We’ve had a very eventful couple of days here in North Carolina.

My family has a house in the mountains just outside of Highlands. I’ve spent my summers here since I was a kid.

One of my favorite memories was going to watch the sunset at Sunset Rock. The weather is questionable the next few evenings so we decided to go on our first night here.

We took the opportunity of the beautiful view to take some pictures.

The view up there is absolutely breathtaking. The sky fills up with so many different colors and you can see for miles.

After our super-touristy photo session we both got totally lost in the sunset until the moment was ruined… by a grizzly bear.

I absolutely love this picture.

I’ve been coming here for nearly 20 years and this is the first encounter I’ve had with one.

In the end, Smokey didn’t manage to ruin the moment and we were still able to enjoy the sunset.

After last night’s excitement we got up and went back into town to get some training done.

There is a public pool at the nearby civic center that has lap swimming in the morning.

 Highlands is just above 4000 feet in elevation. I hadn’t really thought about how different it would be swimming at a higher altitude than back home. I was definitely winded a bit faster than normal. 

After our swim we got some more hill training in through town. I was able to show Patrick a lot of my favorite places from when I was a kid. Like “The Toy Store” on Main Street of course.

Its only in the 60s here in the morning so it makes for really nice running weather. Cool morning air is something we haven’t seen for a while back home.

Lots of fun planned for a weekend in the Mountains! Hope you all have a wonderful weekend as well!