Honeymoon in the Blue Ridge Mountains

After the wedding, Trae and I traveled through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to honeymoon in North Carolina. Most people seemed to be ignoring the Government shutdown business and were hiking in the park anyway. High five, America!
Our check-in time for our cabin wasn't until 3 pm so we spent some time in Cherokee, North Carolina at the Indian Reservation checking out the gift shops. Unfortunately a lot of the businesses appeared to be near shutting down or were already closed. I'm guessing this was due to people traveling the interstates instead of the highways.

We grabbed lunch at the Little Princess Restaurant.

Running River/Creek behind the long strip of shops at the Indian Reservation.

We then made our way toward the cabin that was located in Clyde, North Carolina which was only about an hour and a half away from where we stayed in Gatlinburg. I rented it through turkeycreekcabins.com. We were very pleased with the cabin! It was small, dog-friendly and very isolated from traffic and other people. The dogs were able to go out and run around outside without bothering anyone.

Wyatt and Nyx enjoyed running round on the trails on the property

View in the early mornings

Our cabin. There is a pasture for horses in front.

View leaving the driveway

Pisgah National Forest was located within a few miles from the cabin so we took advantage of hiking in the park. Unlike the Great Smoky Mountain National Park, Pisgah allows pets to walk on the trails. There were many people hiking these trails as well despite the shutdown. The weather and colors of the trees were beautiful!

Max Patch Trail

We were able to hike a short section of the Appalachian Trail. I believe it was called the "Max Patch Trail". 

We didn't do as much hiking as I would have liked to but it was still a nice day. We ended up hopping in the car and driving on the mountain roads. The roads don't exactly have turn-around points so we ended up driving around in the trees for the rest of the afternoon trying to find another place to leave the car and hike to no avail.

Nyx and Wyatt taking a swimming break

The next day we decided to visit Asheville, North Carolina and fell in love! We adored the old architecture, locally owned shops and restaurants, liberal people and friendly vibe. We walked all the dogs around downtown all day enjoying the atmosphere.

Alley in Asheville

I fell in love with this old car. Makes me miss my first car.

We ended the day at French Broad River Dog Park to let the dogs make some friends. They had fun! There were lots of different breeds of dogs at the park and the people were friendly and in control of their pets for the most part (which you know is very nice at dog parks if you typically take your pets there). We grabbed dinner and then headed back to the cabin before leaving the next day to head back home to take care of a couple more things before setting out in Harvey full time!