<p>Hi Concerned Dad:
If you are going to check out Warren Wilson, try to stay a day and see what the quality of life is all about in the Asheville region. There is a string of lovely small towns: Hendersonville, Saluda, Flat Rock etc, a zillion gorgeous summer camps, and a lot of people who relocate there for retirement. I have several friends there, and the Pisgah Forest is magically beautiful. Where Cold Mountain is, where Daniel Day Lewis ran around in the Last of the Mohicans flick--Asheville mountains subbing for upper New York State. Lots of artists in Asheville and a great ambiance.<br>
It would be a shame to drive in and drive out.</p>
<p>thanks. we do plan on spending an extra day in Asheville, as we have friends there.</p>
<p>I am sure you will love Asheville. Many people do not realize that Furman University is only 30 minutes drive south of Asheville, just across the line into South Carolina..it is an Upper Piedmont location in the foothills of those magnificent mountains. Furman students staff many of the summer camps and spend a lot of time recreating in those mountains. I live in the Blue Ridge mountains of Virginia but the Asheville area mountains cast a spell.</p>
<p>Concerneddad-</p>
<p>You're welcome. Lots o' fun looking at this stuff. BTW, the $79 fare Newark to Charlotte was on Airtran, but then you'd have to get to Asheville (about a 2 hr drive). Better to spend the extra $20 and fly into Greenville-Spartanburg (GSP), but DRIVE, do not fly, to Asheville. Takes an hour. If you want the scenic route, take Rte 25, s off I-85. If you want more highway driving, with some mountain rds, take Rte 26, north off I-85. I looked at fares from GSP to Asheville and they were OUTRAGEOUS!!! Like $600-700! You could hire someone to carry you over in a rickshaw for less. However, all of these airfares are caprecious. What I saw last night and this morning could evaporate quickly. That can be good and bad. Missed opportunities and new opportunities.</p>
<p>If you follow Faline's suggestions and you happen to check out the beautiful summer camps in Hendersonville.. please, do me a favor. Would you bring my s a toilet plunger? He is a counselor with a bunch of 9 yr olds. Apparently they are a true bunch of little shi**ers, too much for the limited plumbing of their bunk to handle.</p>
<p>jym626: If I make it to Hendersonville I will stop at Costco first! LOL. It's funny, my son is sports director/counselor for about the same age group here in Oregon.</p>
<p>
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If I make it to Hendersonville I will stop at Costco first! LOL
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Costco!! You'll get a gross of toilet plungers! That ought to about do it!</p>
<p>BTW, correction. I was thinking about the time it takes to drive from GSP to Hendersonville (1 hr). Its a little longer to Asheville, but essentially all highway. Give yourself maybe 75-90 min. And if you plan to visit the Biltmore House, lots of discount tix are available. If you buy them from AAA and you don't use them, you can return them, as long as you haven' wadded them up in a ball and spilled stuff on them (aka, if they are resellable, you're all set- they'll take 'em back).</p>
<p>Concerneddad, Actually Faline's comment about Furman made me wonderful if you have considered it for either of your girls. It is a beautiful school with excellent academics. Take a look at their website and see if it would be of interest --- if so, and it's as close as Faline says, it might be worth a drive by at the very least.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Faline's comment about Furman made me wonderful
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great typo, carolyn :)
Unfortunately, its more like 90+ miles from Asheville to Clemson, depending on where in Asheville you are starting from. And only some of it is highway driving. thre's also some State Rd driving (US 25 and US 123). AAA's website calculates the drive from The Biltmore Estate in Asheville to Clemson as about a 2 hr drive. So, while it is a great school to check out, it is probably a longer drive than may be manageable.</p>
<p><em>edit</em> Actually, AAA estimates the drive as 2 hrs 23 minutes.</p>
<p>Faline, I agree with you about Furman, but uhhh -- exactly how fast were you driving when you zipped up to Asheville in your college days? I checked out Mapquest, and the trip from Furman to Asheville is <em>supposed</em> to take over an hour :)</p>
<p>Toilet plunger=gross=apt!</p>
<p>Carolyn, I will check it out. I also remembered that W & L contacted by 2007 grad. Might have to do a drive-by there as well</p>
<p>concerneddad-
Wait. I don't think you have enough on your agenda. If you are going to go to Lexington, you should add a stop at UVA in Charlottesville. Then take a side trip to Colonial Williamsburg, and to College of William and Mary (both great places to see). You'll save yourself lots of money on hotel rooms because you'll never sleep! This is starting to sound like Chevy Chase's Summer Vacation. Who will you tie in the rockingchair on the roof of the station wagon? :) (j/k)
BTW,
[quote]
Toilet plunger=gross=apt!
[/quote]
Very punny :)</p>
<p>And if you're going to do a walk-through of W&L, VMI is literally next door. Of course, you'll also want to stop by JMU, Eastern Mennonite and Lynchburg as you keep going up 81 . . .</p>
<p>lderochi
Too bad it's Lynchburg Va and not Lynchburg TN. Sounds like a stop at the Jack Daniels plant might be in order :)</p>
<p>What, no community colleges in the East? Sleep? I'll do that while I drive!</p>
<p>Jack Daniels in Lynchburg TN used to annually take the graduating law students of Vanderbilt there for a dignified ahem bus tour outing field trip to their distillery, who knows why...on the way home a future fine lawyer was drunk and started mooning from the bus, and fell out of the back of the bus onto the expressway. Luckily Vanderbilt Hospital was closeby to put him back together but I believe that tradition died that year. The Dean of Law was not pleased with that story in the paper.
Now, Jack Daniels and Jerry Falwell don't overlap too much, so all comparisons stop there with a thud.
Iderochi, I have a pact with my husband. He never corrects me regarding things like "how many miles" or "how big the fish, how tall the mountain" anymore in public. All I ask is that he waits till we get to the car to make these corrections, even if I have totally screwed up the facts. Looking up my Alma Mater's distance to Asheville and correcting me on this Board is a breech of etiquette according to Me.<br>
But driving up 276, pulling off toward 25N, stopping at the diner in Travelers Rest to eat and going on up past Ceasar's Head, Shining Rock, Sliding Rock, and eating fresh Biltmore ice cream on the way was always so blissful, it seemed like a half hour. Also the only time we decided to go "see the Biltmore mansion" when I was at Furman, my date and I arrived and had 15 dollars between us, which we thought was way more than tickets and ice cream and lunch all day. WRONG. It costs a fortune to tour the Biltmore, and I don't think I would bother this time. They didn't let us in. We returned for our 20th and could buy the tickets then. The town itself is great fun and full of fine art studios and people who appreciate good food. A fine author grad from Furman, Tommy Hays, teaches at Warren Wilson and has recently published the well reviewed new novel The Pleasure Was Mine..his second novel set in that region he knows so well. Furman Grad novelist and short story author George Singleton teaches at the Governors School nearby..it is a university where contact with fine teachers can't be beat. And the last time I looked up the common data set..it was 16% Baptist, and really welcoming...Of similar schools,
I like University of Richmond's campus and Wake Forest's faculty but the Furman Campus is simply stunning.</p>
<p>And what Jewish supports might one find at Furman?</p>
<p>I found very limited friends at Furman who were Jewish (can't recommend fully) but all faculty members who would like to have met and taught many more students who were not Protestant. I was impressed with the level of scholarship in the Dept of Religion and even went to Israel and Jordan with them on an archeological trip...they were most patient with the kids from more rural churches, and there were both liberals and conservatives on faculty but zero zealots. The Board of Trustees of Wake, Furman and Rice all divested themselve of all Southern Baptist money in the 80s and thus secured academic freedom. Some students were too crusade-y for me back then but many of them grew up quite a bit and many of my Furman fellow classmates are super interesting adults. Type in Common Data Set and they have these things well listed, as I am always curious and hopeful that they are attracting kids from various traditions more than in my era. My husband to be was "pestered" by some evangelicals since he was ID'd as Catholic which was also a bit unusual (?) but those days are largely over. I have to say the lack of diversity was a drawback for me socially but I was never disappointed in any classroom, and I have strong ties to many of my classmates. Strong sciences and social sciences and music programing. Keith Lockhart was two years behind me.</p>
<p>That is a great Vandy story, Faline!! Not sure the Jack Daniels folks had given enough thought to those liability issues. I PM'd you to apologize for any earlier confusion-- my brain took a mini-holiday today. When you said Furman my brain thought Clemson . Apologize for any confusion (in addition to my own). CD, if you do fly into GSP, you are essentially right there (Greenville). A brief visit or drive-by would be quite do-able. Not Clemson, though, that was my error. It's south of there.</p>
<p>Now Faline, I didn't go out of my way to look it up. Both UNC-A and Furman are on S' list, so we'll be making the trip at some point. I was hoping you were right, and that my recollection of the distance was inaccurate! If it's any consolation, my DW appears to have had a GPS system implanted in her head at birth, while I can get lost driving to the same Little League field that I've driven to for 4 years (sadly, a true story). And unlike your gallant H, my DW is NOT shy about pointing this out in public.</p>
<p>errr, my husband is also one of those GPS implant humans, and he did not exactly agree to the "please don't correct me in the middle of the dinner party plan" easily. It took years before this contract was negotiated. Now in his old age he can bite his tongue and "make a note" of my various mileage date and number discrepencies for later correction.
Anyway, hope you someday enjoy looking at UNA and Furman and soak up the essence of that region during your college tours!</p>