Looking for warm and uncrowded destination for Memorial Day
 

We will be flying in from New Orleans, so within one hour of the airport by car. Into hiking, beaches, mountains, boating trips things like that. Its an anniversary trip..not looking for anything fancy. Our main concerns are uncrowded and good foods. Already thought of Maine and North Carolina. We were told it would be pretty cold still. Thought of Florida, but when I think of Florida beaches I think of lots of crowds....are the any relatively uncrowded places?<BR>Thanks for the ideas.

NC cold at the end of May??? Someone told you a fib. Summer starts mid-Mayish here and lasts through September. Maybe the person said water temperature could be cold?<BR><BR>Beaches packed for Memorial weekend. Many schools in NC finish the year the week before so Memorial weekend is a big travel time.<BR><BR>How about flying into Piedmont/Triad International (Greensboro, NC) or Raleigh-Durham (RDU) visiting Old Salem in Winston-Salem, hiking in Hanging Rock and Pilot Mtn. state parks, then up to the mountains and maybe rafting on the New River near West Jefferson. Or drive to Asheville and raft the French Broad River (about 30 miles from Asheville).<BR><BR>How about flying into Norfolk and canoeing in the Great Dismal Swamp. Then spend some time at the beach.<BR><BR>Or flying into Greenville-Spartanburg SC and head up to the SC mountains. The SC parks department has cabins at several parks and some feature mountain lake views.

Janet, have you ever thought of any of the finger lakes in upstate NY. They are beautiful peaceful resorts here. The only thing we can't promise is warm weather. Memorial Day can be in the 80's or the 60's. Saratoga Springs NY, <BR>The Sagamore in Lake George is beautiful and has all of what you want. If your interested you may email me. See ya

Janet:<BR><BR>Although I have never spent any long amount of time in Tennessee, I would still like to go there someday for a week. You could go to Gaitlinburg in the Great Smokies to hike and then go to Nashville for country music and I think they have a boat that goes down the river, if you like that. I'm from Pittsburgh, PA, so no bias here.

Although there are no mountains to speak of, you can get everything else you seek by flying to Charleston and spending a week at one of the beach resorts in the area (Kiawah, Seabrook, Wild Dunes). You get the best of both worlds ... long beaches, warm weather, boating (dolphin watching) ... as well as the pleasures of a beautiful city within less than an hour's drive. Throw in a few plantation tours and great lowcountry cooking and you have a recipe for a great getaway.<BR><BR>Although most beach areas are crowded around Memorial Day, both Seabrook and Kiawah (don't know about Wild Dunes) have a gated entrance limited to guests of the resorts (although they might offer day passes), so there's not likely to be a whole horde of people sharing the miles and miles of beach with you.

Don't go to Myrtle Beach unless you like crowds of bikers. That is their big week-end and it starts getting crowded the week before. ----Most bikers are nice people, but there are big crowds and the traffic is awful.