Raleigh- Chapel Hill Trip with the family. Wonderful!!
 

We just returned from our trip and had a great time!! Wed. night went to the hockey game. Thursday we ended up having Thanksgiving at Fearrington Village at the Granary
(sp) I learned the secret of saying "we are sold out" means nothing. All the restaurants allow for walk-ins. Fearrington village is beautiful. We also visited the UNC-Campus and after sneaking in an open gate,at the football field a wonderful gentleman actually allowed our family to see the stadium and gave us a personal tour of where the locker room was, opened a gate so we could see the field and escorted us to the museum which was closed, and just said "look around, enjoy the museum and just shut the door when you leave." He was setting up the dinner for the players on Thanksgiving. We found the people wonderful and extremely helpful. I will post more a little later.

Continuing from my last post. On Thanksgiving we also checked out the elegant Carolina Hotel in Chapel Hill. We wish we would have eaten there. Beautiful upscale hotel. On Friday we checked out Duke University including the Chapel and the basketball building. The architecture is amazing!! Again, we met another nice young man. The arena was closed and locked because the basketball team was suppose to be practicing. A student walked by and opened the door to the building with his ID card so we could look. People were very hospitable.
We also visited more of the Chapel Hill complex and then went to Cary in the evening to dine and went to an indoor place that was like a miniature Chuckie Cheese. Again the workers were extremely gracious.
Is this outgoing, helpful personality really the way people live their lives in this area, or was I just lucky?

The Football Game!!
A month back I asked posters which game to go to, NC State vs. Maryland or UNC vs. Duke.
Before we left my son said the NC State vs. Maryland game would be a lot better because Duke and UNC "suck". This is what my 10 year old really said. Anyway I talked him into going to UNC vs. Duke because then the whole family could go because tickets were going for a lot less because the students were gone and the teams were not doing well. Well, we had a wonderful time!! Not only did NC State lose around 37-0, our game went into overtime with UNC winning a very exciting game. I learned a lot of tradition with a ringing of a bell etc. Because the ticket prices were so low, the stadium was pretty full.
Our whole family went to the hockey game on Wed night. That cost us over $250. It is getting crazy to take a family of 4 anywhere now.
Anyway, it was a great trip, the trees I believe were still in full bloom, and it was nice to see cities that did not remove all the trees and landscaping. We will definitely go back. My 10 year old said he wants to go to UNC. I said great, you have to get the grades to get in there!!
Thank you to all who responded to me before we left.

Glad you enjoyed our pretty town, glad you had a great time at the game -- and UNC's still celebrating that one (rumor is that Duke coach is going bye-bye).

Unfortunately, the trees still have their leaves because it's been such a warm/hot and dry year -- and we're in such a terrible drought. I've never seen them keep their leaves this late into the year.

When you come back, be sure to ask for some more don't-misses, including seeing the UNC-CH "Dean Dome."

Cassandra, I was thinking about how beautiful the trees looked but I forgot about the drought. What is the normal season for the fall colors? Everyone was telling me that Jordan Lake was low because the lack of rain.
After that Football game I would fire the kicker for Duke. They should have won that one, but we were glad they did not. We did see the outside of the Dean Dome but were not able to get inside. Unfortunately there was not one basketball game going on during our stay. Nothing against woman's basketball but my boys are not interested in that. Looking forward to exploring more on our next visit.

Glad you enjoyed your visit to "The Southern Part of Heaven."

Oops, the Duke coach is gone!

The "normal" season for leaves varies widely, but can start as early as early-mid October; seems to me that they're usually falling by Hallowe'en, or at least have started to.

The Dean Dome is just enormous. And loud.

In any case, there are other things around here besides universities, so do check back when you come again.

And do come again.

Wow, you said the Duke coach might be gone and he is.
Thanks for answering my question. It looked like a post card setting everywhere. Does it look as nice in the other seasons? I forgot the leave season does not last that long. We are looking forward to another visit.

Bigal9, you will find the majority of people here in the Triangle very friendly and helpful. I don't know where you're from, but Southern hospitality is something we really try to live here. Not that you won't find a grouch now and then, but most of the time, it's a friendly place to be! :) Glad you enjoyed your trip so much!

I am from NJ originally and Southwest Florida the last five years. It reminded me of when I took a trip to Indianapolis and people I met actually thanked me for visiting their city. I was in shock!!

Bigal9, I'm glad you enjoyed your trip to the Triangle and that people were friendly and helpful. That is true for almost every place in the South imho.

<i>On Friday we checked out Duke University including the Chapel and the basketball building. The architecture is amazing!!</i>

I have never heard anyone refer to Cameron as &quot;the basketball building&quot; before. That made me LOL. I take it you aren't a big basketball fan. ;)

It's too bad you weren't there on Sunday, because the Duke-Eastern Kentucky game actually had some empty seats, which is an *extremely* rare occurrence at Cameron. (A lot of students weren't back from Tgiving break yet.)

Thanks, we really enjoyed the trip. My sons follow more college basketball than I do, but I love going to games and enjoy teams that have a history. I loved the &quot;Cameron&quot; building and wish we were there for a game also. We will be back.
(For some reason Fodor's kicked me off, so this is why the new ID. There is one woman who hates when I post and keeps on complaining. I have asked for an explanation but have not received a response yet.

Someone please teach me how to post the smiley faces.

&gt;:D&lt; Thanks for showing me this!!

We are spending our first New Year's Eve in Chapel Hill - staying again and eating one meal at Fearrington this year (which we haven't done yet). NC seems so vibrant, booming, and economically healthy compared to home. And yes, we do know sprawl is an issue....

We've been twice to this part of NC now, and love it. Not only the weather, but alot of it is the people. SO very nice and helpful, hate to say, compared to where we are from (Boston area).

Can anyone suggest what the weather might be like for that weekend? And we are sorry the drought is still going on...

Wanderer, I thought you were going to move to Fearington Village a while ago. We loved it there. Prices seem to be in the $350,00 to $500,000 range. They have so many trees, it is so nice. They even said when the townhouses come up for sale that they go within 2 weeks usually because they sell mostly in the low 200,000 area. I did not feel like it was so far away from things. It was only 10 minutes away from the new sub-division called Southern Village, that has movie theatres, restaurants, shops and houses. We loved Chapel Hill. If we had a second home there I would not mind being in Chatham County, Fearrington Village, because the taxes are so much lower. The proximity to Chapel Hill, Durham and Jordan Lake is great!!
We would like to take another visit sometime next year.

Weather for NY Eve? A wide range of possibilities, but unlikely to be warmer than 60 (though it happens) or colder than 25 (though it happens. Most typically it would be around 40-45 by day, 30 or so at night. Be prepared for anything from rain and fog to ice to a really pretty day and night.

Welcome back!

bigal12 -
No unfortunately, we are at least 5 years away from our move. Still too young to retire. Or should I say not enough money saved yet!

If you could lock in the price now in the Fearrington area you probably will be better off. While the slow down in real estate effected many areas it seems like the Raleigh Chapel Hill area is still moving along. They never had the huge price appreciatons like we saw in Florida,California or Las Vegas etc. It really is a desireable area.