Virginia visit to proton pal, Mike Forte and wife Barbara

We arose early (at least for us) on June 15th for the long, 375 miles drive from Charleston, SC to Moneta, VA near Smith Mountain Lake and Roanoke.  Tim wanted to leave early to avoid traffic in Charleston and be able to hog the inside lanes and the middle of the roads to miss the low hanging tree limbs.  Driving through downtown Charleston to get to I-26, then I-95 turned out to be a breeze, thanks to excellent navigating from Linda.  Before we knew it we were across Lake Marion headed toward Florence and the North Carolina border.  We made a few short stops to rest and then kept on truckin'.  By mid-afternoon we crossed the Virginia border into Danville.  This stop turned out to be our first time to fuel since leaving home.  After making a large mortgage payment at the Pilot Truck Stop, we headed toward Moneta.  We took a wrong turn trying to get to Moneta and ended up traveling a curvy, hilly, 1- 1/2 lane back country road.  Meeting oncoming traffic was a challenge.  We decided to unhook our tow car and have Linda drive it ahead of the bus to warn oncoming traffic.  By late afternoon we finally arrived at our camping spot at Sweetwater RV Park.  This park wasn't laid out very well for large RV's but we made it work.

We called Tim's "proton pal" Mike Forte and his wife, Barbara.  They have a beautiful home on nearby Smith Mountain Lake.  We meet them for dinner and decided to go back to the bus for some much needed rest.  The next day we meet the Fortes for a pontoon boat ride on the lake.

We drove to a marina to meet the Fortes on their boat.  It was much quicker to meet this way then drive around the lake to their house.

Pilot Mike with Linda and Barbara

We had a wonderful boat ride on a beautiful day with great company of our hosts, Mike and Barbara.  The lake has 500 miles of shoreline, so it would take years to see it all.  It is also 250 feet deep as its max, so the lake is a large body of water.  We toured some of the lake then cruised to their house.

Linda with Mike & Barbara on their dock

Mike with their '65 Corvette convertible

We picked up some lunch to continue our boat tour.  The shoreline has a large state park along with numerous developed and undeveloped (preserved) areas.  There was something different to see around every finger of the lake.  We had dinner with the Fortes on the evening of the 16th.  Mike started his prostate cancer treatments in Jax about two weeks behind Tim, but they saw each other frequently, because they had similar treatment times.  After dinner we said goodbye, hugged, offered good luck to the Fortes.

Next day we traveled to New River Gorge, WV without being sure where we would stay.