Weekending Through the Mountains

There's something about the city of Asheville that keeps drawing Patrick and me in for a visit {& it's not just the breweries.}

I think it dates back to one perfect weekend that we had there nearly three years ago, back when we discovered just how much we loved day-dates. It's a city that we've become quite familiar with. We know how to get to our favorite breweries, we don't get too lost when we visit these days, and we have so many memories tied to this town. When we realized back in the winter that a big, fancy trip to Ireland wouldn't be in the cards for our anniversary this year... we started planning for Asheville.

We got on the road after work on Thursday, checked into our hotel just before 9 o'clock, and headed right back out to Wicked Weed. I know that a lot of people aren't too crazy about Wicked Weed right now and their decision to sell out, but that's not going to stop me from going to their taproom. Delicious beer is delicious beer and I'm not complaining.

After Wicked Weed, we thought it would be a great idea to walk to Hi-Wire Brewing.

Pro Tip: don't. Call the Uber or make the decision to walk during daylight hours. It was a little sketchy. We did get another brewery crossed off our list {#31!} so it was worth it.

Friday morning, we ventured over to Biscuit Head for breakfast. We were amazed at how many people where there for breakfast on a Friday morning! I can only imagine how packed it must get on the weekends.

Afterwards, Patrick and I went to New Belgium Brewery right as they were opening up for the day. Someone {Patrick!} might have even had the first beer of the day there. I'll have more on this for you tomorrow because our experience at New Belgium deserves an entire post to itself.

Sierra Nevada didn't disappoint, either. The food there is amazing: we had the ham pizza, the moroccan skewers, and the beer pimento cheese with pretzels. So, so, SO good.



It was a short trip to Sierra Nevada and we decided not to do the tour here. They have a self-guided catwalk tour that was plenty enough for us.



We headed out to Hendersonville, NC to meet up with Patrick's family at a family friend's mountain house where we stayed for the remainder of the weekend. They had come to town for Patrick's cousin Angela's wedding. We caught this view of the stormy weather over the mountains as we were going back to the cabin after dinner in Chimney Rock:



Saturday morning, we woke up to this view:



You couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day for a wedding, either. We actually got cool outside. I don't think the temperature ever got higher than 75 while we were in the mountains this weekend and I'm definitely not complaining. It felt amazing and made me wish for fall weather and football season.

It has been so good to be able to spend time with Amy this summer while she's been in town. Patrick and I both felt like we didn't see her at all last summer in between trying to fix up and move into our house and our wedding, so we've been making up for it this year.

That night, we had the best time sitting on the porch, watching the sunset, singing along to some fun songs, and eating pizza. How do you beat this view?



But there comes a point in every summer when you're ready to move on. I think that both Patrick and I hit that point this weekend. It's been a crazy busy, crazy fun summer for us. We've traveled to Nags Head, Kiawah, Edisto, Charlotte, Charleston, and Asheville. We've celebrated the 4th of July, our friends' wedding, my birthday, my dad's 70th birthday, our anniversary, and Patrick's cousin's wedding.

It has been so much fun.

But now I'm ready for fall and football. The cooler weather in Columbia last week combined with the chilly weather in the mountains has me dreaming of football season, all things pumpkin, and a return to our less hectic lifestyle. We've got two more adventures this summer though before we pack away the suitcases for more than three days.

Happy Monday, y'all!