As you’ve heard from my previous posts and if you’ve been following me on social media, you’ll know that I visited a number of different states in the US throughout the fall. North Carolina was one of them, and it was an absolute wild ride! I visited the state at the end of September for a week, exploring many areas ranging from Asheville, Greensboro, Durham, Raleigh, Charlotte, and more. I’ll share a few highlights from the week and the major unexpected event that happened towards the end of my stay!

Asheville, Greensboro, and Charlotte

After being in Houston, Texas for a few days for a conference – which was a TON of fun – I made the trek out to Charlotte, North Carolina. I decided to fly in to Charlotte and drive from there out to Asheville, North Carolina. It was a lovely drive, and I immediately got the feeling that it was similar to BC. I truly had no idea what to expect visiting NC, so this was a pleasant surprise for me.

Asheville was lovely and the hotel I stayed at was spectacular. It’s super green nearby and though we had a bit of rain, it felt super refreshing after being in the Texas heat. I was in Asheville for the day, then headed towards Greensboro. Everywhere I drove felt lovely, green, spacious, and very clean. It was an incredible feeling! Unfortunately, I got a cold from the conference I had attended, so after visiting Greensboro, I headed to Charlotte and decided to stay in for the day. This definitely put a bit of a damper on things, and I didn’t get to explore as much of the area as I would have liked.

Raleigh/Durham and Hurricane Ian

Once I was feeling a bit better, I made the drive out towards Raleigh. Unfortunately, at about this time, I was hearing reports about Hurricane Ian in Florida potentially making its way to the Carolinas. This became a bit worrisome and as I looked into it further, it seemed more and more likely that the hurricane was going to make landfall and would potentially hit where I was staying. It was too late for me to fly out, so I decided to hunker down in my hotel on the Friday, the main day the storm was passing through. Thankfully, my visits were cancelled as everyone was on storm watch.

By the time the hurricane hit the Carolinas, it had been downgraded to a post-tropical cyclone/storm, which sounded slightly better but since I had never experienced this before, I was still worried. Thankfully, I was safe and sound in my hotel room, and had the TV on all day so I could get live updates. We experienced some rain and some wind, but apart from that, Raleigh wasn’t hit too bad. I was very thankful to head out the next day, back to the west coast, far away from tropical storms and hurricanes!

Final reflections

Ultimately, my week in North Carolina was a bit of a bumpy ride. It was definitely an experience, to say the least. However, with being sick and getting hit with the storm, I did very little exploring in North Carolina – which was unfortunate. A word of advice if you are planning to visit: try to avoid going during hurricane/storm season if possible 😉 Hopefully, I will have the chance to return in the future under better circumstances, and enjoy more of what NC has to offer!