Back to Cherokee

We continued into North Carolina along I-26, but shortly after crossing the border we left the freeway and continued along small country roads towards Lake Lure. When we were in these parts tow years ago, it was that it was very foggy, and Else and Carl Jorn had never got to see Chimney Rock, so we decided to make up for that this time.

Else had knee problems, so we chose to take the elevator to the top of the rock. To get to the elvator you go through a tunnel in the mountain. The elevator leads up the mountain and the journey 26 floors up, takes 30 seconds. In the elevator is an elevator operator, and she must tell the whole history of the park during the journey, so she was talking very fast.

When we got to the top, we walked along the little bridge leading over to the Chimney Rock, where we stood and enjoyed the views of the valley below until we had seen enough, then we took the elevator down again. We left and cotinued the goal of the day, Cherokee. On the way we went through Lake Junaluska, a popular resort and home of the International Methodist headquarters. The lake itself is named after a Cherokee chief. When we got to Cherokee we found  the hotel which was the same, we had stayed in two years earlier, and after unpacking, Carl Jorn, Dorte and I walked to the town center, while Else chose to stay at the hotel to care for her knee. Originally we had talked about seeing the outdoor drama, "Unto These Hills" which is about tribal life from the whites came to the area in 1540 until most of the tribe was deported to Oklahoma on the Trail of tears in 1838. But since we were pretty tired, we skipped the show and satisfied our selves by visiting the tribal museum.

The museum is located in the city and outside stands a wooden sculpture of Sequoia, another of the tribe's famous members. He is famous because he single-handedly created a written language for the tribe, based on homegrown characters. After he had invented the language, and demonstrated - with his daughter - how he could send messages without talking, the tribe aopted the idea. Inside the museum there are various exhibits on the tribe, its history, legends, the tribal medicine, clans, customs, etc., and the museum uses eg holographic computer technology to tell their stories. Opposite the museum is Qualla Arts & Crafts, a shop which sells original Native American crafts, but you need the big purse, for it is expensive. We did not buy anything (we had used our assets for a bread basket), but merely to study the many exciting things.

When we were finished we walked around and saw a little more on the city itself, which really is not particularly exciting compared to many other tourist cities in the world, but we bought a few Native American pots and a couple of Dreamcatchers, which we took home as gifts. Then we drove back to the hotel and joined Else again. The hotel was one of the few that we stayed at on our trip that had restaurant. That we knew from before, so we had already planned to eat there, and so we did.