Hey guys! Happy Wednesday to you! I am so excited to be able to share today’s blog post with you! It’s only taken me a few months to finally put it together! (oops!) We took the absolute best road trip this past Fall all the way down the southern part of the East Coast! We made so many stops and I tried to document every last drop because I wanted to remember EVERYTHING!
The weather was perfect, the mountains were beautiful and the company was even better! We got to visit with Nick’s brother, Andy and Mahmoud with their parents for a few days and it couldn’t have been better! You may remember around the Fall of 2017, we took a trip to Madison and Chicago because they previously lived there! Well, lucky us they moved all the way down south to Raleigh, NC and we got to visit! We are already planning our next trip there because we couldn’t squeeze everything in, even though we definitely tried reallllly hard to!
There will be 3-4 parts to this, so be sure to keep up and stay tuned! 😉 First stop, we traveled from Little Rock to Raleigh with one overnight stay in Asheville, NC! We really wish we could’ve stayed longer in Asheville and saw it more in the daylight, so that’s what’s on our list for next time. We’ve heard nothing but good things about Asheville so we feel like that may be a trip just on it’s own!
The colors and views were literally stunning around every corner! We felt like we were driving in a postcard! Even though this trip was technically 14 hours or so–it didn’t feel even close to that because the drive was so dreamy!
After spending all of those hours in the car, we finally made it to Nick’s brother’s apartment right in the heart of downtown Raleigh! His brother is THE BEST at finding the go-to spots so we of course had some of the yummiest food while we were there visiting. The first place we went right after pulling in was their local food hall spot. If only we had something like this in Little Rock, I’d be there all the time! They had so many different options of food to choose from depending on what you were craving at the moment!
We went with a good old fashioned burger and fries! That basket of fries is calling my name as we speak! 1 order of crispy fries with a side of ranch please! 😉
Raleigh was such a great city! We felt super overwhelmed by the craziness and chaos everywhere last year when we visited Chicago, but Raleigh was just big enough for us to feel the city feels but also get that cozy hometown feeling at the exact same time! It was super clean, everyone was friendly and the big winner in my book–EVERYONE had dogs!!! They were everywhere!! Andy said they could probably be on of the only ones there without a pet but only because they travel all the time so it would be really hard to have to find somewhere for a little furry friend to stay for those trips! I’m still secretly crossing my fingers they get a dog really soon though! We’ll be happy to come to Raleigh to dog sit anytime! 😉
We strolled through their downtown streets and came across a little art walk and I was AMAZED at the chalk drawings! Nick’s brother said they had some sort of a festival the days before we got there and these were drawn by local artists! How cool, right? Anthony Bourdain’s picture was beautiful and felt so real!
I couldn’t believe these would have to get washed away by rain or something! If I were the artist behind these, I’d want to make sure they stay forever if I put in that much work and love into my masterpiece! Clearly, this happens frequently for those crazy-talented artists, so they probably weren’t too concerned like I would be! HA! Spoken from a true non-artistic person!*
Andy took us to the best pub hall/beer garden! It was so fun tasting the different flavored beers!
Did I mention we had perfect weather to do everything outside? We got to sit in their outdoor patio area for our drinks and it was so nice!
I was more of the lighter beer fan and not so much of the dark. Nick was the complete opposite!
Another super delicious food stop! There was no shortage of delicious food while we were visiting Raleigh, that’s for sure! Fish and chips was a common order for us because you can’t really ever go wrong with that.
One of our favorite stops though, was this old school arcade right around the corner from where we were staying! (Literally, everything was in walking distance!) It’s an arcade with all of the old games we used to play as kids like Tetris, Pac-Man, Frogger and so many more! They give you free popcorn and you can even grab drinks while you play!
I would like to say, here, that I did win a game of 4 player Pac-Man against Nick’s mom, brother and the MOST competitive person ever–Nick himself! I WON! I never win against him in games, so to say I was prettttttty proud was quite the understatement! 😉 I wasn’t quite so lucky with the air hockey though…
The night scene didn’t disappoint either! I’m such a sucker for twinkly lights and they were perfectly wrapped around every light pole in the city! Charm, charm and more charm everywhere we looked!
So much fun was packed into just a few quick days in Raleigh! But, the fun didn’t stop there! We packed up and headed to Washington D.C. for a day trip and it was even better than I could’ve dreamed! More to come on that trip next week–but in the meantime–here’s a video of all of our Raleigh fun! I love being able to bring these pictures to live in video form for my very first travel vlog! Take a look and let me know what you think!
Thanks for following along for Part 1 of our trip! If you’ve never had the chance to road trip down the East Coast, I am totally encouraging you to take the chance when you can! If you can’t tell we had so much fun in just a few short days and saw SO many beautiful sights! We loved not having a plan and just winging it by the feel and what sounded best to us!
Next up on the travel blog/vlog: Part 2: Washington D.C.
Stay tuned, friends!
Questions for you:
Have you ever been to Raleigh, NC?
Have you ever camped at the Smokey Mountains?
What was your last vacation? What made you pick that destination?