For those of you who have patiently waited on pins and needles (yeah, right!) to find out the answer to my riddle, your wait is over!
We awoke the next morning to find ice. Everywhere. Now, those of you who are accustomed to (and sick of) ice will not find this amusing, but we were just as tickled as could be to find the doors of the Suburban frozen shut. The kids were so surprised to see icicles hanging from the truck. Mr. C carefully removed the sheet of ice from his window so that he could see. 
We had breakfast at the Dillard House restaurant. I’ve heard people rant and rave about this restaurant for years, and let me just say that you have never really eaten Southern cookin’ until you’ve eaten at the Dillard House. I think even Paula Deen would agree with me on that one. 🙂They serve the food “family-style,” so everything is brought out to the table in bowls and platters. I can’t even begin to tell you what all we had for breakfast (definitely grits with biscuits and gravy), but you can see part of the meal in these pictures.
We were absolutely stuffed after breakfast. Unfortunately, none of the forecasted snow presented itself :(, so we decided to head about 40 miles away near Lake Toxaway, NC. We have some friends that own a huge Christian retreat on the top of Cold Mountain (yes, the one the book was based on). The owners graciously gave us the code to get through the security gate even though no one was home. It took us about 1 1/2 hours to make it those 40 miles along winding mountain roads. We then made the six-mile drive up Cold Mountain. We saw lots of frozen waterfalls along the way.
When we arrived at our destination, we were a little disappointed that instead of falling snow there was just a light “wintry mix”, whatever that is. So, we decided to take a walk around and show the cabins to the kids. When we reached the chapel building, we saw this.
Yes, those are some very small piles of SNOW!!!! Apparently the rain had not washed these piles away yet, so we took advantage of them and had a little snowball fight. We only missed the actual snowfall by a few hours. The kids were absolutely thrilled to be able to pelt their Daddy with snowballs.
We continued our walk before leaving the mountain. We followed the path of a small train track designed for the “kiddie train” at the camp. The large cabin is the main lodge where the owners reside. It was once the vacation lodge for E.M.Backus, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and some other smart, rich men from the early 20th century. It is on the National Register of Historic Places. We look forward to going back for an extended visit during the summertime so that we can hike further up the mountain and visit some of the waterfalls and lookouts.
After the ride back to Dillard, we were ready for supper at the Dillard House. We were so stuffed after our huge breakfast that we didn’t even eat lunch, so we had worked up quite an appetite. We weren’t disappointed. I think I counted 17 different foods that were brought out to our table. We saved the leftover biscuits and ham for our breakfast the next morning.
That sounded like such a wonderful trip. I’m so happy that you all got to go!
WOW, he did good!! LOL Looks like you had a wonderful time. The pictures are great. I’m sorry you didn’t see snow falling, but I’m glad you did get to see some snow. 🙂
Would love to hear more about the Christian retreat place. Our church has one to two couple’s retreats every year. We actually have one coming up the end of March and our church secretary is always looking for some place new.
~Kristi
What a wonderful getaway!
How thoughtful of your husband.
It looks and sounds like you went to some great places. I’m glad you were able to see some lingering snow. How exciting! I enjoyed seeing your photos.
Praying for you this week.
~ Christina
HsKubes’ HomeSchool Haven
What a lovely family outing you had, snow or no snow!! Mr. C planned a great trip for you all.
what a beautiful trip, we’ve got snow here 🙂 The photo of your kiddies was just adorable.
How fun! And that food looks yummy!!!!! You’re making me hungry, lol. Come visit me, and you’ll see plenty of snow; we just had 6 inches fall this Sunday! What a welcome to our new place, huh? :~)
Sounds like y’all had a great trip as well as my hubby and I did. We didn’t see any snow either. We saw rain!! We were hoping for snow though. Just didn’t happen for us. We had a great time anyway!! 😉