The original plan the morning we left Charlotte, NC was to blaze our way south to make it to Myrtle Beach that night. I'm so glad we got distracted while taking the back roads because South Carolina was enchanting! We passed through a little town right off of Highway 151 and parked on the old main street to see if we could pick up some wireless internet. We couldn't, but we noticed a couple of guys standing across the street outside of a guitar shop. We decided to go take a look at the treasures inside. We've stopped at nearly 15 different music stores in ten different states now.... Jake is like a kid in a candy shop! He says I must be lying when I tell people how many different music stores we have visited, but it's the truth! I've only had my camera with me a few times but we have stopped in more than one music store in every state!
Anyway, back to Hartsville-- that's the town we stopped in and unfortunately I have NO pictures of our time there. We went into Frets & Necks and the guys standing outside followed us into the store. They were both working there. Actually, they were apprenticing there, learning how to make guitars from scratch. We started talking to them and 45 minutes later we felt like we were just hanging out with old friends! We explained to them what we were doing on our trip - looking for a new place to live, school, work, etc. - and the owner of the store (named Boot) pretty much offered Jake an apprenticeship if he wanted one. They were really nice and very cool people. One of the employees, Zach, told us we could pick up wireless at a coffee shop a block down the street where his wife worked. We told him we'd love to go meet her. We left Frets & Necks, walked into the coffee shop two minutes later, and as soon as we sat down with our computer we were approached by the wife, Rachel. She asked us if we were the folks from Utah and then told us her husband had just barely called and told her to put our drinks on their tab. She was busy working but made time to talk with us and she felt like an old friend too. She introduced us to another friend who came into the coffee shop (called The Midnight Rooster) and we talked with him for another half hour. Dylan was going to play his own music show the following night at The Midnight Rooster so we decided it would be fun to stay in Hartsville for a couple nights. We really don't have any strict plans or obligations on this trip so we decided we could go to Myrtle Beach in a day or two or three or whenever we felt like it.
There is nobody online who does couch surfing anywhere near Hartsville so I plainly asked Rachel if she knew anyone we could stay with. The next two nights we slept at her and Zach's house. They are the coolest! Rachel and I talked about opening a new Health Food store and Zach and Jake talked about making music. Rachel is French-Canadian and Zach tours with a Christian Rock band. The following night we saw Dylan Sneed play a concert and we made friends with the owners of the Midnight Rooster. We also ate the best fried chicken in the entire world at a place called Yogi Bear Honey Fried Chicken. I've never been a huge fan of fried chicken but I was eating this stuff like there was no tomorrow! Jake was laughing at me because I turned into some kind of beast hanging over my food. A guy that was standing in line waiting for his fried livers saw that we were first time Yogi visitors. We got to talking and he offered us his trailer home and said we could start renting that day if we wanted.... no thanks chicken liver trailer park guy. Everyone around town was very friendly and glad to talk with us for as long as we felt like talking! I stopped into two day spa/salons and they told me they had a room ready for me to use and a computer full of clients if I wanted to do electrolysis in Hartsville! And the coolest part about visiting this place--
Jake and I have taken back roads and stayed off the Interstate this whole trip and so far we haven't run into one LDS church unless we have google mapped it and gone seeking. Starting from Southern Utah to New Mexico to Texas to Louisiana to Mississippi to Tennessee to Kentucky to North Carolina, we haven't happened upon one single Mormon church. LOTS and lots of other types of churches but none of ours :( The first thing we saw while pulling into Hartsville (a town of 8,000 people) was our church! I just thought that was really cool. Plus we like their license plates which we all know is the most important thing when deciding where you want to live. At the bottom of many SC plates it reads "Smiling Faces Beautiful Places." Sounds good to me!
