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Today we did a half day road trip. The first stop was Duke Energy's World of Energy display at their Oconee Nuclear Station in SC. World of Energy takes you from the early 20th century as Duke transitioned from hydro electric to coal to nuclear power generation. The pictures show the entrance, Judy at one of the displays and their three nuclear reactor containment buildings.
Following that we went to the Stumphouse tunnel, where else but at Stumphouse Mountain. The tunnel was planned to connect the Blue Ridge Railway between Anderson, SC to Knoxville, TN in 1853. There were 1500 Irish miners working with hand tools & black powder on it but the Civil War then economic problems doomed the tunnel to nowhere. It sat unused until 1951 when Clemson University acquired the tunnel to, get this, cure blue cheese (due to its constant 54 degrees and 85% humidity), really. They stopped using the tunnel when they built a facility duplication the tunnel's environment.
At the same park we also walked over to the Issiquenna falls. To make a long story short the name came from an young girl kidnapped by the Cherokee, falling in forbidden love with a trader, running away (by riding a horse 96 miles) to warn him the Cherokee we going to raid the settlers, and hiding under the falls to escape the Indians.
