North Carolina is a huge state with tremendous climactic, economic and geographic diversity, but after a wicked bout of weird weather, including hurricanes in the mountains and blizzards on the beaches, the state’s one-size-fits all school calendar law still leaves many western counties singing the summertime blues.

By Julia Hartbarger • SCC Public Relations

A little time has passed since the Great American Solar Eclipse on Aug. 21, but the memory will always be there for myself and millions of others who were fortunate enough to witness the celestial event of a lifetime.

With so many charities working to assist in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, many Western North Carolina residents are curious about the best way to help.

I can still feel the cold air, the sense of hopelessness.

Watching the clips of the massive rainfall and flooding in Houston and greater Texas this week, I can’t help but simply direct my eyes towards the confused, helpless faces, the scenes of utter destruction at the hands of Hurricane Harvey. It conjured a slew of images in my own memory of the “North American Ice Storm of 1998.”

Rainbow Falls Trail: The Rainbow Falls Trail is the next trail in line to get a complete rehabilitation through the Smokies Trails Forever program, funded by Friends of the Smokies. 

Dealing with the aftermath of two major storms while preparing for what could be another record-breaking visitor season, trail crews in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park have been keeping busy this spring. 

“Three major projects are taking place in addition to the normal routine spring cleaning that our crews do, along with storm damage that we’ve had from several different wind events,” said park spokesperson Dana Soehn.

In True Stories At The Smoky View (She Writes Press, 2016, 325 pages, $16.95), Vrai Stevens Lynde — the “Vrai” is short for Vraiment — finds herself and a 10-year-old runaway boy trapped in a room at the Smoky View Motel near Bristol, Tennessee, during the great blizzard of 1993. Snowbound for several days — the monster storm has completely closed I-81, and the motel desk clerk delivers food to the stranded travelers on a tractor — Vrai and Jonathan begin comparing notes and sharing stories from their life, an exchange of information resulting in a lifelong friendship and a mutual decision to embark on a crusade to right an injustice.

Unseasonably warm weather and the drought have combined to temporarily close Cataloochee Ski Area.

The first frost serves as a given year’s most distinctive dividing line. It’s hard to pinpoint just when winter becomes spring, when spring become summer, or when summer becomes fall. But the winter season has arrived when the first frost occurs.

Some things change, and some things stay the same. 

Thousands of years ago, humans developed visual and spoken languages to convey thoughts and meaning across space and across time. Among the first topics they shared with each other was one that has persisted even today — whether by smartphone app or over the weathered wooden top rail of the old back fence with a neighbor.