Dinner and a Laundromat

North Carolina Travelog #5
Brevard, NC - Wed, 20 Sep 2023. 10pm

We finished up our last hike today a bit after 6 and drove back to our hotel to shower and change. We were going to treat ourselves to a nice dinner in town!

We also inquired about laundry facilities at the hotel, as we need to wash clothes tonight. Unfortunately this hotel does not have guest laundry. It's, like, the one Hampton I remember staying at that doesn't have a coin-op washer/dryer for guest use! Maybe it's not our kind of place, after all. So in addition to showering and changing for dinner, we also carried our laundry bags out to the car. So instead of "Dinner and movie", our night out tonight was "Dinner and a laundromat."

Why do we do laundry on vacation? It makes packing for a 9 day trip easier. Instead of having to pack 10 fresh changes of clothes (always pack an extra in case of mishap) we can pack half as many. It saves space in packing, allowing us to reduce our number of bags by one, or downsize a bigger suitcase to a smaller one, or more comfortably fit in a few nice-to-haves in our packing in addition to the must-haves.

The downside of doing laundry once during a trip is minimal— usually. Usually there's a night when we aren't doing much else, maybe just soaking in the hot tub or something, and it's little effort to run a load of wash and a load of drying while we're in for the evening. But tonight we had to be out for the evening, sitting in the town's one, dingy laundromat waiting for our clothes, instead of soaking in the hot tub. Oh, speaking of hot tubs, there's not one of those at this hotel, either. Maybe despite waterfall pictures in the bathroom it's not our kind of place.

Moore Cove Falls

North Carolina Travelog #6
Pisgah National Forest - Thu, 21 Sep 2023. 11:30am

We got a slightly earlier start to the day today than yesterday, getting to our first trailhead by 10:30am. That's not as early as I wanted but still early enough that we should be able to hike several trails today given how close we are to them.



Many of the falls in this area have low water flow right now. You saw that yesterday in our visit to Twin Falls. Meanwhile others are flowing heavily, like Looking Glass Falls, which we also visited yesterday.  Which is better? It's hard to say. They're not so much better or worse as they are different. Waterfalls with light flows can be fun because you can get up close to them safely, as we did here. How close? Watch this video:

Watch on YouTube

Link: watch video on YouTube

Spoiler alert: I walked around and behind the falls. I could have walked straight through them but chose not to. ...I've been under a falls with a camera before, and it was... not a good result.

Slide Rock Falls

North Carolina Travelog #7
Pisgah National Forest - Thu, 21 Sep 2023. 12pm

It seems like only minutes ago we finished up hiking back from Moore Cove Falls. Another waterfall, Slide Rock, was just a few minutes' drive away so we figured we'd go and take a look.



Slide Rock Falls, or Sliding Rock as one sign puts it, lives up to its name. It's an apron style falls that's suitable to go sliding down. During the high season it's a popular enough swimming attraction that there are lifeguards and an entry fee. Visiting in September meant we visitors were on our own.

Watch on YouTube

The falls are still slideable— and the modest water flow makes it safe for anyone with basic swimming ability. But the water is cold. That, as much as not having packed swimsuits and towels in the car, kept me from trying it myself. Watch the video above to see another visitor go down the falls.

Unnamed Bonus Falls

North Carolina Travelog #8
Pisgah National Forest - Thu, 21 Sep 2023. 12:30pm

On the drive up to Slide Rock Falls this morning we heard the sound of waterfalls as we approached. It was an un-busy road in the middle of the week, and we had the car's windows open to enjoy the pleasant weather and fresh mountain breeze. (Plus our car was starting to smell like wet hiking boots when left closed up for too long. 😅) "This must be it," we thought. But it was not. The parking area for Slide Rock was 1/2 mile further up the canyon.

"Well, let's go back and figure out what those other falls are next!" we agreed. So after Slide Rock we hopped in the car for a minute to roll down the road to an unmarked pulloff.



We looked over the edge of the pulloff and saw a nice little waterfalls in the river running alongside the road. All it would take to get down there was a bit of careful footwork— which we were totally prepared for, in terms of both equipment, skill, and mindset. We stepped over the knee-high rock wall and scrambled down the slope and out onto rocks in the river.



It turned out there were (at least) two waterfalls down here, one a bit upstream from the other. We visited the upstream falls first (above) then picked our way along the steep bank to the lower falls.



After spending a bit of time at both falls we climbed back up the embankment, a height of 25 feet or so, back to our parked car.

It's phenomenal that there are so many waterfalls in this area we can just listen for them as we drive and hop out to explore them!