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Lake Lure

Even though we’ve lived in North Carolina more than four years now, our family hadn’t spent time in the western mountains before last week. We rented a cabin for six days on Lake Lure, just east of Asheville, where Dirty Dancing and Last of the Mohicans were filmed.

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We were greeted on our arrival Sunday night by a bat in the cabin, who lost an epic battle and was cast out into the night–mostly unharmed. The week was full of relaxation and adventures, including hiking, kayaking, fishing, swimming, and a visit to America’s largest home, Biltmore. Our rustic cabin featured a pool table and brook in the back yard. The kids enjoyed roasting marshmallows and playing with animals.

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Outer Banks 2010 Part 1

I still have many more photos to go through from our OBX trip earlier this summer, but I thought I’d at least try to share some from the first half of the week since the months are rapidly ticking by.

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We really enjoyed ourselves on this trip. After living in North Carolina for 3 years, this was our first visit to the beach we had heard so much about. We planned our excursion for early May in order to beat the summer crowd, which ended up working out great for us. The only downside was that the water was too cold for any real ocean activities. We had plenty of fun, however, making sandcastles, spending time at the pool, exploring local restaurants, and seeing the great sights nearby.

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Some of the highlights from the first days included seeing the Bodie and Hatteras lighthouses, visiting the Wright Brothers’ First in Flight monument, and scaling the dunes at Jockey Ridge Park. While at the Hatteras lighthouse, we bumped into the family of Brian Schlag, a former missionary I served with in Germany, who also happened to live for a while near my parents outside of Philly.

I’ll try to get the rest of the photos up soon.

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Road Trip 2010

In early February, I joined Sierra, Camden, and Grandpa on a cross-country adventure. I’m still sorting through the photos, but I figured it’s taking me long enough that I should just make these available to the family now. I will follow up later with the story of our trip, and will cull a lot of the Grand Canyon photos that you’ll find in this set. We had a lot of fun, and especially enjoyed spending time with Cordell and Sarah’s family in Santa Clara.