Hiking North Carolina

North Carolina has some amazing hiking trails what with the Blue Ridge Mountains and several other state parks like Pilot Mountain and Hanging Rock. It’s been a while since I’ve been hiking and I was reallllly missing it. We used to go about once a month when my good Italian energy-bundle of a friend still lived here. So I was super excited when the fiancé had most of a Saturday off and we were able to go hiking!

Harper Creek Falls Pool

I packed my fanny pack (oh yes, it’s awesome, you know you want one) and the love packed a backpack and off we went. Well, that was after trying make a decision on where to go. Sooo many options!

We drove up to the Harper Creek Area just west of Lenoir. My hiking book had mentioned several different length loops and waterfalls – yes please! After we had driven two out of the three hours there his airline decided he had to work the next morning. GREEEEAAAAT. Just as we thought we had the day to actually do something that normal people do on a weekend. Luckily there were some late evening flights that could get him to work so that we just kept going to at least do a short hike.

NC90 all of a sudden turned into a narrow gravel road…. But nothing that this farmer’s daughter couldn’t handle.

Gravel road NC 90to Harper Creek Falls

We eventually went on a fun but short 3 mile hike along Raider Camp Creek and to the Harper Creek Falls where you could rappel down to the base of the falls with the rope that was there. It looked super steep and sissy me was a little intimidated but after I saw a 5 year old rappel back up I just followed zee babe down like a mountain goat. Super fun and the view was awesome! Definitely a place to go back for a swim in the waterfall pool!

Harper Creek Falls Hike Edmonton, NC

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A Wonderful Vermont SnowCation

After a year of hard work we finally had a chance to relax and went on our wonderful winter vacation that hit all the sweet spots of Vermont. When we planned our trip we had wondered where to go skiing in early December to have a chance of snow. The Rockys are quite far from us in North Carolina and you have to deal with high altitude (think thin air huffing and puffing) and not the best chance of snow that early in the season. So it was settled, New England it was! Zee Man had been to Stowe once before and deemed it a cute place not too far from the airport in Burlington.

Thanks to the many reviewers at Tripadvisor we found the coziest little inn, The Gables Inn, and I’m not going to lie, the breakfast was out of this world! Every day we got to choose from a huge menu and we loved every single item we tried! Food in general up there was fantastic. Lots of fresh farm to table food options!
Lucky for us, that snow storm that had me stranded in Philadelphia on the way up also dumped a nice amount of snow on Vermont. Of course we went skiing (and considering that it was my second and third time on boards it went really well) but the other cool snow activity we did was dog sledding! While not cheap, it was totally worth it and an unforgettable experience! The dogs were so quirky and so eager to run. We started as the sun was setting and finished as the full moon came up. It was so special!

Naturally we explored the town of Stowe a bit (hello snow globe village) and hit some of the typical Vermont covered bridges. More Vermont-ness was had as we stopped at a cider mill, Cabbot’s Annex Store (hello free lactose-free cheese samples galore), and Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream factory. Didn’t think we were going to stop there as it seemed like an ice-cream version of the World of Coca-Cola in Atlanta (“Why do I have to pay if it’s a bombardment of advertisement?!”) but it was actually fun. Not to mention tasty! 😉

Stowe also has a tight connection to the movie The Sound of Music as the Von Trapp family settled there after they left Austria. They have a mountain lodge up there that brews their own beer so after I had finally memorized the DoReMiFaSoLaTiDo lines from the movie Michael treated me to a drink at their lodge. More cheese sampling and a great piano player made for a fun time.
Waterbury and Burlington were the other cities we hit on this trip. We had more great food in Waterbury: Prohibition Pig had as the name suggests all sorts of pig food and I couldn’t help but chuckle that Michael got the North Carolina style BBQ. Like, really?! On our anniversary we tried Hen of The Wood and that was another delicious Farm to Table choice. Mmmmmm!

Burlington itself was unforgettable as Michael popped the question at the shore of Lake Champlain. I said “Awww look, we walked down that hill as boyfriend and girlfriend and we’re walking up the hill as fiancé and fiancée!” “Well,” he says “I guess marriage will be an uphill battle!” Hahaha! Well we shall see about that!

So yes, if you have a chance to go to Vermont, do it! We had such a great time and it was the perfect mixture of relaxing, action, good food and good beer.

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I Declare Pimento Cheeseypendence!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAHappy Independence Day! One of my fondest Independence Day memories is a trip to Pawley’s Island with two of my girlfriends a few years back. It was the weekend  the bartender got fired for giving us too many free drinks. Wonderful beach time, fun shopping and frat boys asked us what year we’d graduate from college (thank you SPF for keeping us looking fine and young).

It was the weekend I was introduced to pimento cheese. I’d eat a sandwich for lunch, one for snack and maybe one for dinner. I was totes hooked! Later that year I discovered I was lactarded and the worst thing for any lactose intolerant person or people in their vicinity 😉 is soft cheese. Sayonara pimento cheese. 🙁

Untillllll I found a recipe in Rachael Ray magazine the other day that didn’t use any cream cheese at all. Hey hey, fancy that!! It asked for cheddar cubes, which I can easily get lactose free (thank you Cabot’s Cheese!!!) I added some jalapeños for good measure and always have some pickles as a side.

Pimento CheesePimento Cheese
● 3/4 of a block of cheddar, cubed
● 1/2 a glass of pimentos, drained & chopped (ca 4oz)
● 3 heaping table spoons of mayo
● ca 10 jalapeño slices, chopped (optional)

Throw cheddar into food processor and process until somewhat of a paste. Add rest of ingredients and pulse until everything is mixed well.
I like mine best on fresh bread but it should be awesome on burgers, too. Guten Appetit y’all!

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Brownie Points for You Atlanta

Y’all may or may not have noticed how good I was with keeping up with the daily photo challenge in the beginning of May. Then lots and lots happened and I became incredibly busy! Too busy to find a creative photo opp every day. No regrets though! I currently have all my engines running at full speed and am pulling strong – but more about the hustle bustle in a different post.

Before the whirlwind picked up and tossed me around we had a fantastic weekend in Atlanta. We both shamefully have had a bit of a bad opinion of Atlanta (The traffic! Gahhh! The weather! Blahhh! Lame town! Bleehhh!) The city gained tons of brownie points during this trip though and we both had a really fun time! What made it easy to go even though we felt so blah about Hotlanta was that the hotel didn’t cost a penny! The nice thing about having to travel for work are of course the frequent flyer miles and hotel points and so we used the latter and booked ourselves into a historical beauty right in the heart of downtown. High 5 to our foxiness!

We kicked off the weekend at an awesome Irish pub near by. Don’t think I had ever seen that large of a Guinness mix selection! Two of zee boyfriend’s friends joined us and we headed to the ballpark to see some Braves baseball. I hadn’t been in eight years and it was a blast. Love their signature tomahawk chop! Our friends treated us to a giant bratwurst and the Braves treated us to a win and some spectacular fireworks in the rain. Nothing like running back to the car in squelching shoes! Great fun! Brownie points Atlanta!

Saturday morning we checked out the Delta block party. Whoop whoop! Classic cars, airplanes, life music, free food and drinks. Not bad at all!!

Have to say, my personal favorites were probably the retro flight attendant uniforms. How fabulous!

 

After some relaxing at our hotel we met up for drinks with one my girlfriends and her husband at the swanky W hotel. Can I please hire the W’s interior designer for our home?!

Another high-light was checking out the original Ru Sans sushi restaurant. They have a branch in our town that I call “The Happy Place” and so I’d been dying to check out their first restaurant in Atlanta. Oh it was so much fun! (If you consider yelling waiters fun…) Had some great sushi and enjoyed cruising around MidTown. Brownie points Atlanta!

 

And finally, more brownie points on Sunday. We walked through the Olympic park (remember those games from, geez, 17 years ago now?! #FeelingOld) to the Georgia Aquarium. It was friggin’ amazing (aside from the Dolphin show, that was extremely corny). Huuuge sea creatures and we got to pet sting rays and anemones. Great fun!

So yeah, if you have a chance to go to Atlanta, do it! We enjoyed our weekend in the city tremendously and I think we’ll go back some time soon to check out some more hopefully brownie slam dunk point worthy sights. Sorry HOTlanta for totally underestimating you. Our bad.

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