Dispatches from the Blue Ridge: Part V

When I began my series of posts about our trip to North Carolina, I wrote that the house we rented was so good I would eventually devote a post specifically to it. Well, here it is.

When you go on vacation, you almost always get a better deal renting a house than staying in a hotel. There are the obvious benefits of having much more space, much more privacy, etc. As I have written previously, with a washer and dryer at your disposal you can pack fewer clothes, and with a kitchen at your disposal you can buy groceries and prepare some of your own meals, which is more economical than eating every meal out. And the rental rates tend to be stunningly competitive (more on that later).

Simply put, renting a house gets you a better place to stay and saves money in the process. However, the place we just rented takes it to a whole other level. Dubbed Appalachian Retreat by its owners, Dennis and Debbie O’Neal, it was completed less than two years ago and is immaculate in every way. Though I previously called it “a ridgeline cabin,” I am dropping the word “cabin” because it implies a lack of creature comforts that you just won’t find here.

Appalachian Retreat is a three-level home with every level having its own bedroom, bathroom, and sitting area. The first and second levels each have a gas fireplace and outside deck. The sitting area on the first level includes a foosball table; the one on the second would be considered the home’s great room; and the one on the third is a loft with a tasteful game table. Here is a view looking down from that loft:

The second-level fireplace is two-sided, so you can view its flames from out on the deck as well as from inside. And I know its flames are not merely cosmetic, because we felt its warmth standing outside even when the temperature was in the teens. Here I am reposing on the deck one morning:

I can not begin to tell you how wonderfully appointed the house is. The furniture and appliances are all top-of-the-line and full of character, from the kitchen’s granite counter tops to the lower level’s hardwood floors, which are fashioned from wood salvaged from an old tobacco barn. In a major plus for me, there are none of the cheesy decorations that often afflict vacation rentals (you know what I mean, the kind of decorations which assume that because a house is in the mountains, every square foot must be festooned with images of bears).

And speaking of those stunningly competitive prices I mentioned earlier, as of the day I am writing this, the nightly rate for this entire house is $130, while the nightly rates for a lone room at the nearest LaQuinta Inn range from $79 to $129.

More impressively, the weekly rate for Appalachian Retreat is only $775, and if you go with friends and split the cost like we did, you will start salivating over how much you get for your dollar. If you and another family go for a week and divide it in half, you will pay less than $56 per night. If you and two other families go and divide the price evenly, you will pay less than $37 per night and each family will have a whole floor. (Keep in mind that all of these rates are for non-holidays.)

If you read my previous posts about our vacation, I shouldn’t need to sell you on Appalachian Retreat’s location. It is on a ridgeline in one of the most beautiful parts of the country, close to many handsome towns, and we saw deer in the yard almost every day. However, because my posts were all about winter activities, I feel compelled to mention how wonderful the Blue Ridge Mountains are during other seasons.

Fall foliage brings a riot of fiery colors from mid-October to mid-November, and because most of the trees surrounding the house are hardwoods, I am sure the view from its deck will be postcard worthy if you come at that time.

When the days turn warm in spring and summer, wildflowers bring their own changing hues and the streams and waterfalls run full. Whitewater rafting is exciting on the Watauga and Nolichucky Rivers, and the summit of Grandfather Mountain -- highest in all the Blue Ridge, featuring this mile-high swinging bridge -- is reliably accessible.

You can not go wrong renting from the O'Neals. They are nice, and easy to work with, and their house is splendid. Go here to visit their web site, where you can check current rates and inquire about reservations.

Dispatches from the Blue Ridge: Part III

Today's theme was slidin' and imbibin', with more of the former than the latter.

After breakfast we headed to Hawksnest Resort and logged a couple hours of snow tubing. With 20 lanes ranging from 400 to 1,000 feet long, Hawksnest is the East's largest tubing park -- and at $22 per person you can't complain about their price, especially when you compare it to the price of a ski resort lift ticket. If you haven't been tubing before, you should give it a try. You basically sit in an inner tube and slide down a groomed lane of snow, with no talent required.

Then we headed to Banner Elk, the only one of "The Three B's" towns we had not yet visited on this trip. We drove through town and made our way to The Banner Elk Winery, where for $15 each we got to taste eight of their wines and keep the glasses. We found all of Banner Elk's wines to be good, but especially the Banner Elk White and Banner Elk Red, each of which is a simple table wine made from a blend of grapes.

Located at 4,200 feet elevation, Banner Elk is the highest winery in Eastern America -- and one of its vineyards is located at 4,900 feet, making it the highest vineyard in Eastern America. If wine is your thing, you will be interested to know that an eight-room bed and breakfast is located on site. Here is a picture I took from the winery's front porch:

It didn't snow during the day, but flakes started falling as I was unloading the car after we returned to the cabin. Right now it is 26 degrees and they are continuing to fall.

Dispatches from the Blue Ridge: Part I

We are in northwestern North Carolina, close to the mountain towns I have always called "The Three B's": Boone, Blowing Rock, and Banner Elk. We are staying in a ridgeline cabin that is so good I will devote a post specifically to it once our trip is done.

There has been snow on the ground in these parts for more than two weeks, and in the three days since we arrived temperatures have not made it above freezing. Such conditions may not sound appealing to Northerners, but they do to Floridian children...and even if the parents of those children aren't cold-lovers like me, they will find the wintry landscape beautiful and enjoy playing in the white stuff with their kids.

Boone, home to Appalachian State University, is the U.S.A.'s highest town east of the Mississippi River with a population of more than 10,000. Yesterday we poked around a number of shops in its town center, including Mast General Store (which is the ultimate general store) and Footsloggers (which has high quality outdoor gear). Then we dined at a sandwich restaurant called Our Daily Bread, where I enjoyed the Gouda Heavens and every person in our party raved about the food. The kids kept wanting to stray from the sidewalks to step in the snow.

Today we drove to Blowing Rock, which is about 7 miles on the other side of Boone and has an even more immaculate downtown. Snow started falling on the drive over and was soon showering down, although the flakes were small and weren't always visible in pictures. I photographed a downtown park that looked peaceful but felt piercingly cold when the wind swept across. Needless to say, the hot chocolate across the street at Kilwin's hit the spot!

By the time we made it back to Boone for a 5:00 dinner at the Dan'l Boone Inn, the snowflakes were big and they were falling fast and often horizontal. We watched them come down while eating at a round table by a window, and snowplows were on the roads before we left.

The Dan'l Boone features family style eating that Erika aptly described as "a buffet but they bring it to you." It is not cheap in the way McDonald's is cheap -- but it is not expensive, and they charge different prices for kids and adults, and you will definitely get more than your money's worth. It is down-home-like-grandma-cooked-it and the mashed potatoes will make you drool thinking about them. Here is one of the Dan'l Boone's window boxes:

We've been back at the cabin for hours. It is 15 degrees right now and continuing to snow. I just came in from the back deck, where the porch lights illuminated white flakes falling through the clouds of my breath. I can not wait to play with Sarah tomorrow.