Mama Hawthorne's Sycamore Tree.

On Wednesday, at Mama Hawthorne's, I was treated to special entertainment. Her 100 + year old, 75-100 foot tall sycamore tree had died and had to be cut down.

And I'll just tell you now, if you ever need a tree cut down, this is the man to do it.

Greg had actually started on Tuesday, cutting off the side branches. Wednesday morning when I went over to Mama Hawthorne's, he was well up in the sycamore.

This was fascinating to watch.

The treeman carefully tied each limb he was going to cut down.

Then he pulled up on the rope lines, giving directions to his helpers on the ground, taking up the slack.

When he finally cut through the branch, the ropes held it in place, suspending the branch.

Then, he carefully lowered it to the ground.

Here, Greg has tied the branch with the blue ropes in two places.

Then he cuts through between the two tie-offs, and the branch drops exactly where he wanted it to, without knocking him out of the tree.

And the next branch is lowered to the ground.

I was fascinated by the process. You could see the guy approach each branch, quickly figuring out where to tie it off, then cutting through. It was science and art.

The easier logs just got sawed off and dropped to the ground.

Here, he's just happily hanging.

After a while, he took a quick smoke break and rested.

Time for a Sprite, being pulled up on the rope.

I noticed about a dozen or more planes in this flight path. Check out the picture closely. There are two planes in this one.

Notice how many branches are up there in the top.

Here's a better picture so you can see the blue rope tie-offs.

He cuts between the blue tie offs.

And the branch falls exactly where he wants it to.

The branch is lowered to the ground, with two helpers below guiding it.

After about 4 hours, the top of the sycamore has been trimmed down to this.

Notice his intricate system of ropes.

Just enjoy the pictures.

Another smoke break.

Maybe 4 hours later, Greg calls it a day and rappels down.

I quite enjoyed this. It was amazing to watch.

Thank You, Yanceyville, NC.

After we had a nice visit and birthday lunch in Greensboro on Tuesday with Middle Hawthorne, Mr. Hawthorne dropped me off in Danville for a lovely visit with Mama Hawthorne and my dear friend Maxine, while he went on to Bassett and Collinsville to see his family. This morning, we headed back home to the Outer Banks. Just mere miles out of town, we started having car troubles. Mr. H. would put on the gas, the tach would rev up, but, alas, no acceleration. Uh oh. We are only 5 hours away from home and this does not bode well. We go to Yanceyville and stopped, as usual, at Yoder's Market, where Mr. Hawthorne stocked up on their delicious butter, homemade sausage, corn salsa, and pickled beets. And I bought several copies of the Caswell Messenger because YOU-KNOW-WHO had a write up! Here's an EDIT. On 01/06/09. Xmaskatie just informed me that the Caswell Messenger offers their past stories for $5 a pop. Highway Robbery! Who's gonna pay that in Caswell County? Or anywhere? So's, I'm offering the article here: (I scanned my pics and sent them to myself.)

Since we were having car problems, the ever-so-nice lady at the register at Yoder's gave us directions to Caswell Tire Company. The nice folks there immediately took the truck for a test drive and naturally, it didn't do what it had been doing for the past 12 miles. We don't know whether that's a good thing or a bad thing. But they didn't charge us anything, so, thank you very much, Caswell Tire. After leaving Caswell Tire, we stopped at the offices of the Caswell Messenger so I could personally thank Angela for the nice article she wrote about me. Thank you again, Angela. I appreciate your efforts. The Caswell County Courthouse is right near the Caswell Messenger office, so I figured I had to shoot pictures of that. While I was shooting, a lady was walking across the street and generously offered to turn the Christmas lights on for me. Seeing how I was shooting into the sun, it really wouldn't have worked, but I thought it was an extremely nice gesture. All in all, Yanceyville, NC, is a wonderful town with some of the friendliest, nicest, and most helpful people I've ever met. Again, I'd like to offer my thanks and appreciation to the nice lady at Yoder's for her directions, to the folks at Caswell Tire Company for their help, to the random lady crossing the Caswell Square for offering to turn on the lights for a complete stranger, and to Angela at the Caswell Messenger for affording me my 15 minutes.

This, my friends, is Yoder's Market. Every time Mr. Hawthorne and I visit Danville, we always stop at Yoder's Amish Market on our way home.

This is a market unlike any you've ever visited.

Spices line the right wall.

All types of jellies, jams, and flours can be found. You can find stuff here you can't find anywhere else, except maybe online. I also found xanthum gum, which I may buy next time I go. Don't know what to do with it, but I'm sure my Alinea cookbook will have a use for it.

After visiting Yoder's Market, we took a bit of a detour so I could take pictures of the purple house. This purple house is the Yancey House, built in 1810 by Bartlett Yancey, a local and state politician. Today it houses the Yancey House Restaurant. We will definitely make a point to stop and eat there one of these days.

Here' s a bit more of the history of the Yancey House.

A trip to Yanceyville would not be complete without a visit to the Caswell County Courthouse, which was completed in 1810.

Here's what that sign is all about. The Kirk-Holden War of 1870.

In front of the courthouse, is the Confederate Memorial. I'd like to include more of the history of this lovely town, and perhaps one day I will, maybe even going into the story of Chicken Stephens, which I'm not saying Mama Hawthorne's family had anything to do with ... but I just wanted to get this post out as soon as I could. P.S. Angela! Are you salivating?

Road Trip!

Mr. Hawthorne & I are taking a brief trip to visit Middle Hawthorne in Greensboro. Then on to Danville to visit Mama Hawthorne. Surprise, Mama Hawthorne! Today is Middle Hawthorne's 21st birthday. Happy Birthday Middle Hawthorne! Will be checking in along the way, and of course I have my cameras with me in case I see anything slightly photographable. See you later, Maxine.