Massive Fire Place at Grove Park
I arrived in North Carolina FINALLY at 3am on Thursday (Cali time) after being in California for work discussing rabbit farms. Alexis took me to River Jam at the Whitewater Center on Thursday so I could make friends with the climbers and flash some routes and wow others.
Friday was the beginning of the big adventure west. We left Charlotte around 3pm and headed through some interesting towns with TONS of churches. We finally arrived at our destination of Brevard and checked into the retro Sunset Motel. It was a long journey, so we were ready for dinner and ventured into downtown. After checking out some magnets and maps at DD Bullwinkles, we decided to eat at Square Root. They had some fancy music playing and we tasted some pork belly empanadas. Brevard Brewing Company had some difficulties with their music, so we didn’t get to hear any.
Early Saturday we began the short drive into the Pisgah National Forest where we’d start our hike to the north face Looking Glass Rock. Condensed version of Looking Glass: Made it to the wall. Saw people on Glass Menagerie. It was sweet. Were asked if we saw copperheads. Got off route and fell through a couple of trees. Found all the stinging nettles in NC. Then asked again if we saw copperheads.
The after hiking we drove up and down the Blue Ridge Parkway getting more magnets and pictures of the Blue Ridge. We made our way to Asheville and walked around town. We had some beers at the Greenman Brewery, the beer was ok, then walked around town looking for snacks. Drink some more beer at other breweries we chilled out until we got hungry again. While waiting for our 1hr long wait for a table at Tupelo Honey, we listen to some folks singer and bought a sweet sweater that was 80% on sale. At Tupelo Honey I have a nice drink call Ode’ to Old Muddy. (Ginger Ale, whiskey and sorghum). Then next morning Alexis awoke me early for a surprise tour. We took a electric Bicycle ride around Asheville visiting all types of fun architectural sites. It was a really cool activity. We viewed many cool dome churches and archdeco motifs, but the highlight was the Grove Park Inn. This a sweet resort that was construct from jumbled granite rocks.
We left Asheville after the tour and went to Bat Cave, NC and Chimney Rock. This a tourist-ed area next to Lake Lure where the mountains turn into plains. This is where the “Last of the Mohicans” last battle scene was filmed, (although you couldn’t take the actual path they hiked). We also ascended the massive of amount of stairs for the tourist attraction of Chimney Rock itself.
The next days I worked from Charlotte, and trying to help out in removing old busted things from Alexis’s condo. During the week we also made some awesome tie-dye shirts.
It a fun trip and we packed lots of activities in to a short time.
