Indie Grits Film Festival

The Indie Grits Film Festival will be returning to Columbia April 15th-19th. The films are screened at the Nickelodeon Theatre.

Distance from downtown Greenville: 104 miles


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Hospital Rock and Falls Creek Falls

Hospital Rock is a large cave located in the Mountain Bridge Wilderness area. It's accessible most quickly via the Hospital Rock trail at Jones Gap State Park. Getting to the cave requires a very strenuous 1.1 mile hike in. This is labelled as one of the "most strenuous and rugged" trails in the state. As Kimberli stated on her blog recently, there's a reason they call it Hospital Rock. The trip up is a doozy. (I had another name for it most of the way but this is a family friendly site.)












According to the SC trails website the cave was used as a hideout for confederate deserters.

A month or so ago, someone left a campfire burning nearby and damn near burned the place down. Story


After reaching Hospital Rock, should you have a masochistic streak, you can continue on the Hospital Rock trail another 3.3 miles to Falls Creek Falls. The mile after the cave is worse than the first. Whoever built it was apparently not a huge fan of switchbacks. I guess if you're running from the Confederate army you'd want the shortest path. During this section you may spend a lot of time in existential introspection examining why you would choose to do this to yourself, realizing why your wife never hikes with you anymore and determining that if you ever make it out alive, you're starting a new hobby. Macramé perhaps. But then, right at the 2 mile mark the trail levels out as you begin to walk near the ridge. It stays that way 3/4 of a mile or so then starts getting a little hairy for another mile before descending sharply (very sharply) and then running along a beautiful stream before reaching the falls.

If you really hate life (or the people you brought with you) turn around and go back. Otherwise continue on the Falls Creek Falls trail (which is mostly down hill) to the Palmetto Bible Camp then walk three miles up the road back to your car. Or you could always just park at the Bible camp and walk the 1.4 miles to the falls and back.


Distance from downtown Greenville: 25 miles.


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Official Blog Name Change

The city of Greenville is apparently upset with my using the word Greenville in my blog "without proper licensing to use said title." The city has threatened to withhold from me my portion of the stimulus package targeted for Greenville bloggers unless I pay the licensing fee. Instead I've decided to change the name to A Day's Drive from 'Round Here. The new address will be http://www.addfRoundHere.wordpress.blogspot.com/myspace-facebook.twitter. (All of which are soon to owned by Google.) All references to Greenville in previous posts will be replaced by this symbol , (assuming the color laudable lime green does not also threaten legal action).

Trailfest 2009 - April 25th & 26th

I've never made it this event, but it sounds like a good time. Trailfest is located in the quirky town of Hot Springs, NC. Both the Appalachian Trail and the French Broad River run through the middle of the town.

The festival features music, food, games, a chili cook off and some sort of duck race.

Distance from downtown Greenville: 96 miles.


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Blarney Bash

Slainte!

If you missed Return to the Green last weekend, Blarney Bash is coming up next Tuesday in front of Connelly's Irish Pub. The music is usually more classic rock than celtic but it's always a good time. And it features one of Greenville's best local bands, RetroVertigo.

Time: 4-10 PM

Distance from downtown Greenville: 0 miles.


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Augusta St. Haunted House?

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What's up with this place? It's located a block from Main Street between the SC Children's Theatre and Smiley's Acoustic Cafe, near the baseball stadium. It could be beautiful.

Distance from downtown Greenville: 0 miles.

Kaleidoscope Film, Food and Fine Arts Festival

If you'd rather take a drive to an event this weekend, Beaufort`s Kaleidoscope Film, Food and Fine Arts Festival occurs March 5-8th.

Beaufort is mainly known as the town where films such as the Big Chill and Prince of Tides, (among others) were filmed. Nick Nolte was even nominated for an Oscar for his role in Prince of Tides despite having the least realistic southern accent in the history of film.


Distance from downtown Greenville:

235 miles.


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Hickory Hops Brew Festival

Keeping with the Brewfest theme, Hickory Hops Brewfest is coming up April 18th in Hickory, NC. The town of Hickory isn't much of a destination with the exception of their recently refurbished downtown area where the festival is held. The festival is sponsored by the Old Hickory Tap Room, located on the square next to the festival area. This is a great place for dinner afterwards.

Distance from downtown Greenville: 120 miles.


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Classic City Brewfest

Sunday, April 5, 2009
2:30 to 6:00 pm

If you can't wait for the Asheville Brewfest, the Classic City Brewfest in Athens, GA is coming up much sooner. The bad news is that it is already sold out, but according to their website, you can still attend as a volunteer. I can speak from personal experience at some Greenville events, that pulling beer at a festival is a lot of fun. And downtown Athens offers a lot of good places to hangout afterwards.


Distance from downtown Greenville: 100 miles.


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Brewgrass Festival

Imagine being parked in a lounge chair under a large elm tree in a North Carolina mountain town in autumn with unlimited access to the best beer in the region, listening to the area's best fiddle, banjo and guitar players performing a few feet away. You can't beat that.

On that note, Ashevegas is reporting that tickets for the best micro-brew festival in the area, Asheville's Brewgrass Festival, went on sale at noon today. Although the festival doesn't take place until September, they always sell out early.

I attended this beerfest a couple of times when it was held in Asheville's Pack Square, which was an ideal spot for a beer festival. The past few years they've been holding it nearby at Martin Luther King Jr. Park which I can't vouch for one way or the other since I've never been there. But they always have an excellent collection of brewers who show up. Having attended several beerfests (in Athens, GA, Nashville, Hickory, NC and even here in Greenville) this is the best run festival I've attended with the largest variety of beer.

Yes, Greenville tried this a few years ago. I think it lasted for two years but South Carolina's restrictive alchohol laws prevented it from being financially viable. There have been efforts since to bring the Greenville Beerfest back but with little success.

Distance from downtown Greenville: 64 miles.


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