Summer Road Trip: Day One

Asheville, North Carolina: After a great trip in the mountains last year, we decided to return to the mountains again this year for our summer vacation.  We had originally planned on going to New Orleans, however the great advertising package run on television by Visit Asheville guided us to changing out venue to North Carolina.

We departed for North Carolina early, hitting the road by 3am.  The original plan was to leave early and reach Columbia, South Carolina in time for the Columbia FireFlies matinee.  However, my wife had woken up early so we decided to hit the road earlier than planned.  As a result, we were going to be passing through Columbia too early for the game so we decided to head straight to Asheville instead.

While on the way up, my wife checked on the rates at our hotel and found that the room had been reduced again.  Over the course of planning this trip, we have saved considerably since the original booking.  When we changed the trip from New Orleans to Asheville, we booked the Country Inn and Suites on Expedia for $139 a night.  A few weeks ago, I decided to check the rate through the hotel directly and found that it was listed at $113.  So we decided to cancel the Expedia booking and book with the hotel.  Since booking with the hotel, it dropped to $89 last week and $80 today.

Once we reached Savannah on I-95, the rest of the trip was uncharted territory for us.  South Carolina was rather uneventful and unexciting scenery wise until we reached closer to the North Carolina line and the elevation and mountain views.

We headed straight to the hotel to check in before heading into town to explore.  At check-in, we were greeted by a helpful hotel staff who informed us that they were upgrading our room to a suite.  So what a deal, in addition to the savings, we got an upgrade to boot,  You couldn't ask for much more.  We then unpacked the car and headed into downtown Asheville.

Our first stop was the Asheville Visitor's Center to board the GrayLine trolley tour.  The 2 hour hop on/off tour starts at the visitor's center and gave us a narrated tour of the city.  While we didn't have time to hop off at any of the stops, the tour was an amazing way to get an overview of the city, its history and what it has to offer.

When the tour concluded at the visitor's center, we headed to dinner.  Tonight my wife chose the Moose Cafe.  This southern homestyle restaurant was more than I had expected.  The food servings were huge, two meals in one huge.  I had the country sampler which was country fried steak, chicken tenders, 3 sides, biscuits with applebutter and corn bread.  My wife had the Biltmore sampler which was country fried steak, chicken fried steak,  3 sides, biscuits and corn bread.  My son had the Moose Burger and fries.  There was so much food that we brought two whole meals back to the hotel fridge.  In addition to great food and great service, the price was amazingly cheap for the amount of food that you get.

After dropping the food off at the hotel, we headed back to downtown for our ghost tour.  We met our tour guide Tadd at the masonic lodge and hit the streets of Asheville to hear about the haunted history of this great city.  Tadd did a great job bringing the history to life via great story telling with a lot of historical context, something which I really enjoy.  We did have one unexplained occurrence during the tour.  While Tadd was telling the story about the Battery Park Apartments, he mentioned a red glow that comes from an unoccupied apartment on the corner of the building.  While he was telling the story, a figure appeared in the window he was referencing.  We brought his attention to the window, but as the group began to focus on the window, the figure vanished.  However, I checked my camera and revealed to the group the image that showed a figure in the window of the unoccupied unit. The tour concluded in their museum.  We browsed their exhibits and then headed back to the hotel to call it a night.

We had a very busy first day.  It was a long day, hitting hour 20 being awake as I type this.  I will have more photos and stories about the trip when I return home.  So be sure to follow the site for these new additions.

Tomorrow's adventure has us heading to the Biltmore.  Check back tomorrow for a look at the Vanderbilt mansion in the mountains.



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