youhas travels to: the Carolinas!

**youhas** · Joined: 21 Jul 2006 Posts: 3015 Location: Santa Clara, CA

Oh, that's right, I almost forgot: I am flying into Raleigh, NC, next weekend! (The weekend of April 8, that is.) Cashing in a free flight and touching down on Friday morning, at which point I am renting a car and have three-and-half-days to do whatever I see fit before I head back home. (This is all part of my crazy/possibly stupid/indisputably epic ongoing life-long goal to visit every county in the United States. You can see my present progress here, if you're so inclined. I dunno which is scarier: how far I've actually gone or how much further I have to go....)

By visiting "Raleigh", by my exceptionally loose standards, that means "south of Richmond, VA; north of Charleston, SC; east of I-95". On paper, anyhow. I mean, if it turns out that I have some giggly secret female admirer in Charleston, WV, who wants to force-feed me wine coolers and "accidentally" make out with me, who am I to say no?

I AM ONLY A MORTAL, AND POSSESS AN ID; I APOLOGIZE IN ADVANCE.

It should be noted that as much as I love long-haul stretches on the open road, man, roadtripping after sundown sucks. So if you want to put me up for the night? In exchange for me treating you to dinner, or helping you knock out the GH2 co-op career achievements once and for all, or whatever? Yeah, totally shoot me a message or something. Because chilling with some cool rhythm-gaming local seems more awesome than sacking out in a Motel 6 in East Nowhereton, SC, and watching bullshit movies on FX until I convince my body to pass out.

And hey, as long as I'm in the area, my standard questions:
Are there any weird restaurants I should visit? Crazy regional chain restaurants are great. I mean, you can't visit The South without trying a Waffle House and you can't visit California without sampling In-N-Out, right? White Castle, Zaxby's, The Varsity: these are all random chains I stumbled upon. If there's something in that general area I should be actively seeking out: consider me clueless! So dude, let me know! (We will also accept crazy out-of-the-way non-chain restaurants that you think are awesome coolness, of course. Bonus points if they didn't show up on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives nor Man v. Food at some point; those are kind of my fallback options.)

Is there anything in the area that will blow my mind? I almost did a spit-take when I randomly stumbled upon Helen, GA. Just minding my own business, winding my way through rural Appalachian Georgia... when I stumble upon a Bavarian town, complete with beer gardens and horse-drawn carriages and polka music in the town center. WTF?!? It was one of the very few occasions where I was in "OK, when I get home, I need to Google this, to make sure I was not having some sort of hallucinatory episode" sorts of moments. Which was awesome to randomly visit, in retrospect. If there's anything suitably nuts and out-of-the-way in the area, clue me in, would you?

Thanks in advance for humoring me.

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**THABEAST721** · Joined: 26 Dec 2007 Posts: 2000

Hey this is really neat. I've had a sort of dream of visiting every state, but I would probably never go through with it. Every county though? That is just insane! When do you plan to come to Charleston, WV lol? I wouldn't be able to let you stay at my place because I live with my parents, and they wouldn't like the idea of a guy they don't know staying for a night. However, I could let you in on a little secret about here. There is absolutely nothing of value here! You might as well just cross Kanawha county off your list and forget about it because it is a waste of time! If you come to Monongalia county though, you should head to Morgantown and check out Sandwich U. There is actually a lot to do here in Morgantown, so I would recommend coming here when you go to Monongalia county.

And good luck with this! It seems like this is going to take awhile

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**Squirrel** · Posted: Thu Mar 31, 2011 5:11 pm Post subject:

I might live too far up, but I live in PA, southwest. I can house you for the night with no issues, and I have LOTS of games for us to play... over 1000 across all my systems/burned games. ^_^

There might be a rave that weekend too.... ^_^
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**xtremecarbon** · Joined: 29 Mar 2008 Posts: 3998 Location: Columbia, SC

If you haven't, you must stop by Chick Fil A and Moes. Two amazing chain eateries. The bar district in Columbia, SC is pretty legit, though its mostly all college kids lol. One place I'd really recommend you try out is Mello Mushroom, they make great pizza. Everything is fresh...best you've ever had. (this is if you ever come here) If you BYOB we could definitely chill and play some old school GH

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**Sarg338** · Joined: 07 Feb 2008 Posts: 5143

**Saru786** · Joined: 20 Dec 2008 Posts: 1650 Location: In a box...

I see you came to Weschester county in NY back in '06. I feel bad for you, you must have cried when you saw this place. Nothing here. Boring. >.>
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**GuitarHailz** · Joined: 11 Jun 2007 Posts: 4910 Location: Austin, Texas

youhas, you should visit (edit: come back to) Austin. There's enough weird restaurants and mind-blowing to last you for at least a lifeteime, if not longer.

Just sayin. Though NC is very nice, my sister lived there for three years, I never visited long enough to really have any suggestions of cool stuff to do. The only cool thing I remember is going to Rocky Mount North Carolina and visiting the original Krispy Kreme. But I love donuts, so...

But yeah. Go back to Austin. #1 city in America as far as I'm concerned.

(There's also a couple dozen counties you can prolly skip out in west Texas in exchange for a few more weeks in AUSTIN. I won't tell if you won't).

Edit: Ah, looks like you've visited my old stomping grounds - Vanderburgh county and Evansville, Indiana. You know what you should have done, is just take a few months off of work, start in the middle and just make a spiral outward, and end it so that you are back in CA.

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**fcedyourmom** · Joined: 20 Mar 2008 Posts: 1008 Location: Zebulon, NC

Five guys is a pretty good burger joint just in case you happen to go by Knightdale.
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**slfan68** · Joined: 30 Oct 2007 Posts: 656 Location: Pink Hill, NC

Bojangles, just because you'll probably never run again
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**Fugitive** · Joined: 20 Aug 2007 Posts: 3035

**RLKDragon** · Joined: 06 Jun 2007 Posts: 2253 Location: Chicago, IL

Ah, you already came to Chicago. Bummer.

**this1neguy** · Joined: 19 Aug 2007 Posts: 5444 Location: Flint, MI

Interestingly, I'm going to be in Hilton Head this weekend over my dad's spring break (he teaches high school) but that would be too far south. I was in NC over my own spring break, too, but that was a few weeks ago.

I'll just add that you should come to Michigan at some point and depending on whether I end up transferring either come to Genesee County (boring as hell, but whatever) or Lansing if I'm at MSU or Grand Rapids if I'm at GVSU. Both of those are much more interesting than Flint, that's for sure >_>
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**Vampyromaniac** · Joined: 08 Feb 2008 Posts: 1216

Things to see in the Carolinas: Vampyromaniac and Fugitive

No but seriously, there's not a whole lot in SC. You could try Myrle Beach, a lot of people enjoy that as a vacation spot, and there are a lot of businesses and general "fun" things to do there, such as visiting 'medieval times,' which I'd suggest if you've never been to one before. There are some other ones too: I know of one in the Discover Mills mall in Georgia also, but I've heard it's not as good as the one in Myrtle Beach. Charlotte, NC has a ton of stuff too, but I wouldn't know where to start with what to recommend from there, honestly.
If you were coming here in the fall then I'd recommend the Renaissance Festival in Charlotte / Concord, but I don't think it'll be open in early summer.
Carowinds is a pretty awesome theme park, and it's right on the border between SC and NC. Lots of good roller-coasters. There's also a 'Scarowinds' version of it near Halloween time, if you're into that kind of thing.
And if so, the company that I work for owns the "Campground Massacre" which is a pretty awesome ad surprisingly frightening experience. (Or at least it was for me, I was in front and had to lead everybody through the darkness.) For example, there was one room that was aaaalmost pitch black, and when you walk in you start bumping into these moist hanging things that you realize are body bags. Then you see this thing walk/glide into the room and disappear, and you know it's a guy in a costume, but it's creepy as hell cuz you have NO idea where he's at, and you have to FIND the exit because it's too dark to see anything, and when you first walk into something you're not sure whether it's a person, body bag, or a wall. In another one, you enter a hallway and there's a clown right at the end, at the entrance to a room, and he walks backwards back into the room, and there are all these clowns hanging with hooks in their backs or ropes around their necks, and they all start like seizuring. Then that guy in the clown costume is so good at blending in you have no idea which one is him, and you have to push your way through all these seizing clowns, with no idea which is the real one, meanwhile every so often you catch a glimpse of him moving around. Pretty cool stuff, it's $20 iirc and takes a little over an hour to make it through the entire thing. They spend $500k on props each year.

As for the restaurants people mentioned, Bojangles sells biscuits the whole time they're open, and they have some pretty awesome chicken sometimes too. Their fries, when seasoned properly, are some of the best in the world. They don't need any condiments.
With Chik-Fil-A, you have to try either their chicken nuggets (best ones ever) or their plain chicken sandwich (they use the same style chicken on those as for the chicken nuggets). It's actually the only restaurant where I'd personally prefer the fried chicken sandwich over the grilled version. For a drink, go with a large milkshake; you won't regret it. I suggest cookies and cream, but surprisingly their mint shakes or other temporary ones are good too. A lot of people love their fries too, which are shaped like waffles. Also they keep honey in packets on the counters so if you ever need some quick honey just swoop in and grab some and jet before anyone says anything.
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**Davers** · Posted: Fri Apr 01, 2011 4:12 am Post subject:

Wow, this sounds like a lot of fun. Wish I could tell you a few places, but I have yet to visit the Carolinas myself. I have a goal to visit all 50 states before I turn 40 which looks like you've gotten most out of the way O.o I've seen 35 states and plan on traveling/driving to Montana sometime this summer which will put me through Wisconsin, North and South Dakota, and Montana. I might stop off in Minnesota while up that way just to get it out of the way. But hey, I have 14 years left to visit 15 states. lol

We really need a travel thread on SH. That would be a ton of fun to participate in. Especially for those that do a lot of traveling like the both of us. And it looks like you missed the county I live in in Illinois

You didn't miss much anyways. lol

**youhas** · Joined: 21 Jul 2006 Posts: 3015 Location: Santa Clara, CA

MEGA-REPLY MODE: ACTIVATE

As for various folks' places being boring: true, there are a lot of non-shocking places out there - like one scrillion semi-interchangeable small towns, holy jeez - but you never know when you'll have something that is totally banal to you that's a cool or head-scratching novelty to an outsider. It's a little like visiting parallel universes or something. (Locally, I've seen tourists stop to have their picture taken next to the Yahoo! sign at an office park. "OMG! A physical building where some of the Internet comes from! We must commemorate this!" It's a total zero-interest background image to me... which may well be how "Zeke's Gun and Sandwich Shop" or "religious billboard right next to a strip club billboard" is to them.)