New City, BBQ, and America's Largest Home

Mom and I finally checked off an item that's been on our "must-see" list since I started working at Southwest: The Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC. Each year we include it in our potential trips, but every year closes without a visit. The North Carolina winter weather cut out a number of months (considering its gardens are part of the attraction) and the rest of time was well, just a little too rich for us frugal travelers.

But this year, the end of March provided the perfect opportunity: springish weather, March 16th service start to the new SWA city of Greenville, SC (just over an hour drive, instead of the 4+ hours from Raleigh), and best of all - half price admission!

Over the past few years, we've adapted to this flexible travel called non-reving, which leads to a less planned trip than what my personality would normally require. When you've had trips change destination from East Coast to West Coast the day before (or even day of travel), you learn not to over plan, because things always change. So for this trip, I had 1) Tickets to the Biltmore - they had to be booked in advance for the discount 2) a refundable hotel reservation and 3) a refundable car reservation. That was it, no info on other sights to see or restaurants, etc.

The black cloud point of view to this would be that you miss something you really wished you had known about. The silver lining is the fun of discovering and experiencing something unexpected. Luckily, this trip was much more of the latter. While I was driving us north from the Greenville-Spartenburg airport towards Asheville, Mom was researching some of the must-see sights in the area, other than the Biltmore. She found the home of Carl Sandburg, noted author and poet, was just outside of Asheville and right off the highway on which we were driving. A National Historic Site in the Park Service meant admission would be minimal and we could arrive with plenty of time to explore.

On the way to the house, we experienced a true serendipity. This beautiful house and waterfall was along the tree lined county road. So perfectly picturesque and people were just driving by it! We, of course, made a u-turn and stopped to capture the image.


As you may be able to tell in the above picture, it was raining in the area. By the time we made it to the Carl Sandburg house, it had let up enough for us to make the relatively long trek up from the parking lot to the house. Which was good, because neither of us had an umbrella. Sunglasses a plenty, but no umbrellas.

Front view of the house - not as large as the one we'd see the next day, but very interesting nonetheless. The neatest thing was how much the house was kept as if someone was still living there - that was the family's request when they donated it. Our guide said one of the granddaughters visits anonymously and then tells them where things are out of place, from the piano to the magazines!

The books in the study - just a fraction of the 11,000 volumes in the house; and another 5,000 are in storage! I don't know if my library will ever catch up!

While he was writing (and obviously reading) Mrs. Sandburg raised goats and ran a small dairy. The dairy is no longer a working one, but they still raise goats "for the tourists." A couple of babies had been born the day before.

Our second day was wholly dedicated to the Biltmore. Pictures were not allowed inside the house, so there's just a few outside pics to share. A few fun facts about the house. At over 4 acres of space (in the house; it sits on 6,000 acres of land), the house includes 250 rooms, 34 bedrooms, 43 bathrooms, 65 fireplaces, a swimming pool, a gymnasium, a bowling alley and 30 work rooms, servants' quarters and kitchens.

Our self guided tour covered most of the main public rooms, the servants areas, and a few of the family and guest bedrooms. They had just recently restored four of the guests rooms and it was interesting to see the painstaking details they took to recreate fabric, paint, and wallpaper from photographs and mere scraps of materials found off the originals. Remarkable, and really beautiful final work.

Mom and one of the lion statue "greeters."

The front of the house (cropped, compare to the one at the top)

Lunch in the Barn
After walking through all those rooms and stairs, we had built up an appetite! So we wandered over to one of the many "out" buildings and decided on lunch at the Stable Cafe, the former horse barn which has been converted into a dining room.

See the old horse stalls along the side.

Mom with one of the "booths."

Good home cooking - chowder and chicken pot pie!

The Gardens
Although we weren't there for the peak garden season, there was plenty of green and quite a few plants in bloom.

We were fascinated with these trees, which have been made to grow in interesting shapes.

Mom with the conservatory.Lots of blooms inside.

Some other interesting things about the place. First, this clock, to which all of the clocks in the house were connected. Only one time at the Biltmore!

And this - a rare 1913 Stevens-Duryea Model “C-Six” seven-passenger touring car. Only 10 are known to be in existence today.

As you can imagine, touring the whole house and grounds took up the better part of the day. It left us with only time for one important task for the trip - eating Carolina BBQ! Evidently the best (aka. most well known) places are only open for lunch, but the very helpful staff at our hotel directed us downtown to ED Boudreaux's Bayou Bar-B-Que. Interesting menu - BBQ and Cajun, not something you see everyday. Still the meal didn't disappoint and they had more sauces than I've ever seen -14 in all!


And the final, fun random sighting of the trip. We left for the airport earlier than needed and so we had some time to kill. Mom had discovered an old covered bridge was just off our route - one of the few standing in the state. Another short detour for another fun picture!