About Sylva's Downtown Sylva

While working with someone new to the area today, I was reminded of when I first moved here to the mountains of Western North Carolina 25 years ago. I remember thinking "How will I ever find everything I need in this new place?".

People moving here from large metropolitan areas really are mystified as to how they will be able to access all of the services they are used to. Make no mistake, small towns are different...but for many people, they are different in a good way. Believe it or not, just about everything you can find in a big city, you can find here. The quality is here, maybe just not the quantity. The trip to get those items could be right in town, or you might have to travel just a little further - but the views that accompany you on your trip are incredible.

So, like with this woman I worked with today moving here from the Ft. Worth, Texas area (hi Karen Anne Stone!) to Sylva, I want to reassure her and others like her ...it really is all here, just relax and take a deep breath - you'll find it.

Health is important to all of us. We have an incredible network of physicians and hospitals with the MedWest Health Care. MedWest services not only Sylva's own Jackson County but also Macon, Haywood and Swain Counties. Most of our physicians are here from other places in the country. One of the country's finest cardiology care units is just 40 minutes away in Asheville, Mission/St. Joseph Hospital System.

Ease of travel is crucial to a lot of people. The Asheville Airport, while small, is a very efficient and friendly airport. Again, just 40 minutes from Sylva. There are also small county airports in Jackson and Macon counties.

Driving traffic is great also. I remember when I lived in St. Pete, Fla there didn't seem to be anyplace you could drive without 3 or 4 other lanes of noisy traffic and the inevitable 2 or 3 traffic light wait. That just doesn't happen here. The roads are in good shape and for better or worse, NC pays serious attention to earmarking tax money to the upkeep of roads.

We have it all in this area...restaurants, theaters, movies, arts, festivals, grocery stores, veterinarians (lots of them), great medical care and don't forget those awesome mountain ranges. What we don't seem to have so much of are the traffic jams, high crime districts, non-stop sirens, ridiculous light and noise pollution, or concrete jungles.

So, don't give it a second thought. As long as you aren't completely addicted to all things big city (and there isn't anything wrong with that), don't worry a moment. You will find everything you need here in Sylva and the other small towns in the area. You'll find it, because everyone here is ready with an open hand to help you find what you need.

After an incredibly busy morning it was time to meet our clients at City Lights Cafe in Sylva for lunch. What a welcome treat it was and a grand chance to relax. While the restaurant has been there for a while, it's gone through a couple of names and owners. This newest incarnation is the best! The new owner, Bernadette, has so much to be proud of. She has created the perfect kind of menu. You know the kind, everything is so tempting that its difficult to make a quick decision. Maybe that was her plan. The complete antithesis to "fast food". A grand opportunity to fully appreciate what you are about to eat. A very intentional experience.

The food was fantastic, Leslie and I each had different crepes and Nelson and Jeannette had scrumptious looking grilled pannini sandwiches. Our plates were garnished with a wedge of sweet and juicy watermelon. If that wasn't enough, Nelson ordered a slice of carrot cake that was just exquisite...and huge! We split it four ways and all had an opportunity to enjoy dessert. The slice was beautiful, with actual shreds of carrot. Food shouldn't always be the result of talking into a speaker and reaching through a drive through window. It should be about feeding all of the senses and that is exactly what we had today.

City Lights Cafe is in a great location, just off Main Street right here in downtown Sylva and...get this...attached to a great independently owned bookstore called City Lights also. Bernadette did everything right. She updated the windows so that she could improve the energy efficiency of the building and added air conditioning. We had stopped going to the earlier lives of this restaurant space because it was jsut too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. Now it's perfectly comfortable. There's also seating on the covered front porch and around the side in the veranda area. City Lights Cafe is very bistro, very local, and a very good addition to Sylva. I can't wait to go back!

When you think about eating out in our area - Sylva, NC really is the little town with the big town amenities.

When I was telling Leslie about participating in the 30 Day ActiveRain Localism Challenge, she had the great suggestion to write about the many advantages to living in this area and the access we have to many of the same things that bigger cities boast about. As soon as she said that, I started seeing this Town of Sylva and the surrounding towns in Jackson County with new eyes. There is so much to talk about, this will take several days to even just give you a sample. I'm looking forward to sharing with you everything that makes this area special.

Take tomorrow for example. We have a lunch date with clients who we really like to visit with. We do this every two or three months, whenever the one client feels the mountains calling him back home to visit with his mother. We eat at a different place each time. Just in Sylva alone, we have several choices.

• City Lights Cafe is located below the City Lights Bookstore just off of Main Street in downtown Sylva. In addition to a great menu they also host live music, book discussions, visiting poets and authors and other special events. Not only do they have a great eating space but there is also courtyard dining available.
• Lulu's Cafe on Main is in the heart of downtown Sylva. They've been here as long as we've lived here. For the longest time they were the only "bohemian" atmosphere we had available to us. Outside dining is available.
• Mill and Main is at the corner of well...Mill and Main! Great salads and sandwiches plus fabulous pizzas.
• Hooper's Restaurant on Main Street is unusual in that it is a full service breakfast restaurant in addition to lunch and dinner.
• Nick & Nate's is outside of downtown, they used to be located in the Hooper's building but a couple of years ago they made a big commitment to building a larger restaurant on the way into town. Good for them to take the risk, it seems to be paying off - they are always packed.
• Guadalupe's Cafe is a tapas bar and also provides live musical entertainment.
• Signature Brew Coffee Company roasts their own beans, serves breakfast pastries and provides a showcase for local art and music.

This blogpost could easily be well over a thousand words if I gave all the restaurants in one article! Consider this just the appetizer...there will be more to come in later days.

I've already sent a text to our clients suggesting Spring Street Cafe for tomorrow. Last time we were there we ordered their crepes, they were so delicious. I think I'm already hungry!

There would not be a moment's hesitation about putting the restaurants of little Sylva up against those in larger towns. After all, Sylva, NC is the small town with large town amenities

I can't believe it. Sylva and Jackson County, NC's local radio station - WRGC has just been silenced! Jackson County which just this year created one of the most fabulous public libraries I've ever seen and who is growing daily with the addition of wonderful new businesses and restaurants no longer has its AM radio station, WRGC.

People who live in larger towns can't understand what it means to lose a local radio station. Since long before the 70s, WRGC was owned by Jimmie (Uncle Jimmie) Childress and operated by him and his children. The call letters are named after one of Jimmie's sons, Ronnie G. Childress, who was killed in an unfortunate accident by electrocution while working at the radio.

Sometime towards the end of the 90s, WRGC was purchased by a Georgia corporation who operated it until August 31, 2011. Listeners found out the radio station was off the air when they turned their radios on and were greeted by nothing more than static. Posted on the station's website was the corporation's "explanation". Citing economics and the inability to keep advertising revenues up, the corporation felt they had no alternative other than to silence Sylva's radio station.

This started me thinking, were advertisers reluctant to run commercials on the radio because money was tight or were they finding more viable places to advertise? Or...did the corporation just not try hard enough to work with the community?

When we still had a retail store here in Sylva, ad reps would drop in on a regular basis to sell all kinds of creative advertising packages. Sometimes it would be sponsorships for the high school football games, or supporting Toys for Tots or other charitable events. WRGC would tie community events in with advertising...the Sylva Christmas Parade, Dillsboro Luminaires Festival, the Dillsboro Arts and Music Festival. Sylva's Greening Up the Mountains Festival, etc. WRGC would then have a booth at these events and do on air promotions and interviews.

I don't know the answer. Maybe AM radio is a dinosaur, all I know is that I am going to miss being able to tune into local news and weather reports, the community calendar, Tradio and yes...even listening to local advertising. Funny, you think you can't stand listening to radio ads...until you can't hear them anymore.

It makes me sad to know that Sylva's local radio station, WRGC has been silenced.