We’re going on vacation the last week in September and we’re planning to go to the North Carolina mountains for a few days. We went a few years ago to Asheville, to visit the Biltmore Estate (I’m still trying to figure out how I can convince the owners to let me move in there…) and Chimney Rock. This time we’re going not quite all the way to Asheville. We’re planning to visit Linville Caverns and some other spots in the area. The Husband went to Linville Caverns when he was a kid but I never have. I’ve seen shows about it on our local PBS station though and it looks really cool, so we decided that’s where we’d go this year.
I was telling my grandmother the other day that we were going there. Her eyes widened and said, “You’re not really going there, are you?”
“Um,” I said, “yeah…”
“With all the bats?!”
“Uh,” I said. “Yep, that’s where we’re going!”
The truth is, I had not even thought about bats at all before she mentioned them. I never saw bats on the shows about Linville Caverns. So I went to the website to try to find out if there were any in there and found a comment in their guestbook talking about the bats.
Okay. As long as the bats sit nice and still and don’t try to fly at my head I’ll be fine. I have an unexplainable mild fear of flying animals. I get really nervous around birds that aren’t in cages because I always think they’re going to fly at my head and claw and peck me. I’m okay with birds in the wild as long as they’re sitting up on a tree branch far away and aren’t giving me that look like they’re considering flying at me.
So Linville bats, stay up on the ceiling of the cave or wherever it is you like to hang out and don’t even think about flapping your wings at me. Maybe I’ll wear a hat. With a full face mask.