Mooresville, North Carolina

Lucky break in Daytona. Believe what you want... I'm calling it DEE-vine intervention.
Had a lot of that on this trip. Some say that what you imagine you will find. You make your own Reality. Yeah, well.... I'm not that clever, I think, and I've sensed the presence of a Lucky Presence along this whole trip. Surfing the coincidences as I coined it to someone.

Yep. So I headed north out opf Daytona... sort of happy to be leaving. It seemed like just another East Coast beach/tourist town, with a big racetrack to glue it all together, (because most of the other beach towns I've seen out East are decrepitating)[love that fake word]

Let me look over my atlas.. ehh..
Took I-95 up to Jacksonville because I wanted to make some time... and, well, there isn't much other option. Feature-less.. or at least, memory-less.

Into Georgia and onto state Rte 17... all the way north. Muuuuch better; local poverty and other such odd sights.

Up through the Georgia swamplands along the coast.. beautiful swamps, if ever there be any.

Lovely scenery... warm for early October (for me)... mid Seventies. Humid but not uncomfortably so.

WHERE I COME FROM WE CALL THIS, "YIELD"

aHHHH, the Southlands. The Low Country as it is often referred to.

I crossed the line into South Carolina and headed for Hilton Head Island where my old guitar-playing buddy has been living for five or eight years in a low-slung ranch house a block or two from the Atlantic ocean with an ex-Lersey-ite bartender named Ted. El Ted-o-rino.
It's a blurr. The first day there it POURED endlessly.

The Rock & Roll Lifestyle... sleep all day and Rock all Night. My pal Craig is a very good professional guitarist who has taken his signbificant musical skills and made them work to his advantage in Hilton Head, playing gigs steadily... enough to pay his bills. Problem for me is the endless, late-night party-life going on amidst the Locals... and I found myself rising out of bed at 4 PM, following Craig to hios gigs, then fire the Midnite Oil past 5AM, locked in deep Hippie Discussion.

This shit went on day after day... not a lot of thought given to Proper Nutrition, but Craig and Ted provided me a warm welcome, and for a few days we partied like champions. Craig introduced me around diligently for which I was grateful; too many times you go somehwere and the "host" leaves you in a corner by yourself. But he did a great job of mentioning me as his buddy of 25 years who was completing a 10,000 mile trip around the US on a motorcycle... which pleaded me. I'm very aware that this whole Event may go un-noticed by too many of my friends.
So for a few days I tagged along with Craig and we burned it Down... meals for 48 hours consisted of Stouffer's frozen pizza out of the local 24-hour bleary Walgreen's. Okay, no sweat.. a fun time of the Island of Lost Boys... a lot of Trust-a-farian kids and people who don't give a damn about growing old.

After a few days of this I took a breath and split north to see another old band-mate, Al, in the Charleston area, three hours away. A good move. Al is a fine old egg of a Russian Cossack who hasd a huge brain for computer logistics and a quasi-believable fantasy regarding the End of Civiilization As We Know It.

THIS IS A TERRIBLE PHOTO OF AL WHO JUST WOKE UP MOMENTS BEFORE BUT IT'S OKAY SEEING AS HE TRULY DOESN'T GIVE A RAT'S ASS BECAUSE BY THE TIME THE SHIT HITS THE FAN HE'LL AREADY BE TUCKED COMFORTABLY IN HIS SMOKEY-MOUNTAIN HIDE-OUT AND YOU YOU CAN TRY TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO SURVIVE, AND WELL, FUCK YOU, BECAUSE YOU AREN'T THINKING ABOUT THE POSSIBILITY AT ALL  RIGHT NOW, ARE YOU? ADMIT IT.

Al is another great NY guitar player and he took me out to some music and bars in the Charleston area... including downtown King's Street...Isle of Palms... Folly Beach. We saw a great bluegrass jam-band called the Acoustic Syndicate in a great club that had equal stages indoors and out. Al gave me a clean, comfortable room to myslef and took good care of me for two nights.
Here are some Chareleston photos.

FORT MOULTRIE, USED IN THE REVOLUTION AS WELL AS THE CIVIL WAR.

BAD SHOTS OF FORT SUMTER

FROM ATLANTIC TO PACIFIC TO ATLANTIC

Back to Hilton Head where most of my gear remained. A few more late-nights with the Coogey Brigade... flurries of disfunctional Carolina chicks seeking... God Knows What... strange burnout people who son;t seem to be worried about Al-pocolyto's scenariao, that's for sure.

With very little A-dieu I packed-up and with some relief was off again onto the American Roadways, this time heading north to see my old pals Bill & Alrlene, who had moved to the north Charlotte a year before. This would be quite a wrench in my mind, as Bill was an old friend, highly pragmatic and although wide-minded, was quite critical of people's surreal nonsense. Bill is an experienced landscaper and over-all construction wiz; he works hard to support his family and doesn't tolerate slackers. I love the guy, despite my predilictions towards being a slacker myself.

North of Beaufort I headed up State Rte 17 through Orangeburg and Columbia. Gorgeous Carolina landscapes, often flecked with images of gritty rural poverty.  Cotton fields and abandoned Buicks. Young black men sitting in clumps by the side of a rural road, seemingly doiung nothing except hanging out. Ghost towns. Deliciously beautfiul agricultural landscapes.

REAL BULES CROSSROADS IN BLACK PEOPLE TERRITORY

DANGEROUS SPEED-TRAP. JUST BEFORE THIS BEND THE LIMIT WAS 60. LOCAL COPS AWAITED IN THE SHADOWS.

It was a spectacularly beautiful day, and with the Mp3 playing my favorite music in my earplugs and an occasional stop for a smoke, it was just ... heavenly.

AFRICAN-AMERICAN GROCERY STORE AT A CROSS-ROADS; THOUGHT IT LOOKED GOOD TO DOUBLE AS A FRIDAY NIGHT JUKE-JOINT.