<p>Hi all! I am planning to take a trip with D2 to visit colleges in NC. We live in central FL and would like to drive to see the following: NC State in Raleigh, UNC-CH, Duke, UNC-Charlotte, possibly USC and as a side trip, the Biltmore Estate in Asheville. </p>
<p>I need to know how to schedule the days, how long to drive each day, and perhaps where to stay the night. We were thinking it might take a week to do this and we would start the trip around April 13 Saturday or so. We are flexible since I home school. I did look and the colleges all seem to end their normal classes around April 24.</p>
<p>You could easily do this in a week. UnC-CH and Duke are minutes away from each other. There is a La Quinta Inn & Suites Durham Chapel Hill on 4414 Durham Chapel Hill Blvd
Durham, NC 27707 that’s located in the middle of the two. Many of the students going on visits stay at the hotel. NC State Raleigh is less than an hour so you can stay at the same hotel.</p>
<p>If you are using 85 from FL, Day 1 I’d stop at UNC-Charlotte (early morning) and continue on to Durham. The hotel is about 2 hours north on 85. Go to Duke or UNC in the afternoon. Stay at the Laquinta that night. Next day you can do Duke then NC State Raleigh. Travel to 95 South and then travel to USC. See USC Day 3. If you have more time, you can spend an extra day in each location. </p>
<p>If you are staying in Charlotte, I’d stay in the hotels in Concord, NC (North of the city). They are cheaper and you can visit Concord Mills and plenty of places to eat. </p>
<p>I lived in Florida and Charlotte, NC. Let me know if you have any other questions or if I need to clarify something.</p>
<p>oops. I forgot about Asheville. It’s best to go see Asheville when you are near Charlotte. It’s very pretty but it will take you out of the area for your college visits. It’s probably 2.5 to 3 hours north of Charlotte one way.</p>
<p>Thank you for all of your suggestions. I like the idea of staying in one hotel while visiting several schools. That helps a lot. Would I encounter a lot of traffic (slow-moving) when driving from the La Quinta hotel to the 3 colleges? Especially driving the one hour to NCSU from the hotel? </p>
<p>Once I figure out the logistics of the hotel(s), I can book the campus tours. </p>
<p>My D wants to go on the engineering tours (schools that have eng’g), regular school tours, see the bookstore, eat on campus, drive by the dorms, to get a feel for the campus. It seems like we would be on each campus from 9am until 2 or 3pm. Does that seem long enough? I want her to get a good feel for life on campus but I am also worried we might burn out seeing 4 campuses in 4 days.</p>
<p>Regarding Asheville and the Biltmore: Is the drive to Asheville from Durham mountainous? Should we stay on property? Any recommendations for hotels in Asheville? How long should we stay? Is one day and night enough? My D and I travel well together. I know this will be a fun trip!</p>
<p>The last part of the trip to Asheville has mountains. It wasn’t too bad from what I remember but I would do that part of the trip during the day/late afternoon. We’ve only had day trips. I can’t recommend a hotel but a day or two would probably be enough.</p>
<p>There shouldn’t be a lot of traffic from the LaQuinta hotel. Duke is 5-10 minutes from the hotel in one direction and UNC is about 10 minutes the other direction. It’s so easy that you could get lost and you’re lost on campus. There is everything in the area. Two Walmarts, restaurants, grocery stores, etc. Both campuses are beautiful but there will be obvious differences in the students that attend each. It depends on what your daughter likes.</p>
<p>My best friend works at Duke. Make sure you visit Duke Gardens. We usually take our dog, go grab some BBQ, find a bench, listen/watch the people and wildlife. There’s a great BBQ place about 10 minutes from the hotel. I can’t remember the name but I can get it if you like that kind of food. You can get one order and share it between you and your daughter.</p>
<p>NC state is a little different. You will hit traffic if you travel during rush hours in the morning (approx up to 9am) and afternoon (after 3pm.) The trip to NC state is about 30-45 minutes without traffic from the hotel but also and easy drive. I think it’s I-40, it’s about 2 or 3 lights from the hotel. You hop on that and ride up to NC state. </p>
<p>The hotel is great for the price. I hate to leave my dog at home and there isn’t a charge for pets. Request a room away from the road. Durham Chapel Hill Blvd can be loud during the rush hours. Free breakfast, fruit etc. The front desk people are extremely nice. The hotel was filled with students for college visits. We weren’t there to do an official tour but we drove around UNC and walked around at Duke.</p>
<p>4CookieMonster: (love the name) Thank you for the tips on driving during the day to Asheville. This will be a lot of driving on my part. </p>
<p>My D and I definitely want to see the Duke Gardens. We also want to see their iconic chapel and the museum. Yes we like BBQ, how did you know? ;)</p>
<p>The main objective of the trip is to decide whether or not to apply to these colleges. There is just so much info you can get from the college website and Google Maps. The other objective is to have a great vacation in NC. We would like to see mountains and rivers. I guess it would be in the Asheville part of the trip. </p>
<p>The hotel you suggested sounds great. It really helps to have the free breakfast.</p>
<p>I enjoyed staying at The Inn on Biltmore Estate. They have nice packages if you want to do a relaxing, convenient, two day visit, although it is not the inexpensive way to go. You can see the house in a half day and walk (run through) the gardens in another half day, but I’d split it over two days cause you will be there during the Festival of Flowers. The drive is nice to Asheville. It is very mountainous if you go across the border to TN, but is not bad at all to Asheville and parts east. Have fun!</p>
<p>Take a look at traffic.com at the same day of the week and time as you plan to travel. If you see lots of yellow and red, you’ll know the traffic gets backed up.</p>
<p>If you are going to Asheville anyway, and the student is interested in small LACs, then UNC - Asheville is probably worth a look, as it is a small public LAC that is not that expensive, even for out of state students.</p>
<p>(The claim that “90% of students do NOT get accepted into any of their top 3 college choices” is false.)</p>
<p>If I were you, I would make NCSU my first stop in NC and I would stay near it before going on to Chapel Hill/Duke. (We live in the area.) There’s a Doubletree a block from campus, or there are many hotels in nearby downtown Raleigh and between campus and the east side of Cary which would make for a much easier visit. You could check out Hillsborough Street and Cameron Village the night of your arrival and be close to campus for an early morning start. Then, head out to the Chapel Hill area for your next night or two. The drive will be anywhere from 30 - 45 min. in regular traffic. Rush hour could take a lot longer. I think it’s hard to really get a feel for a campus if you spend less than most of a day on each, but you could cram UNC-CH & Duke into one day if absolutely necessary. I think it’s better to do the Info session, tour, meet with a department rep if possible, and eat in a school cafeteria for a better look. Duke Gardens can easily take a few hours itself. </p>
<p>Asheville - I agree a quick look at UNC-Asheville might be worth it if you’re interested in a smaller school. Allow a full day for the Biltmore. Staying on the grounds will be very pricey. We stayed in town (lots of choices) and had no problem driving into and parking for the tour, etc. There are some great places to eat in downtown Asheville. The drive from the RTP area to Asheville should take between 4 to 5 hours. Traffic can get congested in the Greensboro/Winston-Salem area. You’ll only hit the mountains close to Asheville, and it’s not scary mountain driving by any means. Be sure to check out the Blue Ridge Parkway Folk Arts Center just outside of Asheville on the Parkway. If you have time to drive a few miles on the Parkway, the scenery is spectacular.</p>
<p>Sorry, I don’t know about UNC-Charlotte. I would recommend stopping at USC Columbia, however, on your way there or back. </p>
<p>Thank you for all of the thoughtful explanations and information. I will definitely keep track of the traffic. </p>
<p>I do have a question about the traffic in the Greensboro area. Google gives a trip time of 3.25 hours from Durham to Asheville. Is the 4-5 hours because of the traffic? Can I travel at a certain time of day to avoid it?</p>
<p>We won’t be looking at UNC-Asheville since my D is very interested in engineering. There is another thread where someone asked about the main NC schools and UNC-Charlotte. The latter was considered more of a commuter school. Is that the consensus here? Is there a reason to include or exclude it? Could we tell by just a quick look? </p>
<p>Maybe I should include the Univ. of South Carolina instead of UNC-C. </p>
<p>Thank you for the tip regarding driving on the Blue Ridge Parkway. I drove on it with my H many years ago and it was spectacular.</p>
<p>UNCC does have a large local commuter population. They have built a lot of new facilities at UNCC in the past few years and the engineering school has a very good reputation. My son is in engineering at NC State, so I am biased and would recommend NCSU over UNCC. If you end up visiting UNCC let me warn you about the construction on Rt. 85. It can be a nightmare. There is some construction north of Salisbury that hasn’t been too bad when I’ve traveled that way, but the construction between exits 55 and 46 heading into Charlotte can slow traffic down in both directions any time of day.</p>
<p>I’ve never done the Durham to Asheville trip. Charlotte to Asheville is around 2 hours. I would think traffic would have to be really bad to make the Durham to Asheville trip 5 hours. I have never had trouble with traffic through Greensboro during non rush hour times. I don’t know about rush hour.</p>
<p>Does USC have engineering? Like Lafalum mentioned, Clemson is the engineering school in SC. UNC-CH only has biomedical engineering, which is a joint program with NC State. NC State is the North Carolina engineering school. If you want to go further north, there is Virginia Tech or you can go south to Georgia Tech. Lots of good choices!</p>
<p>For engineering in North Carolina, note that many schools have a limited selection of engineering majors. Those with the biggest selection are NC A&T, NCSU, and UNC-Charlotte:</p>
<p>Trip to Asheville: Raleigh to Asheville is closer to 5 hours. From Durham, it will be less. I use MapQuest for travel time estimates, and it shows Durham to Asheville at 3 hours, 43 minutes on I-40 which is about what it took us. Just try to avoid peak rush hour times. Traffic can be heavy all the way from Raleigh to past Winston-Salem otherwise.</p>
<p>USC Columbia has an excellent Honors College if your d is interested. The campus is lovely.</p>
<p>If engineering is her goal, I would drop UNC CH and add Clemson/South Carolina.</p>
<p>UNC Charlotte is not a rah,rah school. It’s just sort of an afterthought on the edge of Charlotte. You don’t see lots of UNCC flags waving in Charlotte neighborhoods or lots of people wearing UNCC t-shirts. You see NCSU/UNC CH/Clemson/Duke/VaTech/even ECU…all schools with lots of history and tradition. Charlotte and it’s population are not big supporters of UNCC…it’s just overshadowed by the other big state schools </p>
<p>There’s nothing wrong with the academics at UNCC. Engineering,architecture,nursing,etc. are well repsected. It’s just there’s nothing special about it. I can say that because I am a UNCC grad. If your D is the caliber of student who can get in UNC CH and Duke, I wouldn’t bother looking at UNCC.</p>
<p>Notice for the engineering programs each school offers different degrees with a few of the same ones overlapping. While A&T has the only architectural engineering degree (same as Cal Poly SLO) NCSU offers an environmental engineering BS (son’s hs sal did this and is now at Carneige Mellon working on her Phd in same) and UNC-C has some engineering tech degrees which the other schools do not.</p>
<p>A&T also has the new school [Joint</a> School of Nanoscience and Nanoengineering](<a href=“http://jsnn.ncat.uncg.edu/]Joint”>http://jsnn.ncat.uncg.edu/) for Nanoscience Engineering. This is more geared towards graduate work but they will allow advanced students take the grad work while an undergrad and use it towards an advanced degree. </p>
<p>The ABET provides a great list of what schools have what as shown by the above poster (ucb) and it reallyhelps breakdown where one might apply based on available programs.</p>
<p>I have one son who loved A&T’s engineering program and school while two other children enjoyed their time at NCSU (both STEM majors).</p>
<p>Kat
ps also note that the OOS cap for all NC schools (public) is no more than 18% and sometimes that number is lower, especially for the more impacted/difficult majors</p>