up North in Dayton, Ohio

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Now we made it back North to Dayton, Ohio. But the way from Key West to Dayton led over the beautiful small town of Asheville, South Carolina, home of the University of North Carolina, and named 'New Age Mecca' by CBS News. It is located in a lovely setting in the Blue Ridge Mountains (remember 'Am Fuss der Blauen Berge'?), has about 90k inhabitants who are sure its the center of the Universe, and have some excellent restaurants and a vibrant life in town, at least of Friday evenings. Just as Bob and Steve had told us before.

This morning we visited a true gem in the Asheville area - the Biltmore estate from George Vanderbilt, a 250 room castle, com;lete with a beautiful garden and some 8000 arcres (32 km2) of forest around it, that was finished in 1895. It is quite comparable to Neuschwanstein, the most romantic castle from the same period. The key differences are that Ludwig II of Bavaria built Neuschwanstein entirely with tax money, while Vanderbilt used his inheritance of 10 M$ (1890 value, now about 200 M$ or more) to build it, and he lived afterwards 19 years in it with his family, and had it always filled with many guests. We had never heard of it before, but it out-scales Hearst castle in California quite a bit. Its a fascinating place, and the visit there is quite worth while.

It better is worth the while, as the entrance to Biltmore is very expensive. But still it is quite crowded with tourists, so it seems that the business school of Vanderbilt University (founded by the grandfather of George Vanderbilt) has done a good job in setting the price - just below the absolute pain threshold. Different than Hearst Castle, Biltmore still belongs to the Vanderbilt extended family, and they use the money for maintenance of the estate - and it is in a very good state, the entrance fees seem to be well used. And maybe there is some leftover to pay for the large Xmas party...

After the visit of this enchanted castle, we continued our flight to Dayton (Ohio). On departure from Asheville,, we requested to fly over the Biltmore estate. Controller responded with 'Biltmore tour approved, steer heading 30 deg to intercept' and gave afterwards more vectors to the estate. When we arrived, it was in the shadow of a cloud, but after one turn over it, the sun started to illuminate it - spectacular view. The picture doesn't capture it fully.

Went North to Dayton VFR between the clouds - quite spectacular. VFR with flight following is handled like IFR traffic, except that the controllers always state to maintain VFR, Worked out well today, only two clouds insisted to block our path.

We'll fly to Oshkosh tomorrow, after a visit of the Air Force Museum tomorrow morning. Arrival to Oshkosh seems quite stressful, so we went through the arrival procedure this evening over the Mexican food and the Magaritas - we'll see how its going to work out tomorrow. No idea where we'll find he next internet access, we plan to camp next to DDN, and don't expect much comfort.

By the way, there were rumors (i,e, weather forecasts) predicting thunderstorms yesterday and today on our flight path - didn't materialize. Yesterday we saw the thunderstorms from a little distance (but we stayed clear of them), and today not at all - maybe at the horizon. Lets see what the weather is like tomorrow. Today in Asheville it was a moderate 27 C, but here in Dayton it has increased to 35 C, which feels by far not as hot as the 32 C in Key West, due to the high humidity there. Oshkosh may be worse - we'll see tomorrow.

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Photos

up North again
some 7 hrs flying time, with cheap fuel ($4.91/gal) in Lake City.

fairwell from the Keys
and the thunderstorms were still some distance away

Biltmore castle
the 250-room estate from 1895 - nice art objects inside

Biltmore from air
with the nice gardens

Cloudscape over Ohio
from 8500 ft VFR