Visit to Dooley-land and returning to Denmark
The time for my return home approached. I had decided to make a video about places connected to the Tom Dooley case for my YouTube channel: DaddySage, so Monday would be used for that. On Tuesday I was going home, but I had agreed that on the way to the airport I would visit TV producer Carl White in his studio in North Wilkesboro, so that we could have a cup of coffee together and meet each other again, which we had not done since 2019. The previous day I had received an email from British Airways that my flight from London to Copenhagen at 12.15 PM had been canceled and that I had been rebooked to one that was supposed to leave at 8.15 PM. It did bother me some, because then I would have to wait 11 hours in London, but there was really nothing I could do about it. What bothered me even more was when my phone rang at 3 at night. It was Expedia, through which I had bought the trip, which partly wanted to tell me the same, partly wanted to rebook. With the departure with British Airways, I would be in Copenhagen at 11.15 PM, but they could instead offer me that I could be in Denmark as early as 9.15. However, that would require me to fly from London to Brussels and from there on to Oslo and then to Copenhagen. With little time to "change" and triple the risk of the luggage disappearing along the way, I politely declined this offer and chose to wait in London.
Visit to Tom Dooley-land
Low hanging clouds over Brushy Mountains, seen from Yadkin Valley
As usual, I started with breakfast in the house, and then I drove around to the places in the area that were connected to the Tom Dooley story and the murder of Laura Foster in 1866. Along the way on my tour, I visited and filmed, among other things, Tom Dooley's grave and Laura Foster's grave (at a distance as there is an electric fence around the field where it is located). The area where Ann Melton is buried has been sold and signs have been put up saying "No trespassing", and also a gate which was open, but I chose not to defy the signs. A couple of cemeteries or three, where some of those implicated are buried, also joined the tour, as did an attempt to show both the place where Ann and James Melton lived, as well as Bates Place, where the murder was committed, but unfortunately also these places today are on private land, so I could only film from a distance.
When there was no more to
film in the area, I headed for Wilkesboro, where the prison where Dooley was
held from July to October 1866 was recorded. From there on to Statesville, where
there is not much left to see, but I could show the place where the prison once
stood. Today there are offices for an investment company. Also, a few of the
places that are laid out as the place where the gallows stood on May 1, 1868
were immortalized. If you are interested in watching the video, there is a link
to it here:
A visit to places connected to the Tom Dooley Case.
In fact, the only place connected to the case that I didn't visit was the small
town of Pandora, where Tom was eventually arrested. However, this one is a good
distance inside Tennessee, so I opted out of it. Instead, I included a photo of
a mural in Mountain City, Tennessee that illustrates the event. I had taken that
photo a few days earlier.
When I finished in Statesville, I headed for Hickory, where I visited a Barnes &
Noble bookstore: Here I bought a few books; one that I directly came to get, and
one that I just "stumbled upon" on my way through the store. From there I then
headed for Lenoir and on back to the house, with a single stop at Food Lion to
stock up on the last evening meal of the trip, which was eaten in the kitchen as
usual, while the evening coffee was once again taken on the veranda.
A podcast and trip home
It had become time to go home, but since my flight wasn't due to depart from Charlotte-Douglas International Airport until around 8.30 PM, I had plenty of time, so I didn't rush out the door, but cleaned up thoroughly and carried my garbage bags to the outside garbagr before leaving. I also drank morning coffee while I packed the last things in my suitcase. When I was ready, I drove around a bit to "say goodbye" to the area. Not the same places I had been the day before, but other places I had visited on previous occasions. Then I headed for North Wilkesboro to have coffee with Carl White. However, it was not how it went. I gave him a copy of my book, "Who killed Laura Foster?" and that immediately made him decide to do a podcast for his "Life in the Carolinas" podcast site. "Life in the Carolinas" is usually a TV show that, funnily enough, is about life in the two Carolinas. The show is "syndicated"; that is to say, it is shown on several nationwide channels, often as so-called "filler". This means that it is used if there is a gap between two other broadcasts. The podcast can be found on the broadcast's website, but can also be found on YouTube. We chatted for an hour, and after editing it came to approx. 40 minute broadcast which can be heard (and seen) here: "Who killed Laura Foster? Life in the Carolinas Podcast". In fact, I was also in the very first podcast that Carl ever made. It was in 2018, and the story can be read in the article A Lunch, a podcast and a thunderstorm from that year. There was no coffee, but instead Carl sent for lunch and here I got an excellent BBQ sandwich with pulled pork and the vinegar based dressing that is used in large parts of North Carolina, and which I like very much. Excellent!
Art on the gate wall at Charlotte-Douglas Airport. After four hours looking at it. I mastered the details of the painting.
After the meal, I said goodbye
to Carl, and headed for Charlotte and the airport, where I arrived already
around 3 PM, so when I had returned the car, checked in and gotten through
security, it was only 4 pm. With my Business Class ticket, I had lounge access,
but unfortunately there are no lounges in this particular small airport, so I
walked out to the gate, where I bought some water and a couple of sandwiches in
a small kiosk, and then otherwise sat down to wait while I entertained myself
with a few games on the tablet, and then otherwise surfed the web a bit and read
an e-book, I had brought with me. It wasn't the most comfortable chair for a
four hour wait, but I survived. The trip across the Atlantic was flown by
American Airlines, who has some quite comfortable Business Class seats. There is
nothing to tell about the trip itself; it was as dull as most of its kind. We
arrived in London at 8.45 AM, and once I had been transported from Terminal 3 to
Terminal 5 and passed through security once more, I went to the British Airways
lounge, where I stayed for the next almost 11 hours before I had to go to the
gate. In the lounge they have had a new system since the last time I was there.
You no longer had to pick up food yourself, but had to download an app, which
you then used to order, and then the food was brought to the table (but not
bread, coffee and drinks - you still had to get those items yourself) .
The flight was on time, and at 11.15 PM we landed in Copenhagen Airport, where
it didn't take long to get the luggage, and Tim was waiting outside to drive me
home, and so the Easter holiday was over.
In the same way as when I'm on a trip with Tim, on this trip I had also counted
the usual trucks that I met along the way, but since I hadn't driven much on the
freeway, it didn't turn out to be that many. The winner was J.B. Hunt, who
started it all back in 2004, but I had only seen 24 of them. Number 2 was
Schneider National with 20. Swift followed with 6, Estes, Werner and Knight each
with 5, and as the icing on the cake, C.R. England with a single sighting.