NEIGHBORS: Home of the unique art of cheese making

March 13, 2012 By Rob

The High Country is home to the state’s only cheese making facility, Ashe County Cheese. Famous for its grand tastes, it recently made news with its new bovine decor.

Our State Magazine recently spent some time in the factory, detailing just how the goodness is made.

Ashe County Cheese FactoryIn addition to being known for breath-taking mountain scenery and as the location of a thriving Christmas Tree industry, West Jefferson is home to North Carolina’s only cheese factory. The Ashe County Cheese Company makes up to 50,000 lbs of cheese a week. The factory is just around the corner from Main Street, and we’re invited to see how all that delicious cheese is made!

Fun fact – Color is added to the cheese simply due to demand. People want it, so they get it!

Ashe County Cheese Factory is just one of the many great neighbors in the High Country of North Carolina. You can Live the Dream in that squeaky clean neighborhood, thanks to more than 130 opportunities to call West Jefferson, NC home.

Filed Under: Neighbors

Coming up on a very special Extreme Makeover

December 20, 2011 By Rob

The hit ABC television show, “Extreme Makeover,” spent time in the High Country recently filming footage for next year’s big Christmas special. The episode will revolve around the Friday family, who live in Lincolnton, just over 90 minutes south of Blowing Rock. The family recently adopted five siblings who once stayed at the Crossnore School, which offers a residential education for special needs children.

The television show decided to add details about the school to the episode, and sent their cameras to Avery County.

Crossnore schoolThe show’s hosts toured the Crossnore campus on camera during the episode’s filming. The show surprised all of the current Crossnore students with a Christmas party complete with Santa and a truckload of gifts.

Avery County’s Roy Krege portrayed Santa Claus.

Gifts included monogrammed luggage filled with presents including iPods, digital cameras, toys, monograpmmed blankets, journals, art supplies, books and personalized towels.

During the party, the “Makeover” hosts contacted the Friday family on vacation and filmed the Crossnore students waving and sharing words of love and congratulations to the “Fab Five” as they played on the beach in Jamaica.

A group of Lincolnton High School students came to Avery County to help the “Makeover” team deliver Christmas to the Crossnore children. The students held a book drive and brought boxes of books for all ages to share with the Crossnore students.

After the surprise party, Lincolnton High senior Stuart Rhea said, “It almost made me cry. Just watching the Crossnore children’s reaction made my Christmas!”

“Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” will air the episode as a two-hour Christmas special in December 2012. Earlier this year, UNC-TV profiled the Crossnore School.

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: avery county, boone nc real estate, christmas, crossnore, crossnore school, schools, tv show

NEIGHBORS: Perfect place to find your speed

November 22, 2011 By Rob

The High Country is a blessing for runners. You can push yourself for distance, elevation, endurance or a combination of all three. It’s the near perfect place for an elite training camp. In 2001 ZAP Fitness filled that void. Located in Blowing Rock, the non-profit has become a training center for post-collegiate, Olympic hopeful distance runners. That includes financially supporting 8-10 post-collegiate distance runners in their efforts to make World Championship and Olympic teams.

The Competitor Network recently spent some time at ZAP Fitness, and detailed its training methods by reviewing the life of an elite runner.

Zap FitnessAt 8:15 the runners pile into a couple of cars and crackle down a long dirt driveway. Twenty minutes of slow driving along roads that see frequent deer crossings lead them to Moses H. Cone Memorial Park in the town of Blowing Rock, N.C.

Seven runners emerge from the two vehicles. Six are 25 years old. All of them were exceptional collegiate runners, but not among the handful of very best who graduated and secured contracts with running shoe companies. …

Moses Cone Park is a paradise for distance runners. Its 3,500 pristine acres are home to 25 miles of carriage trails. Based at 3,600 feet of elevation, the park does not become the summer furnace that the surrounding lowlands do, although record temperatures approaching 90 degrees are forecasted for the next few days.

The article later details a visit to the facility by Olympian Anthony Famiglietti. He gives the group a speech that not only brags on the trainers, but the location in which they work.

“Can I say something?” Famiglietti interjects. “I’ve trained in a lot of different places and seen a lot of groups. What you have here is special. You have a great coach, awesome resources and an incredible environment. Some of you are on the verge of major breakthroughs. Believe me, they can happen here.”

Here’s one training video, detailing some lessons taught and some beautiful High Country scenery.

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: blowing rock, boone nc real estate, neighbors, outdoors, running

NEIGHBORS: A top notch National Guard unit

September 27, 2011 By Rob

1451st Transportation CompanyThe High Country is home to the 1451st Transportation Company of the North Carolina National Guard. Headquartered in Boone, the unit has done tours in Iraq during both the 1990s Desert Storm and 2000s Operation Iraqi Freedom. It’s also done various domestic relief missions, such as during post-Katrina aid in the Gulf Coast.

It’s a professional, experienced unit. And earlier this month, it was honored with the 2011 National Guard Logistics Unit of Excellence Award, issued by the National Defense Transportation Association. The award is given for outstanding proficiency in logistics and transportation operations from among the association’s 8,500 individual and industry members.

It was just over three years ago the 1451st returned from Iraq, where it was deployed for more than a year.

1stSgt Jonhehan Doss, a 17-year soldier in both the regular Army and the National Guard and veteran of operations in Bosnia [’97-‘98] and Iraq [’04-‘05], stated emphatically that the unit’s tour of duty was “very successful in that it was a mission we don’t normally train for.” Normal missions for the transportation unit are the logistical transportation of personnel and equipment for resupply of forward units. However, during their tour of duty, 1451st soldiers spent more than 60 days learning new tactics, procedures and responsibilities to operate as a mobile security force. …
During their time in country, the 1451st conducted move than 400 missions, logging over one million miles across the country. Soldiers from the unit received 158 decorations for service, including 24 Bronze Stars.

Two ready reserve soldiers were killed in action while attached to the unit: Sergeant Joshua Schmit, 26, of Willmar, Minn. and Sergeant Brandon Wallace, 27, of St. Louis, Mo. were killed in Fallujah from an improvised explosive device attack on March 14.

While the soldiers were in Iraq, the High Country did its best to play a supporting role. A huge crowd greeted them when they finally returned home.

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: boone nc real estate, neighbors

NEIGHBORS: High Country home to a strong medical group

August 29, 2011 By Rob

Watauga and Avery counties are home to three outstanding hospitals, Watauga Medical Center in Boone, Blowing Rock Hospital and Cannon Memorial Hospital in Linville. At one time, all three operated separately. Then in 2004 a slow merger of all three began.

Appalachian Regional Heathcare System logoWatauga Medical Center first combined with Cannon Memorial Hospital to form Appalachian Regional Heathcare System. Then Blowing Rock Hospital joined the group in 2007. Together they provide a wide array of medical and health series for the area.

Recently The Capital Issue, a quarterly newspaper, did a feature on ARHS with regard to its financial standing.

Before Watauga Medical Center merged with two other hospitals to form the Appalachian Regional Healthcare System, the 117-bed rural North Carolina facility had historically maintained a strong 5 percent operating margin and a comfortable amount of cash on hand.

But soon after, the system ended a year $10 million in the red with a bank’s noose tight around its neck and the collapsing credit markets pulling it tighter. …

The new system went from losing $10 million in operations one year, to losing $500,000 from operations the next, to earning about $7 million — an $18 million turnaround in two years on a $140 million system-wide budget, May said.

The story details how ARHS used new information technology to reduce costs, as well as receiving sole community provider status to help with revenues. The unit is stronger today, and may become a model for other hospitals facing financial problems.

Watauga, Blowing Rock and Cannon merged together to create an entirely new system and then worked together to get the new obligated group on strong financial footing. Nationwide, many other hospitals find themselves seeking ways to create formal affiliations with other facilities to improve operations and care delivery. A July 2011 report by Irving Levin Associates suggested 2011 might be a record year for health care mergers and acquisitions.

The report indicates the High Country might be on the cutting edge of health care consolidation. Another great reason to call it home.

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: avery county, boone nc real estate, health, hospitals, neighbors, watauga county

NEIGHBORS: No modern life allowed at Turtle Island

July 28, 2011 By Rob

Turtle IslandBuried deep in the valleys of eastern Watauga County is a living time capsule to life before electricity. It’s called Turtle Island Preserve, and during the summer it’s home to several youth camps ages 7-18, both boys and girls. Imagine, more than a dozen preteens going a week with no hot water, cell phones, microwaves or television. Instead they get … chores!

Our programs are full of lifestyle practices of earlier people from our great grandparent’s time and back into prehistory. … We plant and harvest in our gardens, milk goats, make butter, soap, bowls, spoons and tools of all size and description.

The preserve is overseen by Eustace Conway, who is profiled in the latest issue of Our State magazine. The story tells of work done willingly by college students staying at the preserve.

Several days after the preschoolers’ visit, students from Elon University heave rocks from a garden patch into the back of a beat-up Toyota work truck. The sun’s been up only a couple of hours, but this isn’t their first job of the day. They’ve stacked logs, cleared a culvert, and hauled firewood. Before the sun sets, they will have dumped the rocks into ruts washed out by the same storm that clogged the culvert, helped cut down and clear away three trees, and filled in an area of eroded ground outside the mules’ stables.

Conway works these students hard, not just because he has a lot of work that needs to be done, which he does — he carries a small notebook with pages crammed full of to-do lists — but also because he has high hopes for them.

Turtle Island Preserve is located in the Triplett area, about 10 minutes east of Boone.

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: boone nc real estate, kids, triplett, turtle island, watauga county

Congratulations Order of the Long Leaf Pine recipient Wade Wilmoth

May 4, 2011 By Rob

Wade Wilmoth has played a huge role in the history of the High Country. He’s served as mayor of Boone, and later as a state House representative for the area. He was also active in the real estate businesses, working within it for more than 25 years, including many years serving on the High Country Association of Realtors board of directors. He was named Realtor of the Year in 1986. He retired in 1995. He currently serves on the five-member NC Property Tax Commission.

Last week Wilmoth was honored with the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, the highest civilian award given to any citizen in North Carolina. The High Country Association of REALTORS congratulates a great friend for his award. The Watauga Democrat newspaper reports –

Boone realtor Wade Wilmoth“I’m quite touched by this, and I do thank you,” Wilmoth said after receiving the award from former N.C. Rep. Cullie Tarleton.

Tarleton said that Wilmoth’s lengthy and distinguished career in the community and state led him to nominate the man.

Individuals like that “deserve to be recognized for it before they go on to their great reward,” Tarleton said.

Along with the honor, the award allows the recipient to raise at any time the North Carolina Toast: “Here’s to the land of the long leaf pine, The summer land where the sun doth shine, Where the weak grow strong and the strong grow great, Here’s to ‘down home,’ the Old North State!” …

Today, Wilmoth spends many of his days at Boone Drug with Trivette and Bob Snead, drinking coffee, lying and telling stories, as he puts it..

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: boone nc real estate

NEIGHBORS: Life is sweeter in the High Country

April 21, 2011 By Rob

Monitor your blood sugar while reading this, cause here’s some pretty sweet information. Did you know each day more than six million mints and candies are produced in Boone, NC? More astounding yet, that translates to well over a billion sugary concoctions a year! They’re all produced and shipped to an international marketplace from Hospitality Mints, a local company founded in 1978. It’s always kept a relatively low profile, but recently allowed a sneak peek inside its operations.

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: boone nc real estate, hospitality mints, neighbors, watauga county

NEIGHBORS: “Every day there’s a little more hope”

March 28, 2011 By Rob

Samaritan’s Purse is an international relief agency headquartered in Boone. It is known for its annual Operation Christmas Child, which sends gifts to children around the world. The organization is also a lightning response unit for disasters worldwide, including the recent devastation in Japan. Days after the earthquake and tsunami, Samaritan’s Purse was on the ground there.

A Samaritan’s Purse disaster response team is in Sendai, the city nearest the epicenter of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated the northeastern coast of Japan on March 11. Every day, they distribute more of the 93 tons of emergency supplies from the airlift that arrived in the country March 19.

“We’re moving supplies out through mostly local partners,” said Paul Chiles, a team member who arrived in Japan within days of the disaster. “They take the supplies out to the local church leader, and the church knows who around in the surrounding communities needs help. They go out and provide that help. It’s effective.” …

Yet as our teams continue to work through our church partners, they see glimmers of optimism.

“We’re hopeful,” Chiles said. “Every day there’s a little more hope.”

Filed Under: Neighbors Tagged With: boone nc real estate, neighbors, samaritans purse, watauga county
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