So this weekend we decided to do a little spur of the moment family vacation trip. And man, was it ever a trip. There were some real terrible times, but overall we had fun and I'm glad we went! Our main destination was Asheville, but we made a few stops along the way and along the way back home. So here are a crap-ton of pictures!
The morning we left. Isn't he so super precious? He sleeps in his own bed most of the night but he likes to wake up around 5:30-6:00am, but if I move him into bed by me he'll fall back asleep for a couple more hours. And that mosquito bite on his poor little cheek!
We made a little pit stop on our way out to Asheville to see one of two covered bridges left in North Carolina. It was only 10 minutes from the freeway so, why the heck not go see it?
After the covered bridge, we continued on our way west. We wanted to go to Sliding Rock and Looking Glass Falls, but they were PACKED with people. It was insane. So to pass the time until there was parking available we hung out with this turtle Kade caught. It was not interested in that watermelon, unfortunately.
We didn't get any phone photos of sliding rock or looking glass, but I got a bunch of video with our little knock-off GoPro type camera, so I'll post that when I get it all fixed up nice.
Kade was nice enough to take me to the Biltmore! I've wanted to see it ever since we moved to NC, which is also around the time I got into Downton Abbey... so after 2.5 years of me whining about wanting to go we finally went. It was quite pricey, and having to bring the kids (who were free) with us almost made it not worth it, but it was. It was fun and so great to see a little part of American history.
Such pretty lily pads on the ponds in one of the gardens.
Check out that view! The Blue Ridge Mountains are no Rocky Mountains, but the way they go on and on and on is stunningly beautiful.
Jones was making himself right at home.
Creepy basement. I'll admit, while we were touring down there I got a little panicky and claustrophobic. It was dark and the windows were tiny and I can't believe the servants just lived and worked all around down there!
But hopefully George Washington Vanderbilt let all his servants play a quick game of bowling after their long hard days doing everything for him.
I'm pretty sure the tour only went around the left side of the building, and only three of the floors. We probably only saw like 20% of the house, but it was fabulous. Can you just imagine what's in the rest of the house?
We got lucky and it was only 80ish degrees and overcast (until the end when we were taking this picture, then it got SO BRIGHT), otherwise I think we would've been pretty miserable inside that house without a/c.
After that we went to our hotel and I found this:
Hey there someone's butt! ***cringe***
On our way back home today we hit up the Henry River Village, shooting site of District 12 of the Hunger Games movies! It's only a little over an hour from our house. Even though most of the buildings were boarded up and totally decrepit, Katniss's house was nice and clean. Still spooky, but there were no gaping holes in the floor boards.
Peeta's family's bakery. How cool, huh? Even though this little ghost town was in a movie, it was once a thriving little community. It would be so neat to see it in it's heyday.
We got some cool video of all the many houses there, but I'll have to post that later, too.
Family Trip selfie! No kid was ever paying attention ever! I guess to them family trip means a vacation from listening to us.
It was a pretty fun vacation all around, the kids even did good sleeping at a hotel! Well, the first night. The second night was rough. We saw a lot of cool things but I gotta admit, the highlight of the trip was running into a Kmart for jackets for the kids (the one thing we forgot! And it rained a whole bunch while we were there) and finding out everything was 70% off because they were closing the store! I got a sweatshirt for SEVENTY CENTS.
Ok, not the highlight. But it was pretty great.
Now I'm gong to get working on all the video footage I took. We got a bunch of video of downtown Asheville, which was legit swanky. Crunchy hippies all over the place. And you know, I say I'm going to work on the video but you probably won't see it for like... a year. Unless you remind me! So please do.
Until next family trip!
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