September 26 - 29, 2024 - Lafe and Faith's Odyssey

Hurricane Helene

The next day, we got up and started heading east from Murfreesboro. Our original plan had been to spend the weekend in Pigeon Forge, TN, Gatlinburg, TN, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and Asheville, NC. Unfortunately, those places had already gotten a lot of rain and expected to get hit by hurricane Helene that night. As we figured out what we were going to do, we meandered our way east and south to Russell Cave National Monument in northeast Alabama. It is a pretty cool little place where numerous human artifacts had been unearthed, but unfortunately that means visitors are not allowed to spelunk on their own. We exited the cave and decided to head a bit north and east through Chattanooga, TN to the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park just across the border in Georgia. We explored the visitor center just before they closed then hopped back into our van as the rain started coming. We had a couple options:

Press on eastwards and cross the path of the hurricane to get towards Greenville, SC, where a good friend of ours lives.
Backtrack westward towards Birmingham or Huntsville where we have family.
Stay put and wait out the storm.

Regardless of the decision we made, we were going to have to deal with the hurricane and its aftereffects to some degree. We wanted to go east to get to see that part of the country, so we opted to go with option #1 as that would get us across the path of the hurricane and allow us to move eastwards to the sea without having to deal with a swath of destruction in our way. However, this meant putting in several more hours of driving well into the night. We hadn’t eaten yet, so we stopped to grab a bite to eat then started driving south and east to Atlanta where we swung northeast towards Greenville. It was a pretty stressful drive: the rain was endless and oscillated between a light drizzle and a downpour as we crossed the hurricane’s path. We saw the remains of several bad car accidents and nearly got into some ourselves as there was a seemingly infinite supply of people (mostly semis) driving far too fast given the conditions. Fortunately, we were able to make it north to about 30 minutes outside Greenville a little after midnight. We stopped at a rest area and tried to get some sleep. It was a warm, humid, and rainy night, and people were constantly coming into, stopping at, and continuing from the rest area. I woke up about 6 AM and was unable to sleep as I was pretty nervous about the weather. The rest area’s power went out about 730 as the hurricane’s wind hit us. It started out relatively mild but quickly picked up: the small branches and clusters of leaves blown about turned into trees collapsing within a few minutes. By this point, we were both up and anxious to get out of the nicely forested rest area. Yet, the hurricane had other plans: just as we were starting our car, a trio of large trees fell across the exit ramp from the rest area and blocked it completely. So, we went out the entrance ramp and found ourselves on a nearly empty interstate… until we saw a tree blocking the entire road not even a quarter mile later. It was just barely long enough to cross the road, so you could get by if you went into the grass median. I didn’t want to take any chances with mud after the night of rain, so I jumped out and started hauling broken branches out of the way. Just as I had gotten a path opened up, a group of traffic arrived along with some truck-driving, chainsaw-wielding men who motioned for us to get out of the way so they could take care of the tree. Unfortunately for you, Faith didn’t get any pictures of my solo herculean efforts. We continued quickly but cautiously down the interstate, switching repeatedly to the left lane as the right was covered in trees and debris. We passed numerous destroyed signs and billboards and damaged buildings before getting to a traffic jam that slowly passed a line of stopped semis. The exit ramp we were attempting to utilize was covered by tree arching across the roadway just high enough for cars but not semis to pass through. Faith and I once again were thankful we longer had the topper on the van. Finally off the interstate, we made our way to Margaret’s apartment through surprisingly tree-free roads. By the grace of God, not only had we made it to her apartment safely, but Margaret had running water and power amidst a sea of outages. We spent the rest of the afternoon into the evening decompressing, catching up, and making only one excursion to Costco for some groceries. Oh man, that was quite the adventure. Apparently almost nobody in Greenville was taught that a dead stoplight means treating the intersection as a 4-way stop: the roads were complete and utter chaos. Costco was in great condition and assuaged our hunger before we returned to the safety of Marg’s apartment. We spent the rest of the night chatting and watching reports of the destruction in Appalachia come in before drifting off to sleep.

The next day, we slept in and continued our conversations from the previous day. Greenville was still in pretty rough shape, so we stayed in until evening when Faith and I made an evening walk to some stores to grab a few snacks and drinks while Margaret ran an errand. We saw quite a few leaning or downed trees as we made our way to a few stores and back but otherwise not too much damage. Almost every store we walked by was packed with people out looking for something to do or just trying to get some internet and air conditioning. Back at the apartment, we spent the rest of the evening chatting (shocker) and enjoying the modern amenities afforded by electricity and running water.

The next day, since Marg’s church was closed due to lack of electricity, we watched a sermon from my parents’ church in Iowa before looking at our options for the day as we were getting a bit of cabin fever. The flooding was essentially done and most of downtown Greenville had opened up again. We wandered down there, got food at a brewery, then spent the next several hours wandering around. Greenville has a beautiful, clean, bustling downtown with countless places to eat and find entertainment. Faith and I were thoroughly impressed and deemed it one of the nicest cities that we have been to during our trip. We will certainly be back to explore the city more and would highly recommend visiting it. As our 2-hour parking limit approached, we made our way back to the car then Margaret’s place. We all had to work in the morning, so we hung out for a bit before heading to sleep relatively early to get some solid shut-eye.