Xenophilia

Having vacation days you have to use can be a good thing. Ready to escape the cold and snowcovered Rockville area, I checked the weather forecast within a 600-mile radius and settled on Asheville, North Carolina as my primary destination, thinking it would at least be warmer than in Rockville. Technically, I was right, but I still did not avoid snow. More on that later.

Logistical delays put me on the road just before 11 am on Thursday, February 15th. It was sunny but very cold. It took me nearly an hour to get to Gainesville, Virginia. A too-early turn put me on a road that went through the middle of the Manassas Battlefield Park, which was very pretty covered in snow. By the time I made it to the Roanoke area, all the roadside snow was gone save a few tiny patches in the median. I was booking it fairly quickly, but still managed to make a few stops on back roads, such as in Hurt, Virginia. I pulled into Greensboro while it was still light out. My first stop was a motel I had seen a sign to, but it turned out to be quite creepy. I think there was a drug deal occurring in the room next to the one I asked to see and the lights didn’t turn on, so I clandestinely called Red Roof Inn and found out they were cheaper anyway, so I went there, stopping a couple times for price checks that were slightly more expensive anyway. I got a ground floor room and met one of the friendliest front desk clerks I’ve ever encountered.

I soon headed downtown, attempting to meet up with a Beer Advocate group scheduled to meet at a bar that I drove around for 25 minutes trying to find. I ended up at the Natty Greene Brewery, which was the endall destination anyway. The beer was good and the food was too, but neither were spectacular. I did some barhopping on a particularly dead Thursday night and called it a night around midnight. At one point I was the only patron in an “Irish” bar (quoted because there wasn’t much Irish about it other than the name and the standard beer taps). At least they did have some good beers on tap. I had a good conversation about travel with some guy from eastern NC who encouraged me to keep on traveling and write about it. Well, I guess I’m trying to do that.

The next morning I headed back downtown after checking out. I had seen the Green Bean coffeehouse the night before and made a note to check it out. They had wi-fi and for the first time I wanted to try out my computer’s wireless capabilities there. Perfect! Note that it’s almost a month later, but that’s beside the point. Anyway, I enjoyed my coffee and a pastry and hit the road. At the hotel lobby I found a brochure for an interesting home in Kernersville, so I thought I’d check it out.

Körner’s Folly is a structural wonder just off the city center of Kernersville, NC. The house was built by an eccentric designer as a horse stable and showcase for his architectural designs. When he got married, his wife wanted to live there but not with the horses, so began an endeavor to build a house layer by layer. There are about 22 rooms in the house, which is big but it does not appear to be big enough for that many rooms. Well, some of the rooms are small or hidden but the place was fascinating. Because it was not on my itinerary it made for a particularly fun discovery. The house had a huge ballroom with “kissing corners” for couples to have some privacy and a repertory theater in the attic that is still used occasionally. The family was well-off, but very community-minded and they had children come over where they learned languages, music and other literary and artistic subjects. The stories are really impressive, for example how the maid who raised Mr. Körner and his siblings ended up living in a house on the property and when she died and the Methodist church wouldn’t bury her in the cemetery because she was black, he bought land next to the cemetery and buried her there! He also wanted access to a large tree for the wood, so he bought the entire farm the tree was on just to get it. I bought a lot of stuff at the gift shop, including the booklet on the house.

My drive to Asheville then took on a longer journey than I had intended. I had lunch in Hickory at the Olde Hickory Brewery, which was fairly good. I even tried to stop at the Catawba Valley Brewery but it was a winery/antique barn with the actual brewing facilities in the lower level. They said a new brewpub will open up in Morganton soon, but I was glad I stopped in Glen Alpine for the wine. It turned out to be quite good and I’ll have to get Lake James wine again.

Asheville was a cool place. It’s very artsy and reminded me a lot of Boulder, CO. I stayed in the Sharky & Bon Paul’s Hostel in West Asheville, which was an old house actually. Lots of barhopping and breweryhopping, but I missed several of them because I couldn’t find them or they were closed.

Saturday was a long day but good. I had breakfast in Weaverville at a little diner/cafe. What prompted me to drive to Weaverville isn’t clear but I’m glad I did! It’s a cute tiny town, but my continuing drive in a loop up to Mars Hill and Marshall back to Asheville was a beautiful drive. The highlight…and exhaustion…for the day was the Biltmore Mansion. Despite being off-season, the lines were incredibly long. After waiting 30 minutes to get tickets, 20 minutes to drive to and park at the mansion, and another hour waiting outside in the cold, I finally made it inside the actual mansion. The pace was like a shuffling penguin and the place was huge, so it took about two hours to go through the whole mansion. It was quite amazing, with an entire floor for the servants, a room for the architectural model of the mansion and a basement bowling alley and swimming pool. The views, even in winter, from the courtyard next to the grape arbor were exquisite over the rolling hills of North Carolina. It had just started to snow, too, so it was peaceful and breathtaking.

Next on the Biltmore tour was the winery, so I drove 4 miles there (still all within the estate grounds) and waited for about 45 minutes to get into the wine tasting room, but it was neat. Apparently though they did not have a winery during the time Vanderbilts lived there. Oh well. I got to try 9 wines, which I thought was pretty generous considering. I bought three bottles and some other gifts and, famished, was on my way downtown for dinner. I ate at Boudreaux’s Cajun Cafe and had some excellent gumbo and a Cuban sandwich, with some local microbrews. My favorite spot was The Barley’s Taproom, the “Brickskeller” of Asheville, with probably 75 beers on tap. I tried some of the local area beers from breweries I couldn’t get to. That night it snowed about an inch, which made driving a little treacherous while it was actually snowing but not that bad.

On Sunday I had to drive back to Rockville, but not before a filling strawberry and pecan pancake breakfast downtown. The scenery driving north was beautiful and I stopped to take some pictures of the snow-covered landscape north of Asheville. I made a few stops on my way home. The first was downtown Johnson City, TN. It was very forlorn–a ghost town and the only thing open was the billard hall. So much for that place. Then I went to Kingsport where I discovered a bevy of antique malls. I stopped at Nooks & Crannies and found some blue glasses for Mark before heading off on the long drive back to Rockville. I ran into a snowstorm around Marion, VA and then a freak blizzard somewhere near Harrisonburg that really scared me. For a little bit, I couldn’t even see the snow itself but just a complete wall of white outside my windshield: no road, no taillights, nothing. Luckily it didn’t last too long and it was just as abrupt ending as it was beginning. The strangest part was that no more than 5 minutes later I looked up and saw a starry sky. The experience was pure adrenaline but at the same time I felt very cozy and safe in my car.

Although I wished I had taken another day off work to extend the vacation, I was very pleased with the choice and destination. Without the stops, it would be about an 8-hour drive so that’s doable on a 3-day weekend for sure but ideal for 4 or more. I hope to make it back to Asheville sometime soon.