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David Smith organized a scuba diving trip to Bluestone Quarry near Thomasville, NC, on Sunday, August 9, 2015. The other two divers were his daughter Bethany Swaim and me, Bob Laney. Dave is an avid diver who goes to the Caribbean, often Bonaire Island, on a regular basis. I have…

At Jim and JoAnn Caudill's kind invitation, I accepted an offer to go paddling on the Tuckaseegee River the week of July 6 - 9, 2015. It turns out that all of the many other persons who traditionally go with the Caudill's on this annual trip had conflicts. We ended…

A couple days before the summer solstice, the longest day of the year, on June 20, 2015, I attempted to repeat my rarely accomplished grand traverse of Grandfather Mountain. I have hiked on Grandfather Mountain close to 100 times, but I have never met or heard of anyone who has…

The weekend of March 21 - 22, 2015, I went backpacking for the first time on the land that Terri and I own on Shoe Mountain, in northwest Wilkes County, off NC 16 North and White Oak Church Road, near the Blue Ridge Parkway. Unless you trespass on the neighbor's…