Hitchhiking Life

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Ramblings of a guy who is taking life as it comes.
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Tuesday, February 21, 2006

The great escape - 1

I had a teriffic weekend. As I had mentioned in my earlier post, I had gone on a road trip to Biltmore Estates (Asheville) and then on to Gatlinburg. The journey took me from Central NC to the mountaineous western boundary of the state and then on to Tennessee (damn! I always get the spelling wrong).
We(me and Surya) started at 5:00 in the morning. The first thing to do was get an economy sized car from Thrifty. The lady there gave us perhaps the best economy car they had. It was a Chrysler Cruiser. The Cruiser is a decent sized hunchback with amazing accessories. Perhaps the most useful thing it had in it was a roof mounted electronic compass and thermometer.
We started from Durham at about 6:30. Surya drove for the first hundred miles and then I drove for the next 120 miles to Asheville. This leg of the journey was eventless except for the 125$$ speeding ticket that Surya managed to get for speeding at 80mph in a 70mph zone. Damn luck!.
We arrived at Biltmore at about 11:00 and after purchasing 25$(off season) tickets we drove the three miles to the Biltmore House.

The Biltmore house looks like a 18th century castle. The huge grounds, the fountain (rather ordinary) and the sculpted gargoyles. You can either opt for a self guided tour of the 200+ room castle or take a audio tour. The temperature was below freezing and we were more than happy to enter the log fire heated castle.

We opted for the self guided tour (stingy of us) and joined throngs of people on a tour of the four storeyed castle. The castle is filled with artifacts and treasures from around the world (Mr Vanderbilt's Collection). Things of note are a 10,000 pounds four storeyed chandelier and the huge basement mechanical refrigerator. Also notable is the bowling alley which was one of the first in the US. I didnt think that the castle was as big a bang as was advertised. Attached to the castle is a cosy bakery and a stable restora. I had a brownie at the bakery and I declare it to be the best one I have ever tasted here. Go to Biltmore for the Brownie, if not for the castle.
Our next stop was the winery, which is one of the best in these parts. The mountains of western NC have warm days and cold nights which make them suitable for cultivating grapes.

I was very excited as this is the first time I was going to an actual winery. My tryst with alchohol usually ends in a burp :-). You take a self guided tour of the winery and familiriase yourself with the various steps of wine production.

I must admit that wine is a vast subject in itself. I never knew that there were several types of wine and prominent among them were Dry White Wine (Chardonnay and Riesling), Rose Wine, Red Wine(Cabaranet Sauvignon) and Sparkling Wine (Champagne). Also each of these wines go well with certain types of food items. For example red wine goes well with meat and the Riesling goes well with Indian food.

The best part of the trip to the winery is the wine tasting ritual. You (provided you carry valid ID) can taste upto 8 different varieties of wine. You are given a leaflet containing the names of the various wines produced at Biltmore and the oppurtunity to taste most of them. At the end of the process you fell rather flushed and tipsy.
By the time we were ready to proceed to Gatlinburg it was 4:30. We bid farewell to Biltmore and started on the final leg of our onward journey. The best was yet to come . . . .

1 Comments:

At 7:48 PM, Blogger educatedunemployed said...

Wow, sounds like an awesome weekend.Have you heard about the wine tasting tours,in that part of the world?An Irish friend of mine and me have been thinking about it.

 

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