Southern Pines

And so it was that our holiday, like all good things, came to its end.  But not before we got to play with some chickens!  Our last night was at Tanglewood Farm in Southern Pines where we were the only guests that didn't turn up with our own horse.  This was rural North Carolina at its best; a little off the beaten track but worth the detour, a family-owned horse farm and B&B where you could get a cosy room and a paddock for one easy payment.

After that short commune with nature - nature with wi-fi and breakfast, that is - it was back on the road for the final hop to DC.  And, inevitably, the last bit was the worst, with traffic congealing the closer we came to the capital before grey clouds rolled in and rain started falling.  It was almost like coming home to the UK.

So our southern sojourn is ended.  And the South really is a different country.  The bit of the East Coast we moved to was always going to feel familiar, with New York and Washington recognisable from any number of movies and news reports.  But stray a little way down and you're in a place where some still think there should be a rematch of the civil war; where I finally saw "Vote Trump" bumper stickers and yard signs; where you can order grits, collared greens, and fried tomatoes; and where they do actually say "y'all" an awful lot.

Now we're back where politics equals civilisation.  Hmm.  Hannah's off to make sure that the oil industry hasn't fallen apart in her absence, and I get to send Pete to school with a bag full of kazoos...

Pete got on very well with the free-range chickens.  "Sometimes we eat chickens," I told him.  "We only eat pretend chickens," he assured me.

Hannah desperately clings to a last few hours of holiday-novel-reading free of distractions.

Henpecked.

Beautiful Southern Pines.  I think I could easily live on a horse farm, as long as I didn't have to do any work.

Pete and the farm dog bonded over a shared love of sticks.

Ah, the happy sight at the end of every holiday.

But the good thing about a family road trip is that you can share the driving.