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Published: September 4th 2007
The view
From the Italian Garden up to the House
The view from Biltmore Estate
Me in front of Biltmore House
It's been a wonderful weekend for travel here in NC! I headed to Asheville, in the western part of North Carolina, to see what I could see between Saturday and Sunday. My friend Jenny came down from Ohio to go with me and we had an absolute blast! I picked her up in Raleigh Friday night after having a wonderful dinner with Joni and Mike in Mebane.
Saturday we got up and had brunch at Midtown Cafe and then hopped in the car to go to Asheville. Took us about two hours to get there but we had no problems. We finally found our hotel (after going to a hotel in the same chain, just not the one at which we had reservations) and then went to Biltmore Estate. As we entered after 3pm, we knew we could go back on Sunday for free. We were going to wait to tour the house until Sunday as we thought we'd see some of the other attractions on the Estate. The FANTASTIC guy at the desk convinced us to tour the house Saturday night with
Lions
Two marble lions guard the Main Entrance a pre-recorded audio guide and it was awesome. There were NO people there (or at least that's the way it seemed compared to all the people there on Sunday) and we could spend as much or as little time in the rooms as we liked.
We finished our tour of the house and headed to the Winery and The Bistro area. We wanted to eat dinner at The Bistro but they were booked until closing. We walked through the winery before leaving to head to Downtown Asheville. We didn't have any real destination in mind but both of us felt that Thai food was a grand idea. We found a place called CF Chan's quite by accident and ended up having a scrumptious meal. I had something called San Pei Chicken and Jenny had Pad Thai. Both were excellent and we'd highly recommend the restaurant!
Sunday was a long day as we were up at 7am so we could get to the House early. As it was a day that typically has tremendous attendance, timed entry passes were being issued. We bypassed this system and went on two separate tours. We did the Behind the Scenes Tour at
Grand Staircase
The exterior of the Grand Staircase 9:30am and learned a lot about the house and its residents. Then at 11am we did the Rooftop Tour. Both gave us incredible insight into the forward thinking of George Vanderbilt.
After we completed the tours, we wandered down through the gardens, past the Conservatory, and on to the Bass Pond. It was a nice walk...but uphill the entire way back! After our walk we decided to go through the Conservatory and look at all the interesting plants that are cultivated on the Estate. Then we went through the Ramble (the shrub garden) and the Italian Garden before taking the shuttle back to the car.
Then we went to eat at The Bistro and there was only a 10-15 minute wait for a table. Granted, it was about 3:30pm when we were eating lunch so there really
shouldn't have been a wait. Our meal was tasty--we both had the Chicken and Portabella Rigatoni--and we cleaned our plates. Then we got in the car to head back to Winston-Salem. A good time was had by all!
On Monday, Jenny and I went to Chapel Hill before her flight left in the afternoon. Now it's back to work on
Up on the roof
Standing on the roof on top of the Grand Staircase Tuesday! Hope you've all had a safe and wonderful Labor Day weekend! Mary
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shelley
non-member comment
favorite place!
Chad and I LOVE Ashville. It is one of our favorite places. Seeing the pictures makes us miss NC. We should come visit. I think one of your trips needs to include Oklahoma...I will start looking for sights.:) How about an OSU (OKlahoma State) football? Miss you, shelley and chad