CloverHillCrawler
Well-known member
Yeah, and one thing that I'm not going to do is go back to the Dragon or even around the Smoky Mountains during the midweek of October again, there were too many people. I even had someone try to pick pocket me at Clingmans Dome, the only thing is that I have a thin wallet in my front pocket, and in my back pocket was my handkerchief, which was folded four ways so that it looked like a wallet, all they got was a snotty rag.
From now on, I'm staying around the back of the Dragon around Marion and Tazewell, and I've been wanting to do what I think it's called the Highland Scenic Parkway in West Virginia. I've been at least in the back of the Dragon around the same time of year and I didn't have to deal with all the people. I left my room yesterday at 4:30 in the morning to go up to the area. There were already backups on 321, which I don't understand because there's nothing to look at when it's dark. I finally made it up to the top around about 8:30 or 9:00 I think. Then I headed off the mountain to Maggie Valley, and that's where everything went to hell in a handbasket. I still have not slept. I couldn't take the Dragon back over to Dragon City with a 15 ft moving truck, this toy hauler, so I had to go down 74 past 129 about 20 mi or so to 294, then take that back up to 68 through Tellico Plains to 411, and then back around 72 to Dragon City. I finally got in there a little bit after 11:00 last night and picked up my things. I have another story to tell about Dragon City, but I'll do that when I get back and have more time. I'm trying to catch a cat nap right now at Buc-ee's and it's 8:00 am, so I've been up now for 28 hours straight.
I'm not even going to try to unload the F3 until after I get some sleep. It was real sketchy loading it. I had to do it in Reverse and with the wheel width compared to the ramp width, there was about two to three inches hanging on the inside of each tire, so there was no room for error. I had to back up and go back down a couple of times to get it aligned properly, luckily the Reverse gear worked to help, but my rear Vredstein is on its end of life and I was planning on changing that out this winter, so it wouldn't keep traction. Leon from U-hall helped me out yesterday, and I'd have a real good story about him which I'll tell later also, when I have more time. If it wasn't for him, none of this would of happened to get me home. After I finished up with Leon on the way to Dragon City, I stopped at Wally World on 74 and picked up some new ratchet straps, as the other straps were really too long and old and were loosening up, so I got them cleaned up before going out on the highway and having the State troopers get upset about all the tie downs flopping around.
Getting ready to leave Buc-ee's now and finish the truck back home. I'll have about 32 to 35 hours without sleep by then.
