A trip through Peach Country to Columbus

On Thursday afternoon, Cindy and I left work early and hopped in Cindy's car to take off down 3/41 toward the small town of Musella. Musella is a blink of your eye between Barnesville and Roberta, not even on the main road. But when you make the left turn, heading southeast, you might as well be traveling through a time warp, because the town contains a Cotton Gin, a General Store, a white-frame Baptist Church and a Peach Packing facility run by the Dickey family.

We pulled into the parking lot of the peach facility and hopped out into the heat and humidity. We ascended the steps to the facility, to find people looking over the ripe peaches they had collected in crates and baskets. A long row of painted rocking chairs lined the front of the facility.

Cindy and I looked over the peaches and bought a basket of one of the varieties of peaches, along with a loaf of peach bread and two cups of peach ice cream. Kate and Cindy gave me a bite of their ice cream, and we sat down in three of the rocking chairs so they could eat their ice cream under the ceiling fans whirring under the roof. The ceiling fans and the breeze under the ceiling presented a delightful place for rest and I told Cindy and Kate that if I had a couple sandwiches and a six pack of beer that I would stay there all afternoon.

Later, we decided to buy another basket of the other variety of peaches before we got back in the car and headed back down 3/41 to Roberta and a run through the country toward Columbus. We finally made it to a four lane which took us from Butler west to Columbus. The trip was delightful and we made it to Columbus in enough time to get me to the State Court Clerk's office to pick up a copy of an order, then on to Country's Barbecue in the old Greyhound bus station, where we enjoyed sweet tea, pork barbecue, field peas, fresh cucumber salad and we all shared what turned out to be the best fried chicken I have ever eaten. It was perfect.

Later, after supper, we drove down through the historic district to the baseball field, where I bought three tickets on the third base line and sat down to watch baseball. The game turned out to be somewhat of a low-scoring bore and we left early. The next morning I found out that the score stayed tied 1-1 until the beginning of the eleventh inning, when Augusta scored four runs to go up 5-1, only to be beaten by Columbus when they scored five runs in the bottom of the eleventh. I don't think we would have stayed long enough to watch the whole game anyway.

Nevertheless, I found out today that the Columbus Catfish are being moved to Bowling Green, Kentucky next year. I hope the City can find a new team to make their home in Golden Park. I already lost my Macon Braves to Rome. I would hate to lose all minor league baseball in Central Georgia. It provides such a fun endeavor in the heat of the summer.