Day 8 Lightning and thunder and rain, oh my!

Yesterday's travel ended safely at my dear college friend's house, only to be spoiled rotten, yet again, by them even though it was a quick turnaround. I am so blessed with wonderful friends from every stage of my life journey. What a gift! More delicious peach cobbler last night, eggs and bacon this morning, and lemon blueberry bread for the road, oh my! So much love. The laughter and hugs made the side trip well worth it, but oh, what an adventure it became-in the not good way-when the severe weather predicted for the area moved in hours ahead of schedule.
Let me just say, I was white knuckling it the last two and half hours as I kept hitting pockets where the rain came down in sheets and debris starting blowing. The early evening sky looked like night and my pace was slowed down by an hour. The navigation system that  I was relying on to find their new home was affected by the weather, my car one-which is always a little sketch-couldn't find my current location anymore making it useless. Then my backup, Google Maps had a hiccup just when I needed it most and at first listed what would have been the correct left turn I learned later, and changed  to tell me to take a right a 1/4 mile farther. Which turned out to be a two block stretch of gravel lane ending at at abandoned looking house and a big ditch of flooding water so I couldn't even turn around. And it was still telling me to continue! I thought it had clearly gone cray cray and backed back out while the storm raged around, went to a gas station and called my friends to double check directions. I was done trusting technology in a storm! Lol I don't rattle too easily, but I was more than ready to be off the road and was glad to get to their home, only about three miles away IN THE OPPOSITE direction as what Google was trying to drag me! Just be aware solo travelers, trust your instincts and not necessarily your technology! I would have been stuck in a rain filled ditch if I hadn't!
 I saw tree limbs down and enough clutter scattered in areas as I traveled out this morning to verify it was a heck of a little storm!

So, needless to say, I am dragging today and I don't think I am going to cover nearly as much ground as I had hoped, but that is okay. Better to go safely than in a tired haze.
Take aways for me:
 *Truckers have a heck of a job, because they do have a tight schedule to keep and can't stop even whenthey often should if they are going to keep it.
*I am into the mountains of North Carolina now near Asheville at a, you guessed it,Cracker Barrel...lol...and this state is so gorgeous, and so different, from end to end. It really is amazing how 8 hours can take you to two seemingly different worlds!
 *These are the times when you really wish you could just do that little nose wriggle deal like in Bewitched and blink yourself home!