My wife and I are expats in USA and we have never been to Southeastern states. This Spring break, we would like to take our 10 year old twin boys to some of the Southeastern states like North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee. We don’t plan on hitting all these states since we only have 7 days in our hands. We would like to hit the Top spots as much as we can. We also would like to experience some good BBQ.
We will be taking off from Northern NJ and please consider our max driving distance for a day as 500 miles.
Considering all this, what would your suggestions be?
Whatever your route, acquire some age-appropriate audiobooks. You probably can take them out from your local library. They make long drives much more bearable and create great family memories. At that age, my kids really enjoyed Sea of T–lls and My Side of the Mountain.
Sorry, one of those titles involves a forbidden word. Search Nancy Farmer
Definetely touristy. Not much outdoor activities. Famous and historic spots, great BBQ restaurants, museums, city tours etc is what we are looking for.
Suggest the ponies at Chincoteague (it’s Virginia, but makes a nice first-day goal), Cape Hatteras, the Wright Brothers flight memorial/site, then Myrtle Beach for the quintessential American boardwalk experience on the beach. Charleston for some history. Sorry, not very familiar with the other states. … Hope this gives you a running start!
If you try for Alabama then four of your seven days will be driving. My suggestion is to either do a coastal trip, say Outer Banks to Wrightsville Beach to Myrtle Beach, or a mountain trip, Blue Ridge Parkway to Great Smoky Mountains and Gatlinburg.
We listened to the entire “Hank the Cowdog” series on our road trips when the kids were that age.
I would say Blue Ridge Parkway to Asheville, but I would not recommend a visit to Gatlinburg. It’s fully of junky tourist stuff. The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is worth seeing, though.
In South Carolina, Charleston is very interesting, and there are some nice beaches around Myrtle Beach.
I liked Kitty Hawk when I got there. One thing I highly recommend is staying off the major highways, when my wife and I went on our honeymoon we drove to Florida, and we did things like go over the cheseapeake bay bridge tunnel, then drove through the Virginia tidewater region on back roads, got to see things you don’t see from the highway. I don’t know if they still exist, but we used to run into these kind of cafeteria style restaurants, that had fantastic food that was to us without a lot of money, just amazing (my wife thought I was going to turn into a chicken, I went crazy over the fried chicken in these places, also loved things like grits in the morning, and collard greens (which I found out were cooked in salt pork).).Beats the tourist traps and such.
I agree with @Magnetron to consider picking one type of trip or the other. If coastal, you could take the Cape May-Lewes ferry and go down the Eastern Shore of Virginia (Chincoteague), Outer Banks (Wright Brothers Memorial) , Charleston, possibly continue to Savannah if there is time. If you prefer the mountains, you could do Charlottesville (Monticello) to Asheville (Biltmore).
I agree with Previous posters that I would pick a destination -like Asheville or Charleston and see what you can do on the way.
If the boys need to let off some steam there are Great Wolf Lodges (indoor waterpark and hotel) in Williamsburg and in the Charlotte NC area. IF you want seriously over the top tacky touristy stuff -Galinburg TN or Myrtle Beach SC (mini golf, go carts, Fudge etcetera )
Atlanta has World of Coke, MLK ,Zoo, Carter Presidential Library -but traffic is a nightmare.
BBQ is different all over the south. NC in particular has an east/west thing going on with different sauces/styles. Whatever your destination you can probably find some good BBQ.
If you go to Asheville NC -one of my favorites there is the Carl Sandburg historic site. A famous American poet who left his house to the government. It isn’t fancy -just kind of quirky and is exactly how he left it. There are goats you can pet. Also in that area -Linville Caverns if you like Caves.
There are also many confederate battlefields in the south -but those are an acquired taste. If your boys aren’t into it they would probably find them boring.
If you end up in the middle of SC at some point, go to Cowpens. It is a Revolutionary War battlefield, definitely not touristy or crowded, and is the only battle of the Revolutionary War where it is considered that a battle strategy involved an “original tactical thought”. Sounds snobby but it means our excellent American leader, Daniel Morgan, could think well in a difficult situation.
There is also an outpost of Abbott Farms nearby. They are a SC chain that sells peaches, fireworks, boiled peanuts, and a ridiculous array of jelly and “chow chow”. Worth a stop even though you’ll be missing the peaches in spring.
Old Salem in Winston-Salem, NC is a well-done restoration and less crowded than Williamburg. Excellent collection of American art at Reynolda House, and good BBQ in nearby Lexington.
Williamsburg VA is a great location for your first stop given your distance. But in addition to Colonial Williamsburg, I suggest Jamestown. There are two of them. One is a reconstructed Jamestown Settlement that includes a reconstructed Native American village, a reconstructed European Jamestown with in-character enactors, and in addition it has reconstructed ships in the James River that kids can climb all over and be hands on with.
The second Jamestown is pretty much next door. It’s the actual site of Jamestown complete with ongoing archeology and a museum with the bodies/skeletons. Since it’s a current archeology site, they have one pit where they ask kids to jump in and dig themselves. Kids absolutely love it. And they actually uncover stuff like pottery shards, buttons, etc.
From Williamsburg you could either drive to the Outer Banks, or you could go the other way and head to the Smokey Mountains via Rowan County NC which has some ruby mines (grab a bucket, a shovel, and work the sluices).