Trip planning: Asheville again!

This planning post is for a trip to Asheville in October 2017.

Hello! After a stationary summer transitioning from the Airstream into our renovated house, we’re looking forward to dusting off the Airstream and hitting the road for a week next month. Our favorite quick and easy destination is Asheville, NC, for the culture, beer, food, hiking, and cool campground. This will be our fourth time taking the Airstream to Asheville; read about the others here, here, and here. We’ll be combining some of our old favorite spots with those we’ve been wanting to try but hadn’t managed to get to, and some brand new (to us, or to the world). What do you think should be on our to-do list? Here’s my brainstorm so far:

Repeats

• FOOD: I suspect we’ll go to White Duck Tacos; we’ll try to keep it to a single visit.
• BEER: The always-packed Wicked Weed brewery kind of turned us off last trip, but they have a new beer, Napoleon Complex, that we love (and J still loves his Pernicious), so we should pop in. Last trip, Hi-Wire and Burial were our favorites, so we’ll probably swing by those again too. Riding the beach cruisers to New Belgium was really fun so maybe we’ll do that again.
• CULTURE: Blue Spiral 1 is our favorite art gallery in Asheville and we’ll visit there for sure.

New Experiences

• FOOD: Ok I’m super excited about this place: a restaurant made out of SHIPPING CONTAINERS. I am obsessed with shipping container architecture. And it’s riverfront! We’re definitely checking out Smoky Park Supper Club. The local/seasonal restaurant Local Provisions sounds like our kind of place for a nice dinner (although they’re undergoing a massive personnel change right now). Nine Mile won Favorite Restaurant over Cúrate and Limones (both of which we thought were great) (EDITED: it turns out we have not actually been to Cúrate, so adding that to the list!) in the Best of WNC 2017 voting. Ice cream sandwiches at Sunshine Sammies! And as seeking out biscuit joints on our Airstream trips has become a favorite pastime, we’ll definitely have to go to Biscuit Head. Stop the presses–right before hitting publish on this post I read that White Duck Taco is starting a Sunday brunch!
• BEER: Beer + science! Yes, please! White Labs is a yeast laboratory with a tasting room. We’ll also do a brewery crawl down Haywood Rd in West Asheville for Archetype Brewing, Triple Seven Brewpub (if it’s open yet), Oysterhouse Brewing, and Up Country Brewing. Throw in The Whale Craft Brew Craft Beer Collective while we’re in the neighborhood. How are there so many new breweries–and we were just there earlier this year!–in a town already packed full of them? Sideways Farm & Brewery opens late Fall just outside Asheville; if they’re open and on the way home from a hike we may stop there for some farm-to-table beer. Eurisko Beer Co is opening on the South Slope sometime in 2017. We could try something different at Ginger’s Revenge, brewer of alcoholic ginger beers.
• COCKTAILS: I do love a creative cocktail, and according to the NYT article, Sovereign Remedies is the place to get one (I’m SOSOSOSO bummed we won’t be in town for their special Indian dinner! A similar dinner in Austin was a highlight for us in that city!). A cocktail is even better with a great view, and apparently SkyBar is the place to get those. If we hike north of Asheville, we could stop on the way home for an afternoon cocktail on the patio at the historic Grove Park Inn.
• CULTURE: The River Arts District has a bustling Saturday scene when many studios open to the public. We stumbled upon it last trip, but didn’t have time to poke around (had a date planned at New Belgium!). I’d like to take a stroll through the historic Montford neighborhood for the pretty architecture.
• OUTDOORS: We had a couple hikes on our list from last visit that we didn’t get to: 6.5 mi Looking Glass Rock Trail near Brevard and 7.1 mi Max Patch northwest of Asheville, and let’s add 7.2 mi Bald Knob Ridge Trail to the list of possibilities.

Getting really excited about this trip! Hopefully the Airstream still works!

Here are some things Bugsy’s been up to: