Goin' to Tweetsie Railroad in My Mind

If you've ever been to Tweetsie Railroad in Blowing Rock, then you get it when I say that it is truly a slice of life. The Wild West theme park attracts an incredible cross-section of people from all walks ... and they converge en masse in the High Country of Western North Carolina looking for some good old-fashioned fun.

We first took our kids to Tweetsie in the summer of 2004, and we have made countless visits in the years since. In fact, for the last three years, we have been loud and proud card-carrying members of the "Golden Rail Season Pass" club.

Tweetsie has been around since long before I was born, and some of my first memories are from when I was about 4 years old, being terrorized on the three-mile train ride through the woods. Back then, after the train would make an "unscheduled stop" in the middle of the forest, actors wielding hatchets and donning war paint would race through the train cars threatening the passengers.

It's not nearly as frightening these days. The cowboys and Indians skip through the train cars without whooping and hollering. In fact, during a visit last summer, one of the "bad guy" Indians even stopped mid-show to console Julianna when he noticed she looked scared.

They might as well hold hands and sing Kum Ba Yah.

And while I love every minute of our trips to Tweetsie, the train rides, shows, and kiddie attractions ooze such cheese that it's enough to nauseate even Mortimer J. Mouse on Miner's Mountain (again, if you've been there, you get it).

Earlier this week I was thinking about our trips to Tweetsie because of LJ's bout with the flu. Strange connection I know ... but when LJ was 5 years old, he started running a fever on a trip to Blowing Rock. We went to Tweetsie anyway because he didn't have any other symptoms. But by that night, he was in terrible shape. Two days later, he was diagnosed with pneumonia. That may be the only time I've seen him sicker than this past week.

Remembering that trip prompted me to pore through our photos. And in looking at our Tweetsie album, I noticed that you could make a pictorial time line of our family using just those photos. Our kids really grow up in the Tweetsie pictures ... summer after summer ... from wispy-headed, bandanna-wearing babies to independent, gun-toting kids. (No worries, they're cap guns. And Julianna's is pink).

So while I sometimes like to poke fun at the whole "Tweetsie experience," I wouldn't trade it for the world. As a family, we have enjoyed a lot of really wonderful times there ... and the photos that document our visits are just the icing on that slice of life cake.