Where We Stayed
I decided on Morganton as a base for our waterfall weekend and found an Airbnb rental within a ten minute walk of restaurants and breweries downtown. We had our own en suite bathroom with a tub, large four poster king bed and Roku access (which we used to watch comedy specials when it rained most of Sunday evening.) Overall it was quite comfortable.
While Morganton as a location was great in theory, many places were closed on Sunday and we found ourselves driving quite a bit to get to the waterfalls we wanted to see. Lesson learned!
Waterfalls
On our way west, we made a brief detour to Monrovian Falls. There were several people standing on either side of the falls so Eric walked out on rocks to get the shot below.
The rain stayed away until we parked the car at the trailhead to Tom’s Creek Falls… we ate our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches until the downpour eased a bit, then donned our rain jackets and headed out. It’s about a 15 minute easy walk to the base of the falls.
Amazingly, we hadn’t been to Crabtree Falls yet due to Blue Ridge Parkway road closures on previous trips, so we jumped at the chance to see this falls. The rain stayed away for most of the hike and even though the trail was a bit muddy and slippery, the hike was a pleasant one and the falls at the end was worth it.
Food + Drink
Damp and done with hiking, we stopped at Mica Town Brewing in Marion for a beer. The brewery staff was relaxed and happy to talk about the beers. We tried half pours of the Barrel-aged Brown, Ginger Beerd, and Stumptown Stout.
Not knowing when we were going to want dinner, I didn’t make reservations, instead hoping we would be able to find a table at root + vine in town. Luckily they had a table for two available, so we were seated right away! Eric started with the grilled romaine salad with what looked like a heavy dressing but wound up being a nice light buttermilk-style with parmesan sprinkled on top. My fried oysters with cheesy polenta was delicious. For our mains, Eric had the grilled chicken over polenta and I had the steak pizza with grilled veggies. Everything went well with the bottle of Spanish rose we split.
After dinner we stopped into Fonta Flora for a pint. I tried the ‘Wolf Spit,’ a baltic porter with hickory bark and Eric had the ‘Fruit Bat Disco,’ a saison with strawberries. We sat at the bar and chatted with the bartender for a bit, planning our route for the following day.
