June 11-22, 2018: A Visit to Fort Lauderdale
	June 8-10, 2018: My 50th Davidson College Reunion
	Return to the Index for 2018

Having just attended my 50th Davidson College Reunion, Fred and I were headed now down to Florida with our two new kittens, but we couldn't come so close to my sister's house and not drive up there for a visit. We also wanted to see Ted, but he was working today, so we couldn't. Fortunately, he had made plans to come up to Judy's house on Monday, so we would see him there. So, Sunday morning, we eschewed the College church service and closing luncheon to head directly up to Elon for our visit.

Getting to Elon, North Carolina

It took us a while to get the kittens ready for travel again; although they are improving steadily, they are still not eating solid food much and aren't yet litterbox trained. But eventually we got checked out and on the highway up to Burlington.

I literally cannot count the number of times I have made the trip from Charlotte to my sister's house outside of Elon, North Carolina. The trips began when both my parents were alive, continued when my Mom and I would go visit after my Dad died but before my Mom moved to Dallas, and then a number of times with Fred on our many trips to the Appalachian Mountain area.

The route up to the Burlington area is a simple matter of hopping onto I-85 north from Charlotte. Now, the road has been improved in many sections over the years, eliminating some of the angle turns to follow the expressway around cities like Salisbury, Thomasville, and Greensboro. Plus, much of the highway has been rebuilt and lanes added. But all we had to do was follow I-85, take the new bypass around Greensboro and then intersect with I-40 east of Greensboro. In case you are curious, I-85 and I-40 are coterminal all the way to Raleigh-Durham, where they split again, with I-85 angling up to Richmond and Washington and I-40 turning more southeast towards Wilmington.

On a normal trip, we might have gone directly to my sister's farm, taking a new bypass around Elon to go north from I-40 towards the town of Ossippee, North Carolina. But since we had two kittens with us, because they were still so small, and because my sister has seven dachshunds in her house, we decided to continue past Elon to the Burlington exit and our Red Roof Inn.

We found the Red Roof Inn with no problem. It's an odd property, as it used to be a Holiday Inn with a ballroom, meeting rooms, and such- things that Red Roof Inns don't have. Most of those public areas were closed off, but it made things seem a bit odd. We got our room and brought the kittens in and got them situated again in the bathroom (which, this time, had a light we could leave on) and then we headed over to my sister's house.

I am not intimately familiar with the city streets of Burlington but I thought I might take this opportunity to follow my nose and see if I could get to Judy's house without going back onto I-40 and going back west to Elon. As it turned out, they were more familiar than I thought they would be, and we had little difficulty going through town, out past Holly Hill Mall, up and through Elon, and then out the rural roads towards Ossippee to find my sister's farm- which is a quarter mile off Elon-Ossippee Road.

My sister has lived in the Burlington area since the early 1970s. She originally moved there to take a job as an illustrator with Carolina Biological Supply, met and married Bob Barbour, had two children and lived for a time in Burlington. Then she and Bob, a pharmacist at his family-run drug store chain, bought some land northwest of Elon, built a house and moved to the country.

Greyfield Farms, the name Judy and Bob chose for their actual farm, got its name, I believe, from one of the first horses that my sister owned. And that's one reason they wanted the acreage- so that she could keep them, take care of them, and ride them. My sister, if you don't already know, has always been a horse-lover (at least as long as I have known her and been cognizant of her interests). So having the farm was a dream come true.

Judy and Bob built a very nice house for themselves, Ted, and Jennifer; there was already an old red barn for the horses. Over the years, they made a number of improvements to the property- upgrading the barn, delineating the pastures, planting a large garden, creating a woodland "park", and so on. The major improvement they made, which I am pleased to say a loan from me made possible, was the construction a a new barn back behind the house. This one had a concrete floor, eight stalls, a tack room, a feed room, and other conveniences that made having horses a lot easier (and which also made it possible for Judy to earn extra money by boarding a couple of horses for other people). It is a really nice structure, and there are pictures of it (and the story of its construction) on album pages from years ago.

Sadly, Bob died in the late 1990s, and after that Judy had to take care of the horses by herself. After Jeffie moved to Dallas and then to Atlanta and then to Prague, Czech Republic, she has not been there to enjoy riding the horses, and once Patrikk became too old to either show or ride, Judy's own enjoyment of the horses declined.

More than a year ago, Judy finally got out of the "horse business", and now has none in the barn (nor does she board other horses anymore). What she does do is raise dachshunds, and they are now the center of animal life at Greyfield Farms (other than the barn cats that Judy takes care of). We arrived at the farm in late afternoon, and had a pleasant dinner with Judy and her friend Patrick (they now run a business selling firearm accessories over the Internet). But all the pictures we took were taken on Monday, both before and after Ted's arrival.

Judy and I On Her New Deck

The biggest physical change to Judy's property has been the recent addition of a new deck on the back of the house. Up until now, Judy hasn't had an outside space, sheltered from the elements, where she and Patrick could sit, but that has been more than remedied by the addition of the deck- two-thirds of which is roofed over. So now, even if it is raining, Judy can come outside and be with the dogs at those times when they are out of the house, running around the woods, and/or taking care of business. At left is a picture that Fred took of me, my sister, and four of her seven current dachshunds. Judy has also hung one of her many hummingbird feeders near the deck so she can watch them. Fred got an excellent picture of a hummingbird coming in to feed.

In Front of the House

We took quite a few pictures of the dachshunds, and I want to include a few of them here:

(Click on Thumbnails to View)

After lunch, Ted arrived, and he brought two of the four large dogs that he has, and with them inside the house as well, it was almost too crowded (well, for people like Fred and I who aren't really "dog people"). But Judy and Ted are both "dog people", and so, for them, having nine dogs in the house isn't unusual or a problem!

Judy and Ted

Judy and Dachschunds

Fred and I stayed all day, of course, just returning to the Red Roof Inn just before coming back for dinner so we could check on the kittens. Knowing what I like, Judy had laid in some barbecue, so that's what the five of us had for supper.

Ted, Judy, and Myself

I knew that by the time Fred and I were ready to go back to the hotel after supper it would be getting dark, and I wanted at least a couple of pictures of my sister, my nephew, and myself, so we took those just after we came back from the hotel.

Ted, Judy, and I

We had a very nice, albeit short visit, and were happy that Ted was able to come up so we could spend some time with him as well. We returned to the hotel about ten P.M., and would depart for Florida in the morning.

You can use the links below to continue to another photo album page.

	June 11-22, 2018: A Visit to Fort Lauderdale
	June 8-10, 2018: My 50th Davidson College Reunion
	Return to the Index for 2018