I've spent most of my life in the western North Carolina Mountains.

My encounter happened in the early 1990s.

My kids and I would spend our weekends and evenings hunting the North Carolina Mountains

for ginseng.

It's a beautiful plant that grows in the hollers in our local area.

The children enjoyed this activity, searching the forest floor for the distinct five-leaf plant

that gave proof the ginseng root would be found in the rich dark soil below.

We did this every September and October, digging and searching.

We could earn several thousand dollars once the roots were dried and sold.

A lot of mountain folks would make extra money this way.

The children would get to keep any money they made for

their efforts. That was a huge motivation. This particular year, we found a real honeyhole in a place

called Greenville Watershed. It is a restricted 19,000 acre reserve. A highway passes through the area with signs visible all along that

warn you not to trespass. Looking back, I have to ask myself why on earth we went in there,

because we could have gotten in a lot of trouble if we had been caught. This forest was

completely untouched by humans and it was isolated. Needless to say,

there was abundant plant life. One evening, after my husband got off work, we went to our honeyhole to

dig. The fall evening was perfect. The air was crisp and the sky was blue and we had been blessed with our

diggings. In fact, we were so successful that we went further into the forest than usual.

The day had gotten away from us and darkness was setting in under the tree canopy. We made

our way back toward our car, which was parked in a discreet area along a

narrow road. We were still in the darkness of the woods, but we could see the last of the

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