Driving the Blue Ridge Parkway

North Carolina Travelog #22
Atop the Pisgah Mountains · Tue, 25 Aug 2026. 10:15am.

Our travels on Day 2 from Brevard, NC continue with a turn onto the Blue Ridge Parkway.



"Wait, continue?" you may ask. Right! I skipped a blog or two that I'll come back around to later. We started this morning with a visit to Looking Glass Falls near town, then a bust at Barnett Branch Falls. The road to the trailhead was closed and parts of the trail are closed for repair. But we have a lot of other waterfalls on our list for today so we're not sweating that one closure.

Even with having lots of waterfalls on our agenda we're taking the time to drive the scenic route, the Blue Ridge Parkway. I discovered the wisdom of driving the parkway two years ago when we visited a different part of western NC's mountains. The parkway is lower speed, with limits between 35-45mph, and it winds around along the mountain crest, but it's just so mellow that it's worth it. There are no stop signs, no traffic lights, no billboards, just natural beauty for hundreds of miles. And compared to going around the mountain, it's ultimately not that much slower.



How far are we driving on the parkway today? All the way. The parkway runs an astonishing 469 miles through Virginia and North Carolina. Okay, we're not going all the way all the way. But we are driving from the US-267 junction above Brevard to the parkway's southern terminus at Great Smoky Mountains National Park— next to the Cherokee reservation, where we're planning to wrap up our day today.



Within a mile or two of turning onto the parkway we're already finding things of interest. Part of the joy of driving the parkway is that there's a scenic overlook every mile or two. This one, Cherry Cove, offers a view of Looking Glass Rock from above. We could only glimpse bits of Looking Glass Rock through the trees when we were at Looking Glass Falls earlier this morning. Now we can see it more clearly.



As you can see here, it totally looks like a looking glass. I mean, if you're a rock, this is what you see in the mirror every day. 🤣

In beauty I walk. Even when I drive.

Waterfalls Day 2 Wrapup. Cherokee Bust.

North Carolina Travelog #29
Back in Brevard · Tue, 25 Aug 2026. 9pm.

Whew, it's been a busy day today. We've hiked six waterfalls— and tried to hike a few more, where either we found the trail was closed or we couldn't find the trail at all! And in between and around that hiking I've logged 210 miles of driving.

Our plan for the day was to drive west toward the Cherokee native peoples' area, to visit a native village while there, and of course hike lots of waterfalls while getting there. We drove the Blue Ridge Parkway for much of the trip there, stopping at:

• Looking Glass Falls... which was just a hop-out, not a hike
• Barnett Branch Falls... where the road and part of the trail were closed for maintenance. We bailed.
• Bubbling Spring Falls... where there were no signs and really not even a trail. We bailed.
• Wildcat Falls... where the trailhead was completely unmarked but we did find it and hike!
• Sunburst Falls... another mostly hop-out spot
• Soco Falls, on Cherokee land
• Mingo Falls, also on Cherokee land
• Woodfin Falls

We drove through the town of Cherokee, NC after hiking Mingo Falls. By then it was about 4:30pm and it seemed like everything legitimately educational about Cherokee people was closed for the day. All that was still open were bars, cannabis shops— OMG, weed seems to be like the #2 industry in Cherokee— and gaudy tourist-trap gift shops peddling the same vaguely "Indian" crafts you see at pretty much every "Indian crafts" gift shop from coast to coast.

It's sad because I remember visiting Cherokee, NC as a child, and my parents quietly steering us away from the gaudy crap sellers and head shops (plus, back then weed wasn't legal and most native communities were officially very anti-drug) and toward one of the educational spots. 8 year old me loved it. I'm sure 50+ year old me would've loved it again. For example, 50+ year old me has questions like, "The Cherokee use a written language... when was that developed?" I'd thought I learned decades ago that the idea of written language was taught to them by European settlers, but that seems not the case for the Cherokee as their writing is apparently syllable-based and doesn't use our alphabet. Perhaps I'm getting my wires crossed with the Five Nations peoples. Questions! And now I'll have to go learn about the Cherokee on Wikipedia. 😞

After busting out in Cherokee we finished up our hiking goals for the day with Woodfin Falls, the last one on the list. Then we plotted a route home... and decided that rather than drive the Parkway again we'd go down the mountain, to civilization, and get some dinner at a restaurant. Yes, we were hungry enough to want to dine out for dinner! No microwaved food in the room tonight like the past two nights.

But now we are back at the room. We got back just before dark, around 8:30. And we did stop at the grocery store again to buy more frozen food... for breakfast in the morning and probably dinner tomorrow night! 🤣

Kill Your TV? Maybe Just Unplug the Spy.

North Carolina Travelog #20½
At the hotel · Mon, 24 Aug 2026. 10pm.

When I was young there was slogan going around, "Kill your TV". It was like a meme before we had memes. Or even an internet on which to share them. Instead things went viral based on car stickers and word of mouth. And there were a decent number of bumperstickers with the slogan "Kill your TV".

A bit of research today shows that the slogan started in 1979 when a self-styled social critic printed up his first batch of bumperstickers. That tracks as I first recall seeing it around 1982 or so. Given the technology of the 1970s and 80s, yeah, it took years for something to go viral. And I don't recall seeing it much after the late 1980s. It seemed to have played itself out.

Why am I thinking about this again now? And why have I tagged this journal entry (see top) as part of my North Carolina trip? It's because the TV in my hotel room might be spying on me.



When we checked in on Sunday night the TV was on, in screensaver mode. I'm accustomed to hotels using their TVs to display welcome information, customized with my name, when I arrived. So I turned it off. Except pressing the power button didn't turn it off, it turned it on. It turned it more on. I turned it off-off... or so I thought.

Monday when we came back to the room, the TV was on again, in screensaver mode. We had the DND sign on the door, so nobody from housekeeping should have entered the room to muck with it. The TV turned itself on.

This time I didn't just turn it off-off, I unplugged the fucker. Why? Because I'm concerned it's a spy.

TVs and entertainment devices have had spy capabilities for several years now. It takes the form of cameras, microphones, and millimeter wave ("radar") sensors that can determine the number, size, and location of people in the room. Consumer backlash has driven companies to remove cameras and mics from most TVs, but some high-end models still have them— and even mid-range models from a few years ago were built with them.

"Any TV with a remote control is always 'On'" you might try to mansplain to me. Save your man-breath. I'm a goddamn engineer. I know what trickle power is and how it's used. I also know what the limits of technology have been over time and that it requires a meaningful uplink for spy devices to work.

My nearly 20 year old TV at home predates spy hardware and "intelligent" functions that rely on it. More critically, it does not have an uplink. I'm not worried about my older-tech HDTV at home. But the TV in this room does have a network cable in it. And the ability to be turned on remotely. So fuck it, I'mma kill this TV. I'm going to strangle it to death by depriving it of electricity.