Orangeburg. Nope, well we get a reservation at a Holiday Inn Exoress only to get there to be told they are sold out. We get back on the road. Call ahead to Walterboro, Savanah, Brunswick , Kingsland , Jacksonville, and St. Augustine. There is not a single hotel with any rooms available to rent. We'll there was one according to Choice Hotels app and it was a darkened out of business Econo Lodge off of Exit 58 in Georgia. ECONO crack house more like it.
So, we stop in St. Augustine for fuel at Buccees . It's 2 AM and Tonya says , let's just sleep in the car here at Buccees. They have great food, security and really nice bathrooms. So, that's what we do. We get about 3.5 hours of car sleep.
We wake up and potty like a rock star. Grab a croissant sandwich and write this post. We are headed to our son's place in Oviedo where we will shower and head to campus for the Big Game Kick. At one point Tonya said the UCF Knights better be F-ing bringing it because we the sure hell are.
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