By Lindsay Martell – When we moved to Huntersville from Massachusetts in 2018, we heard a lot about “the bubble.”

“We don’t often leave ‘the bubble,’” they’d say. “There’s just so much to do here.”

The bubble is, of course, Lake Norman. Despite not knowing much about the area before we moved here, we quickly understood what our neighbors were talking about.

We were smitten with our new home in all the ways that count: Our daughter was thriving in kindergarten, we quickly fell in step with both native North Carolinians and transplants, and Lake Norman just fit us as a close-knit party of three (we didn’t adopt our dog until 2021). Lush, outdoorsy, tons to do and very, very chill.

And yet, we leave the bubble. A lot.

And as much as I hate driving, traffic and paying to park, we love getting out and exploring. Whether it’s catching a Knights game or visiting a museum in Charlotte, sweating ourselves into oblivion while cheering on the Kannapolis Cannon Ballers or lacing up to roller skate in Gastonia (seriously, the most fun way to spend an afternoon), exploring the cities and towns around us tops the list of what we love about the Carolinas.

Lately, we’ve been fusing two of our favorite things (pets and books) at Charlotte Humane Society with its Book Buddies program. On our last visit, I pulled a copy of Charlotte’s Web from the shelves and sat in front of a plexiglass wall, where a bully mix with warm, kind eyes watched my every move.

I turned the first pages, reading aloud the story of a farmer’s daughter pleading with her father to spare the life of a tiny piglet. I showed the pup — whose name I can’t remember — the illustrations, and I was immediately a new mom again, sharing a favorite book with my baby girl back when she was all sweetness and tiny fists.

It’s a moment that reminds me of the power of words and how they connect us isn’t just person to person, but creature to creature.

My daughter and I have to tear ourselves away after an hour with the animals, and we always, always leave with the same heavy heart. Yes, we would love another dog, but our little man is The Dog, and we just can’t.

So we appreciate having our buckets filled, knowing that most of these fur babies will be with their new families by the time we come back with more books and more moments of connection.

On a different excursion in Charlotte — the Whitewater Center — we followed our dog’s lead as we explored the hiking trails and watched the zipliners high above our heads.

It’s a place that you kind of forget is so cool, as much for parents pushing strollers as it is for mountain bikers and rafters facing the rapids, one stroke at a time.

We asked ourselves why we don’t take the Whitewater Center paths every week, or at least every month. I guess because there is just so much to see in the cities and towns we have yet to explore. We don’t want to miss a single thing, a single place, a single moment.

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Milling About is a column about life around Lake Norman, written by Lindsay Martell. The column name is a nod to life around the lake and our town’s mill history.

Lindsay Martell lives in Birkdale with her husband, daughter, and a scruffy mini mutt named Dug.