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Sunday July 10. Left at 9:30 AM. Got to
Aslin Beer Company's
Herndon location about 20 minutes before they opened
at 11:00. They had 3 locations at the time, and this one opened in fall 2020. I sampled:
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Just 6 minutes away is Juicy Brewing, which had opened in Aslin Beer Company's old space 5 months earlier. I was only going to try one beer but the owner, Anton, gave me a second one for free. Both beers were pretty good.
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On a tip from Anton I added Ocelot Brewing to the docket. The name Ocelot is a reference to a Phish song. I only tried one beer as this was my third brewery and there was still another one to go. I liked it enough to buy a 4-pack of it.
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Then it was off to Adroit Theory Brewing, where I had been once before, and tried:
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After that I went to the home of my friends Karin and Roger, who I hadn't seen since returning from my 2017 Asheville/Richmond trip. Since I'd last seen them they'd turned part of their garage onto a very cute Airbnb.
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Karin had to run an errand so she dropped me off at nearby Farm Brewery at Broad Run, which opened in 2017. It's a big place with axe throwing, cornhole, and kids running around. The beer was not very good, as has been the case at most of the farm breweries I've been to. I sampled:
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Then she retrieved me and we went back to the house for a cookout dinner.
Monday July 11. Left before 7 AM and met my old friend Don and his fiancée Sondra at Yee-Haw Brewing in Johnson City TN, where they had been living for two years. Don and I have known each other for many years, and we visited breweries in Belgium together in 2009. I ordered a beer and tried a few beers that they were drinking.
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There are several breweries in Johnson City but most of them are closed on Mondays, so I drove past Tennessee and North Carolina mountains to Zillicoah Beer Company. They don't do flights but they do half pours so I got:
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Then I went to Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which is the most visited national park in the U.S. Here are some photos I took on the way in:
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I got to
Smokemont Campground around
5:00ish, set up my tent, and made sandwiches for the next day. As expected there was no cell service.
The campground has bathrooms with toilets and sinks but no showers. I went to sleep around 10:00ish.
The weather was warm and humid.
Incidentally there is a great website where you can look up
campgrounds across the U.S. and see photos of individual campsites before you make a reservation.
Tuesday July 12. Woke up around 4:00. It was still fairly warm due to the humidity. Left around 6:45 for my first hike. Lack of cell service made me glad I'd printed out driving directions. Here are a few photos I took along the road.
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I arrived at the Alum Cave Bluffs Trailhead at 7:30, and almost every parking spot was taken. Today's hike would be Mt. LeConte via the Alum Cave Trail. It starts out along Alum Cave Creek. Here are some photos of the creek...
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...and here are some videos:
After a while I got to Arch Rock. Here is a photo...
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...and here are some videos:
At this point the hike got steep, and coupled with the humidity and a full backpack made me sweat quite a bit. By the time I got to Inspiration Point sweat was dripping off my face and the shins of my hiking pants were saturated.
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The rest of the hike was no easier, but it was worth it.
A little while later I got to Alum Cave, which isn't really a cave but a big arch in the side of a
mountain. It's too big to photograph from up close, so here are a few photos of the underside:
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Here is my attempt to capture it in a video:
Here is the view looking upward:
Here are a few random trail photos:
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Here are some nice views:
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Here's a mossy area that I thought was kind of cool:
I made it to Mount LeConte Lodge around 11:00. There are several small cabins where guests can stay overnight, and they're so popular that they must be reserved a year in advance.
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Got a cell signal so I was able to post some photos to Facebook while resting and eating lunch.
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After that I passed the Mount Leconte Trail Shelter (where backpackers can stay overnight)...
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...and this view...
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...before reaching the top of Mount Leconte a little after noon, where there are no views, just this cairn:
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Then I went onward to Myrtle Point, which had fog blowing through but during breaks in the fog I was able to snap these photos:
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Then I headed back down, which made my knees and feet sore from all the kinetic energy. The trail has lots of flat and angled rocks, many of which were wet from recent rain and humidity, making them a bit treacherous. I fell on them twice, once on the way up and once on the way down. I also fell when a root caught my hiking sneaker on the way up. Fortunately I did not get hurt. Now that it was sunnier than it had been on my way up I got views such as this:
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I was tired and sore after hiking 12 miles with a 2850-foot elevation gain and drop. Despite its difficulty it's a very popular hike, at least partly due to the cabins, which allow people to go up one day and come down another. On the way back I saw these nice views from the road:
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When I got back to the campsite took a I sponge bath, hung out with the staff at the check-in station, and made sandwiches for the next day. Rain came in around 9:15 and I fell asleep a little while after that.
Wednesday July 13. Woke up at 4:40 after sleeping well with lots of dreaming. Exercise and the outdoors help me sleep better than I normally do at home. The creek next to the campground, called Bradley Fork and which feeds into the Oconaluftee River, was rushing loudly due to the night's rain. Left by 6:30 and headed to Clingmans Dome. On the way I snapped these photos. The first was taken from the same exact spot I'd taken my last photo the previous day. Note the difference due to different sunlight.
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It was very foggy at Clingmans Dome, so I hiked to Andrews Bald hoping that the fog would lift in the meantime. Here are a few trail photos:
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It was still pretty cloudy when I arrived at Andrews Bald at 9:00, so these are the best photos I could take:
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After returning from the 3.6-mile roundtrip, I walked half a mile up a steep road to Clingmans Dome. Unfortunately it was still foggy. When I first arrived the view looked like this:
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The fog came and went in huge billows, so by waiting around I was able to snap one semi-decent photo:
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The view was a little better down at the parking lot:
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Then I drove back up Clingmans Road...
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...to the Newfound Gap parking area...
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...thinking that maybe I could hike to Charlies Bunion, but it started to rain, so that hike would have to wait until the next day. On the way back to the campsite I got this view from the road. Both photos are from the same spot with different camera settings.
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I also stopped at the Kephart Prong Trailhead and shot this video from a bridge over the Oconaluftee River:
When I got back to the campsite I walked around. Here are a few videos of Bradley Fork:
I caught this pair of butterflies doing what butterflies do:
Then, right near my campsite, I found another pair:
After my sponge bath it rained again for a while around 2:30 or so. Then I made sandwiches and didn't eat dinner because I hadn't hiked much. Fell asleep around 9:00ish.
Thursday July 14. Another good night's sleep. Woke up at 4:10. Packed everything up and left at 6:20. At the Newfound Gap parking area I got this view (the three photos are from the same place with increasing magnification):
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Started my hike to Charlies Bunion at 7:12. The trail is a mixture of steep and flat, rocky and smooth. Here are some photos of the trail and an overlook:
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Here is the Icewater Spring Shelter:
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As I neared my destination I got this view:
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At 9:00 I reached Charlies Bunion, and here was my reward:
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Returned to the parking lot, which was packed by now, just under four hours after I'd started. Then I headed out of the park, taking these parting shots along the way:
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The weather was gorgeous: in the 70s and mostly sunny. My Google Maps app was unable to help me due to limited cell reception, so once again I was glad that I'd printed out directions. In two hours I arrived at Sierra Nevada Brewing in Mills River (Google Maps has them located in Fletcher for some reason). Sierra Nevada started in California and has two locations there, neither of which I've ever been to, but I had been to the Mills River location in 2017. It was 1:30 on a Thursday and the place was slammed. One of the employees told me that the place is always busy in the summertime. I got a flight of their biggest beers.
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Then I checked into an Airbnb in Asheville, took a much-needed shower, and headed to Wicked Weed West, which I'd wanted to hit earlier because it's on the way from the Great Smoky Mountains to Asheville, but it didn't open until 4:00. Wicked Weed has three taprooms as of this writing, including two in downtown Asheville that I'd visited five years earlier. In fact, during that trip I visited many of the breweries that I would go to over the next several days. This location has a very cute taproom and many beers and wines on tap (yes, Wicked Weed makes wine). I sampled the following, the first four of which were from the Funkatorium:
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Dropped my car at the Airbnb and walked to some local breweries. This part of town is very hilly with lots of small streets and some unusual-looking houses.
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First I went to New Belgium Brewing. They have two locations, both of which I'd been to, this one in 2017 and their Fort Collins location in 2018. I sampled:
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On the way to my next brewery I stopped at a place called Haywood Common and had a salad.
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Then I visited One World West, which is one of One World's two locations (I'd been to their Downtown location in 2017). There was a live band. I got half pours of:
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On the way back to the Airbnb I stopped at Fleetwood's, which is a rock and roll chapel. There was live music and I would have hung out but they wanted to charge me $10 to stay.
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Friday July 15. Slept pretty well and spent the morning working on this web page, which needed a lot of work because I hadn't logged anything since the previous Sunday. It was a gorgeous, sunny morning when I drove to Eluvium Brewing in Weaverville. Got there a few minutes before they opened at 11:30. Talked with the bartender and another patron who told me that North Carolina law prohibits the sale of more than one beer at a time per person, unless they're samples (which is how breweries can get away with selling flights). Often bartenders will sell two beers at a time on the assumption that you're buying one for someone else (I guess they reason that if they get caught, they can plead ignorance). Also, happy hours are illegal, which means that the same prices must be charged all day. Anyway, I got samples of:
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There is another brewery a stone's throw away, but it wouldn't open for another hour, so I walked around town and browsed a few shops, none of which interested me. Luckily I found a park called Main Street Nature Park, so I walked in there for a while.
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Then I went over to Zebulon Artisan Ales and sampled the following for only $6:
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Came back to the Airbnb and Lyfted to Dssolvr. They don't do samples or flights so I got half pours. They would only serve two at a time, for reasons explained earlier.
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Next I walked to One World's Downtown location. You walk down an alley and then down stairs to get to it, and the taproom has a very nice dark basement vibe to it. I sampled:
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Then I visited Wicked Weed Brewpub, which had many beers, both sour and non-sour. I got:
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I set out to visit another brewery and happened upon Bhramari Brewing, so I went there instead. Their beers got low Untappd ratings so I only tried one.
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Lyfted back to the Airbnb and crashed before sunset.
Saturday July 16. Slept well, with lots of dreaming. Got up around 4:40 and wrote for most of the morning. Drove to Wicked Weed's Funkatorium right when they opened at 11:00. The big space where they used to house their barrels has been converted to a seating area, and the barrels have been moved to another location. I tried 6 sours and all were well made. The first two were a little too sour for my palate, which is why I rated them "pretty good" instead of "good", but they were still well made.
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Wicked Weed's corporate office, called the Funk House, is located 20 minutes outside of town in Arden NC. It's not listed on their website, but there is a Facebook page where I've seen people post that they're at the Funk House, so out of curiosity I drove there. Well, it was locked up and there didn't seem to be anyone around. There were a few company vehicles (pictured below). Upon revisiting the Facebook page, it seems that people mistakenly claimed that they were at the Funk House when they were actually at other places such as the Wicked Weed Brewpub or even the Biltmore.
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Drove back to the Airbnb (traffic was heavy as it was Saturday and people were shopping) and had to wait a half hour for an Uber because it was early in the afternoon and there weren't a lot of drivers (there are more drivers in the late afternoon and evening). Lyft was going to charge $14 but they had no cars available, so I went to Uber, which got me a car but charged $27 to go 4 miles. Oh well, I wasn't going to drive since I planned to hit several breweries and get drunk, so I bit the bullet.
My first stop was Eurisko Beer Company. No flights here so I got two half pours:
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Right next door is Dalton Distillery, and although I'm not much into spirits, I stopped in anyway. It is illegal for them to sell samples, but they can give samples away as part of a tour (another crazy North Carolina law), so for $5 I got an impromptu tour. They use agave and apples rather than grain as a fermentation base. The place has been in business since 2011 but didn't start distilling until around 2016 (it was just a dive bar before that). Dalton is the only U.S. distillery that uses blue agave to make vodka (it can't be called tequila unless it's made in Mexico). After the tour I sampled:
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Burial Beer Company has four locations, including two in Asheville. Today I visited their South Slope Taproom + Kitchen. The place was very busy, and rightly so: the beers ranged from good to excellent. Burial is the best brewery in Asheville, hands down. I spent a lot of time, money, and liver power here, and it was so worth it. They didn't serve samples, only half pours, and they only served two at a time.
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Next I walked to Dirty Jack's, which is Green Man Brewery's original tasting room and where Green Man's specialty beers are brewed. It started in 1997 and is Asheville's second oldest brewery (the oldest is Highland Brewing, which started in 1994). I got half pours of:
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Next door is Green Mansion, a combination packaging hall, tasting room, and "brewtique" that opened on St. Patrick's Day 2017. None of their beers looked interesting enough to buy, and since I was drunk, I didn't sample anything. But I did take photos.
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Then I stumbled over to my final brewery of the day, Catawba Brewing, which has five locations in North Carolina. The original, in Morganton, opened in 1999. Today I visited their South Slope location. They sell preset flights, so I got their hoppy flight. I wasn't very impressed, but to be fair, I was drunk so my palate wasn't very receptive to beer.
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Then I Lyfted back to the Airbnb a little after 6:00 PM and crashed shortly thereafter.
Sunday July 17. Woke up around the same time as the day before. Now before you think that I slept a long time, I didn't. I always wake up at least once in the middle of the night, and it can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours to drift back to sleep. In the 8 or 9 hours I was in bed I might have slept 6 or 7 of them, which is still good for me as I often sleep only 5 hours and have to take an afternoon nap. Anyway, I spent the morning writing as usual before going brewery hopping.
It was a gorgeous sunny morning, and since my first brewery was less than 2 miles away I decided to walk to it. I could've gotten a cheap Lyft but I enjoy the outdoors, so I left at 10:20 and had a nice walk. Some of the streets in this area are not even listed in Google Maps. I noticed this at the other Airbnb, and my Uber driver had said the same thing the previous day. Anyway, on the way to my first brewery I encountered this vehicle:
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I got to Cursus Keme shortly after they opened at 11:00. They started in 2018. The taproom has some neat wooden benches and tables. I sampled:
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A tenth of a mile away is New Origin Brewing. They opened on August 6, 2021. The bartender gave me small samples to help me decide which libation to order.
The place had goats, and women were doing goat yoga.
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Next I walked toward a touristy section of town called Biltmore Village. At many intersections there will be a sign for one street but not the other, which makes navigating this area challenging, at least when you're walking. Along the way I got this view:
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I also found some unique homes.
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Eventually I stumbled upon French Broad River Brewery, which wasn't on the docket due to low Untappd ratings, but I figured, why not? They had just celebrated their 22nd anniversary. Since their beer ratings were so low I only tried one:
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Just around the corner is Hillman Beer, which has locations in Asheville (opened April 2017) and Old Fort (opened July 2020). Obviously I visited the former.
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When I left around 2:15 clouds were rolling in. I visited Catawba Brewing's other Asheville location (the one I didn't visit the previous day) and tried the following, all of which were pretty good.
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When I left it was raining, and fortunately I'd brought my makeshift rain poncho. I walked to Burial's other Asheville location called Forestry Camp Taproom + Kitchen and sampled:
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There were four beers I loved at the other location the previous day, and I hadn't thought to buy any to go. Two of them were for sale here so I bought a bottle of each. Since I had plenty of time I walked 45 minutes mostly uphill in the heat and humidity (the rain had stopped) to the other location hoping they had the other beers. Well, I should have called first because they didn't have them either. So, I ended my Asheville stint with a sample of Hope is as Hollow as Fear. Then I Ubered back to the Airbnb at around 5:45, wrote for a while, and crashed.
Monday July 18. Woke up in the wee hours and couldn't get back to sleep, which wasn't surprising since I'd gotten lots of good sleep the previous several nights. Just as well, because I needed to get an early start. At 6:00 I headed out and arrived at Linville Falls shortly after 7:00. I was the only one there, probably because it was a Monday morning and most people were working, plus it was early. There are three viewing areas for the falls. The first is the Upper Falls Overlook. It can't be captured in a single photo, so watch the video that follows the photos.
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The second viewing area is called the Chimney View Overlook.
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The third is the Erwin View.
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About a half hour away is Grandfather Mountain. On weekends you need a reservation to get in, but during the week there are fewer visitors so you don't need one. It costs $24 to enter, but it's worth it (I got a $3 military discount with my DoD retiree card, which is civilian, not military, but most cashiers don't know the difference). Included with admission is a CD, which narrates what you're seeing as you drive up the very steep and winding road to the top. My first stop was the Half Moon Overlook. The first photo is on normal setting and the second is panoramic.
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There are other views along the way.
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Here is Sphinx Rock, so-called because part of it looks a bit like an Egyptian sphinx.
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There is a nature center on the way up.
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Going further up there are more views.
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About a half mile before reaching the top is the Black Rock parking area. There is a one-mile trail that starts there and leads to some spectacular views, which can be accessed by climbing up a ladder to a cable that will help you climb up a large rock face. Here is the view from the ground:
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Here is the view from the top of the ladder:
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It's not easy to get up there, but it's worth it. There is a 360-degree view, which cannot be captured in a single photo, but here is a photo nonetheless.
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Here is a 360-degree video that will give you a better idea of what it's like to be up there:
Climbing down wasn't easy either. Here is a view from above the cable:
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After returning from the two-mile round trip I made it to the top parking area at 11:00. Of interesting note is that I got cell service on the Black Rock Trail, but not here. Anyway, there were a good number of people. Here is a view from the parking area:
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Probably the most famous feature of Grandfather Mountain is the Mile High Swinging Bridge, so-called because it's a mile above sea level (but only 80 feet from the ground).
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I walked across it, taking these photos along the way:
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On the other side of the bridge is an outcropping that offers other spectacular views.
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My photos cannot do this place justice. Maybe some expensive photographic equipment could, but not my iPhone SE. There is nothing like actually being there.
Then it was a 5-hour drive to my next stop, the temperature rising from the 70s on Grandfather Mountain to the 90s at sea level. A little before 5:00 I arrived at Trapezium Brewing and sampled:
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When I arrived in Richmond a little before 6:00 my car's thermometer was reading 97 degrees. I stopped
at the home of my friends Alyse and Glenn, where I would be staying for the final two nights of my trip.
We hung out for a while, then Glenn and I went with Alyse's son Mick to
Mekong, a combination Vietnamese restaurant and brewery.
My friend Mike joined us, who coincidentally grew up in the same part of Richmond that Glenn did.
The four of us sat at the bar and had dinner. The food and beers were very good. Most of the roughly
50 taps have guest beers. We sampled:
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Next door is their sister location, The Answer.
I'm not sure of the relationship or the legalities involved but they have separate entrances and
they are not allowed to serve any of the same beers, so the roughly 50 Answer taps have different beers
from the ones at the other place. There were a lot more Answer beers here too. We sampled:
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We drove Mike home (he'd Ubered) and then returned to Alyse and Glenn's.
Tuesday July 19. Slept pretty well. Wrote and relaxed most of the morning, then went with Glenn and Alyse to Legend Brewing, which opened in 1994 and is the oldest craft brewery in Virginia. It is also a restaurant that serves good food at very reasonable prices. We sat on their deck, which offered a nice view of downtown Richmond (the view was scheduled to be obstructed by a proposed tall building). We had a nice lunch and sampled the following beers:
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Then we went to
Triple Crossing. They have three locations; this was
their Fulton location, and I'd been to it twice before. We tried:
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Then we headed to a section of town called Scott's Addition and stopped at Ardent Craft Ales.
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A block away is Strangeways Brewing, which has two locations in Richmond, plus one in Fredericksburg and one in Williamsburg. We stopped at their RVA-SA (Richmond Virginia - Scott's Addition) taproom. The place had a unique vibe, and they played videos of Bob Ross. We sampled:
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Then we walked to Väsen Brewing and sampled a bunch of beers. Fortunately Mick joined us and helped us drink them.
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Next we went to Strangeways Brewing's other
Richmond location and had:
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Then we went to Black Heath Meadery, which is owned by a friend who used to be a member of one of my homebrew clubs, and tried four 12% ABV meads:
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We dropped Alyse off at home and the remaining three of us went to our final brewery, Stone Brewing, whose main locations are in San Diego. The front of the building is not marked. To get there you park in back and walk across a small bridge. We tasted:
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Glenn gifted me a growler of RuinTen. Then we picked up food at Station 2, brought it home, watched a movie, and turned in around 10:00.
Wednesday July 20. Slept well. Got up around 5:30, wrote, hung out, and took off a little after 8:00.
Phew, what a trip. Hiking. Friends. Mountains. Waterfalls. Sunny skies. 39 breweries (plus a meadery and a distillery). 169 beers (plus 4 meads, 4 spirits, and 2 slushies).