Leg 5: Deadly Detour

While standing along the parkway, Kayla, Sarah, and Alessa were waiting for Jay and Jeremiah to finish their leg. This old lady, seemingly sweet at first, stopped her car and asked, “Are you girls okay?”

Sarah smiled her cute little smile and replied, “Yes, we’re just running.”

“On purpose’” Kayla replied.

Suddenly the sweet lady’s face turned smug. “You do know you aren’t supposed to run along the viaduct, right?” she said with her nose in the air.

“We know. We aren’t running along the viaduct,” said Sarah. The lady hereafter referred to as “Crazy Lady,” rolled her window back up and drove on to the visitor center.

Jay and Jeremiah reached the interchange point, and the girls started their run.  No more than two minutes later, then van was driving up beside the girls. Crazy Lady had called the park rangers and people were being a little touchy about them running along the parkway. The girls had to get back into the van and were driven off the parkway and onto HWY 221 for finish their first leg. There were some small hills at the beginning, up to the entrance of Grandfather Mountain and then there was a twist of fate: Downhill. The sun was shining down on the girls as a choir of angels sang. The girls were pumped and let gravity do its job.

 The next few miles were downhill. While running with superhuman speed, several cars drove by the girls. Most were courteous and moved over away from the girls.  One particular line of cars was coming up the hill towards the girls; all of them moved over except the last one.  This lovely, HUGE van, instead of moving away from the girls decided to drive on the white line of the road and came within a foot of hitting Sarah who was leading the single file line. The girls panicked and said a few choice words to the van, except Alessa of course, who said “oh my goodness.” After recovering from having mini heart attacks, the girls finished the run and were buffalo.