Vacation 2011, Part 3: Virginia, Shenandoah National Park

We arrived to Rachael's family's house in King George, Virginia, around 8:30. And they had steaks, mashed potatoes, corn, and drinks ready for us! They were so nice. The views from their patio of the hills and river were amazing. We watched some Monday Night Football (Giants v Rams) as we had some drinks.

After a good night of sleep, we got up the next morning and had lunch at Friday's. We hit the road around 2:30.

During the drive, I started noticing signs for Shenandoah National Park. When I saw the "Next Right" sign, I almost instinctively had to pull off. I'm pretty sure Rachael was a little skeptical and slightly annoyed with my adventurous needs, but who knows when you'll get another chance to do anything. So we ventured on to the park's southern entrance and drove about 20 miles along the Skyline Drive. I really want to go back, there were things we didn't get to see.

In the end, I got back to Columbus around 2am. It was a great trip, and I can't wait for another one.

Vacation 2011, Part 2: Myrtle Beach

Day 1, Saturday

We arrived in Myrtle around 1:30pm. The weather was cloudy, and rain had sprinkled down in some areas as we drove east on 501. We checked into our resort, the Springmaid Beach Resort. Saturday was a cloudy day and chilly night. We stopped by Broadway for a few to walk around and buy some pralines for my grandma. Then we headed down to the new boardwalk and had some drink's at the Landshark Bar & Grill (Jimmy Buffett's newest addition to his arsenal). We picked up a pizza from Domino's then went back to the hotel around 2:30am.

Day 2, Sunday

I woke up to the sound of the waves around 7:30am. Not much rest, I know. I threw on my sandals and walked down to the car to grab something. Stopping by the edge of the parking lot on my way back to watch the sun dangling over the water. We then went down and had the awesome breakfast buffet and checked out some of the other pools.

Rachael and I did some mini golfing, and she won the first round! Ahh. We did some shopping at the touristy beach shops until the sun came out. We raced back to the hotel and hurried down to the pool. The sun came and went for about a half hour before coming out for a solid three hours. Rachael got to do some body surfing which was fun to watch! We jumped around in the waves for awhile, took some pics at the pier, and then it was time for the mini-golf rematch. The rematch ended in a 45-45 tie! We used our free $20 worth of tokens at the resort arcade and Rachael hit the jackpot, winning like 500 tickets! She won a ton of candy.

We then made our way over to Murrell's Inlet to have one of the more unimpressive dinners that I've had at Creek Ratz. But still a wonderful night!

Day 3, Monday

We finished up some shopping and stopped by the Surfside Holiday Inn to drop some belongings off to Vicki Davis, whom I used to work with here at the Hilton Columbus. We had a quick rubber-match at Cancun Lagoon, with Rachael winning the final round and going home as champ. We had to make one more quick stop at Broadway to get the pralines, then set out on our way up I-95 towards Virginia.

Vacation 2011, Part 1: New River Gorge and Mooresville, NC

Vaca '11 started out by leaving Rachael's at 7am. We made our way down that familiar I-77 and around four hours later found ourselves driving through the old coal towns of West Virginia. By looking at the pic of the map I've uploaded, you see three stars. The first star is Kanawha Falls. The second star denotes Hawk's Nest State Park, and the third star marks the New River Gorge. All awesome stops as we drove through the old towns of Alloy, Falls View, and Kanawha Falls.


The gorge and West Virginia was left behind just as quickly as we had experienced it. Next stop would be Mooresville, North Carolina, to have dinner with my cousins and spend the night at their house. We had dinner at J.J. Wasabi's in downtown Mooresville. The next morning we were up by 8am and back on the road. Next stop, the beach