Take a walk on the wild side: North Carolina

Looking Glass Falls

After Sliding Rock we drove over to Looking Glass Falls just off of the Scenic Byway. These falls can be seen by the byway or you can get an up close look at them after just a short hike. You can’t come this far and not hike down to see them in all of their beauty. The girls liked getting up close to them and feeling the mist coming off of them. After the frigid water of Sliding Rock, they didn’t feel the urge to jump in and swim.

Looking Glass Falls are named for how they look in the winter when the water freezes and creates a mirrored effect, hence, Looking Glass.

In awe of the natural beauty around us.

The background almost doesn't look real, I feel like we're standing in front of a green screen. :)

After all of our hiking and swimming the girls were pretty beat, which was perfect since we had another 5 hours ahead of us in the car. We headed out of North Carolina and finally arrived in South Carolina! We pulled in to Myrtle Beach about 9:00 and checked in. Our room is amazing with 2 queen beds, a murphy bed, and a sofa bed. Grace wanted to sleep closest to the balcony so she could hear the ocean, Emma thought the murphy bed was awesome since it came 'out of the wall,' so Norah got a queen all to herself. There is a kitchen and a bathroom separating the two rooms so it is nice to put the girls to sleep and not have to go to sleep at the same time as them.

Sliding Rock

After lunch we continued on the Parkway to Sliding Rock. The elevation dropped tremendously at this point as we noticed in temperature. With a lunch time temp of 67 degrees, we didn’t even drive 5 miles before we were already at 78 degrees…our ears popping the whole way down! It got cooler again as we approached Sliding Rock. This natural waterfall is fueled by 11,000 gallons of water a minute, providing quite a rush for anyone daring enough to brave the 55-60 degree water. Of course, our girls are daring! With an 8 foot drop at the end, we thought Norah should maybe sit this one out, so Mark took the girls down for the ride of their lives! They had a ball sliding down the rock, and the blast of frigid water at the bottom didn’t deter them from multiple trips down! Norah dipped her toes to try it out as well…and her finger after getting stung by a bee…poor thing!

First trip down, they thought they should all stick together!

The water was freezing during the plunge at the bottom.

Grace wanted to try it all by herself...Emma wanted to stick with Mark.

Grace held out a few rides longer than Emma.

Adventure is out there...and they find it.

Brrr...cold on the toes, but healing for a bee sting.

Blue Ridge Parkway

After the Arboretum we drove down the Blue Ridge Parkway (considered one of the most beautiful drives in the US) toward the Cradle of Forestry in Pisgah National Forest. Emma and Norah loved driving through all of the tunnels; including Pine Mountain Tunnel, one of the longest on the Parkway. Grace loved stopping at all of the overlooks and checking out all of the amazing views. Halfway through our drive we stopped off at Pisgah Inn for lunch overlooking Mount Pisgah. This all-glass restaurant provided a 180 degree view of the Smoky Mountains while we ate lunch. We had a corner table so we enjoyed our lunch with some incredibly unobstructed views of the mountains…not to mention our lunch was delicious…the Carolina’s know their BBQ!

Her face says it all. The views were incredible...and the drops-off were STEEP!

A favorite were the tunnels when the radio would go out. No signal when your under a mountain, the girls couldn't believe it went out every.single.time.

Who cares about waiting for a table when this is the view?! The Mt. Pisgah inn was the perfect place for lunch!

All-glass walls with an incredible view of the mountains.

North Carolina Arboretum

We woke up this morning and headed out of Asheville to the North Carolina Arboretum. This place was so serene. We walked the paved paths checking out all of the beautiful waterfalls and landscaping and then checked in at the main desk for our fun activity of the day…Geocaching. I have wanted to try this for a while and I thought what better way than to do it on vacation. We checked out a GPS and started our treasure hunt. Grace ran the GPS for the first geocache, ‘Wild Child.’ It took us off the beaten path and was really difficult to find. Whoever had hidden it before us did a great job! We traded a little football for a kaleidoscope. Then Emma took over the GPS. She wanted to find ‘Stream Time.’ This one had better hints and was a little easier to find…between a V of trees. We traded our kaleidoscope for a horse head. Then Norah took over and led us toward the ‘Root of all Matter’ which was sneakily hidden under a downed tree. We hiked all over the arboretum looking for geocaches and it was a new twist on hiking that we all really enjoyed. We couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful hike or a more beautiful morning, the weather was perfect!