About 12 miles South of town is the Oliver Lee General Store just outside of the Oliver Lee State Park where we are staying.
When we decided to stop in and check it out I was expecting grocery items, hardware, and stuff along those lines; you know, like a “General Store”. That is not what we found.
It was more of a mini “flea market” offering a hodgepodge of items for sale, but it was predominantly rocks and gems.
The owner we learned is 85 years old and has been collecting stones and items from all over the area and world, apparently, bringing them back to the store and making sculptures and other decorative items with them.
He is only there on Wednesdays and the weekend so if you want to meet him plan accordingly.
We thought we were just going to drop in, have a look around, maybe buy a trinket or two and then go home. What we found in addition to all of the wares was an endless supply of stories from the locals at the store.
How fun! I sat on the “porch” steps, played with a bunch of kitty cats and listened to the locals.
Wish we would have stopped here first, they had the scoop on all the cool spots to check out that you don’t find in the tourist guides.
There was a water tower next to the building and I thought wouldn’t that look cute with some sort of work up to make it look like the one from the Petticoat Junction.
