Asheville offers a great city experience as well as a nature escape nearby! Photo by: Evan Berman

This is the introduction to the trip, stay posted for reports of the city and hotel. As with all Trip Introductions, I will include Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How Sections.

This introduction is the beginning of the Blue Ridge Excursion. For more information on this trip, follow these links:

Intro (This Article)

Hotel: Fairfield Inn & Suites Tunnel Road, Asheville, North Carolina

Hiking on the Appalachian Trail

Food and Drinks in Asheville

Conclusion

Who:

I went on this trip with my family. While I enjoy traveling alone, it’s great to spend time with family especially around Christmas!

What:

With a couple of days off from work around the Holiday, we looked at places within a short drive of Charleston (give or take under 5 hours). Asheville falls into that category and we found a place to stay and some great places to visit– yes that does include Sierra Nevada obviously!

When:

The trip was a quick 3 day excursion in between Christmas and New Years.

Where:

Believe it or not, no flights were taken on this trip! We drove up after work and drove back Friday night. As such, the itinerary was Charleston- Asheville- Charleston. Quite exciting!

Why:

As mentioned above, it’s always a pleasure to spend time together. Exploring a different city than your own can be a great option and while we don’t get the chance to travel together as frequently anymore, this certainly brings back memories of trips we took growing up!

How:

More details will be provided in the individual articles but here is what I spent:

Flights:

N/A. If you want to be technical, we filled up with gas twice, so there is that!

Hotel:

We booked 2 nights at the Fairfield Inn & Suites Asheville Tunnel Road, a Marriott property. When selecting a hotel, I will usually opt for one of the following (in order of preference):

• Inexpensive Hyatt (either points or cash)
• High return of American Airlines miles booking through Rocketmiles
• A Marriott property

In this case, Hyatt does not have any hotels in Asheville so I went with the second option. Fortunately, the hotel I chose was offering 9,000 American miles for our 2 night stay!

In total, we paid $513.17, a large but not exceptional price for 2 nights during the Christmas season.

The hotel is reviewed in this article.

Highlights Include:

• Hiking on the Appalachian Trail
• Spending time with family
• Sampling beer at local brewpubs and famous taprooms
• Tasting quality food

This trip was a spur of the moment idea. We booked everything about a week before embarking on the trip and still managed to have a great time! Stay tuned for the review of our hotel and time in Asheville.

Evan