By Scott Graber
It is Wednesday and I’m sitting on my small balcony at the Pisgah Inn, first opened in 1919, now situated at Milepost 408.6 on the Blue Ridge Parkway.
It’s early, I’ve got a cup of the complimentary, in-the-room coffee (Velvet Hammer) and a view of the mountains stretching North and South.
The view is actually three separate ridge lines that are 10, 20, and 30 miles distant and more or less parallel the ridge line upon which the Pisgah Inn is perched. Clouds are trapped between and below these ridge lines giving one the impression of lakes that make the mountains look like islands. The cold air sweeping up and out of the valleys makes one think of islands just off Alaska — perhaps the Aleutian Islands.
Yesterday, Susan and I hiked up to Black Balsam Knob where we sat on a flat, multi-veined rock and shared a bottle of Chardonnay paired with a packet of salt-and-vinegar flavored pistachio nuts. While we sat amid these striated, almost tubular rocks Susan asked, “Where did these rocks come from?”
About the same moment a man, perhaps 45 or 50, walked up with two companions in tow. He was lecturing the other men (and didn’t see us) but after a minute or two he realized that Susan and I were sitting in the middle of his demonstration rock.
“Let me see if I can take a shot at this,” I said to the stranger.
“How about long-tenured, beloved professor of geology; teaching at Western Carolina University; taking a short, mid-summer sabbatical with two equally beloved, but slightly bored faculty.”
He laughed and replied, “That’s what I should have been. That’s the life I should have had. But life got in the way.”
“My wife has just asked me about this rock…”
“This one was formed under immense pressure — most likely way below the bottom of the ocean — at 600 degrees Celsius. Of course that was millions of years ago,” he said as he kneeled down on one knee and ran his hand along the ancient stone.
“Once this rock was liquid, plastic, and that’s what gives it the long, stretched-out shape.”
I reminded him that we were sitting atop Black Balsam Knob, at about 6,000 feet above sea level, and asked him how these below-the-surface-of-the-ocean-rocks got themselves up and out of the ocean.
“Its not entirely known. Or agreed upon. But I would guess that when the ancient African continent collided with the ancient Laurentian continent — a very long time ago — it pushed this old stone to the surface.”
This is the kind of person you want to encounter when one hikes. Someone who can tell you what was under way in these spectacular landscapes before the earth cooled down and we decided to improve the topography with condominiums, Cherokee-owned casinos and restaurants offering a fine dining experience at 5,000 feet.
All of which brings me to dining room at Pisgah.
Last night we made our way to the dining room at the Pisgah Inn — a room that comes with immense windows, exposed beams and a history of hearty, trout-focused meals.
This is the same room where I once sat with my law partners trying to formulate a strategy that would bring clients to our small, start-up firm. The same room where my father told me about his time in the Aleutian Islands. The same room where my small family celebrated a successful ascent on Shining Rock. The same room where I gave my son, Zach, an interesting but wildly inaccurate description of the formation of the Appalachian Mountains.
But last night it was just Susan and myself and our server, Steven, who told us about the “Specials” now available at Pisgah.
Although trout remains on the menu, it has given way to scallops, risotto, beet salad, Maryland styled blue crab and some items that are in the $35 to $40 category. It has given way to wine — at $10 and $15 a glass — that once we only encountered in New York City. It has given way to the food and drink revolution that has percolated up the Parkway from nearby Asheville.
As I spoke with Steven—he grew up in Greenville, N.C., and moved to the mountains 10 years ago — I realized that my dinner tab was going in the direction of $100.
“Well” I thought, “The menu may have changed, but the rocks have stayed the same.”
Scott Graber is a lawyer, novelist, veteran columnist and longtime resident of Port Royal. He can be reached at cscottgraber@gmail.com.
