Tonight I was sorting through the pictures from my drive home from Alabama. I liked so many of them I feel like I need to share some of them with you. So…here’s the end of my vacation, with it’s long drive home.

I spent my last evening at the lake sitting on the dock waiting for the sunset, and reminiscing about times in years past when we all spent time there together.

I thought about Katie a lot too and how much she loved the lake house. She’d spent plenty of evenings out there on the dock with me waiting for the sun to set. I hope someday Penny will be able to do the same.

Then, in the morning, I set out for home just under 1,000 miles away. It was hard to leave.

I took a new way back to the freeway, a couple hours away, to avoid the traffic of Birmingham. Even though it was Saturday morning and the city traffic wouldn’t be that bad, I wanted to see if this new way might work.

Plus it put me directly in farm country. And you know what that means.

Barns. It means barns.

I only got off the road once to pursue barns. I can’t remember for sure but it might have even been my second day of driving. Though I can’t promise I showed such restraint.

There were so many great barns in the area that I did a couple of big country blocks.

At one point I ended up in a tiny little town where I saw this interesting house. I only slowed slightly because I could feel the eyes of the residents following my car with it’s out of state plates.

And then of course there was no entrance back to the freeway right there, so, darn, I had to do another country block.

And then up ahead I saw this.

What is that you say? Well, let me crop the image a bit more.

Yep. A bald eagle, in a dead tree right by the narrow dirt road I was on. I held my camera out the window. I knew if I tried to get out of the car he’d fly away.

Which of course he did anyway. But oh my seeing the eagle made me smile!

And then I was back to looking for the freeway and noticing barns. Lots and lots of barns.

And lots of beautiful fields too.

All complete with dramatic skies.

I was so lucky on this two day drive home. It rained, but not a lot, and the traffic wasn’t horrible. Driving on Saturday and Sunday helped.

My favorite barn on the trip back? Why this one, of course.

I hope you enjoy it too and all the other barns I got to see on my drive around the block.

I don’t’ know when I’ll be able to go on another barn hunt, but that’s OK. I’m sure I can find cool stuff closer to home this winter.

Thanks for being out there to share my experiences with me!