Milton DE, who knew.

An excerpt from Amanda's Journal"

"In the car...again. Eric is driving me crazy and I'm trying to ignore his shenanigans in hope that he will get bored."

Somehow through the many hours together we have been having more fun than we ever could have imagined!

We left VA beach and drove north to the Chesepeake bay bridge tunnel. 30ish miles of diving bridges. The views were pretty and we were surprised to find that when it ended we were not in delaware, not in maryland, but still in Virginia! I guess we should have looked more closely at the map.

We stopped to take a walk at a nature conservatory, which was pretty, more just an opportunity to sweat a disgusting amount and get eaten by black flies and mosquitos. Nonetheless, the man working at the conservatory told us about a great little town that we had to visit.

We took the left at the first stop light to get into Cape Charles, VA. It was more like a small cape cod town than a rural VA town. Small vacations stores dotted the main street. We checked out a few. A wine store caught our eyes, so we stopped in. We were instantly greeted with a sweet "hey ya'll come on in," where we readily agreed to taste some wine. Our hostess was Heather, a sweet small town mom. We stayed and talked with her about small town life, wine and our adventure. We told her about where we were headed next when we spotted her shelf of Dogfish Head beer. She gave us a look to say, "well, what are you still doing here? You have a long way to go." She told us a place to stop for a quick bite of food right on the way so that we don't waste too much time and miss our 4:00 brewery tour. We bought a bottle of wine, got back into the car and carried on.

The crab shack was about 15 miles up the road. We ordered 2 entrees of fried deliciousness. Amanda tried her first fried clams and didn't even spit it out! Eric patiently waited to be spoon fed coleslaw as we inched slowly but steadily above the speed limit.

It became clearer and clearer that we should probably drive faster and faster so we can me it to our tour. Well, maybe we will make it. Hopefully.

We did make it! Just in time to check in, don our safety goggles, and show off our closed toed shoes. We got our tour, learning how DFH got its start and how they make such unique beer. We tasted the pale ale, the Midas Touch, the Indian Brown Ale, and the Palo Santo. The guide recommended we go to Rohoboth beach to check out the DFH brew pub. WE ventured to the bach and meandered our way to the pub.

We sat at the bar, as we have found that is the best way to find someone who is somewhat interested in our trip, or knows something about beer. Not only did we find interest in the trip, but we found someone who knew a lot about the beer. Everything about the beer, actually. Literally, everything. We clinked glasses with Jon, an Assistant Brewmaster at DFH brewery. We talked about everything beer from DFH to homebrewing. He must have thought we were sane enough to offer his spare bedroom to us. Our options at this point were to stay up until 2 AM and somehow have to get to Georgetown DE to stay with a potential couch surfing host, sleep in the car, or sleep at Jon's. No question about what choice we had to make. At his house, we shared a bottle of Namaste, a name that personifies DFH's self assurance and uniqueness.

The next morning we woek up and met Jon at DFH for a behind the scenes tour. We saw ingredients being added, dry hopping, and the new renovations. Big shout out to Jon!

Off to DC!

VA beach!

We arrived in VA beach and met Anna and Jon at their apartment, which was only a few blocks away from the beach. We took an armful of luggage inside and immediately mounted our bikes and rode our way downtown. We took a nice moseying pace to the boardwalk and took in the scene. It was a 180 from Asheville. There were tons of beach going tourists (off all shapes and sizes...) loud margaritaville type music and seafood restaurants galore. Despite the lack of breweries, we chose to eat and drink at a local tap house. We attempted to get some information from our server, but when we stated "we love full flavored hoppy beers," and his reply was "oh, you should try a lager," ...we knew that we may want to trust our own judgement. We tried a flight which was instantly forgotten because he never wrote down what it was that we wanted. Good thing that the company was perfect!

We rode our bikes back for an early night. Jon was having ankle surgery in the morning, and we figured an early night without much alcohol would be best. That was until we decided to hit up the local scene, Nat's bar, where you can eat, drink...and smoke. A few vicious games of pool (ahem, with the women being victorious) and cheap beer later, we continued back to the apartment.

In the morning, Anna and Jon headed off to surgery, and Eric and I explored the area on our own. We drove down to the Back Bay nature preserve to walk around the marshes. We walked the narrow boardwalk through tall grasses and trees in the marshland. Crickets, spiders, an birds fluttered in and out of the trees. We took a long dirt road to the dune hike, which was just a short walk to the ocean over a few dunes. The sun was unforgiving at this point. We stood on the desolate beach and watched the waves lazily crash on the beach. The sandpipers were busy tapping their noses into the ground, scurrying away from the waves and chasing them to find lunch in their retreat. Our heads were foggy with the heat, and we were tempted to just head back to the car after only about an hour of exploring. The beach was beautiful, but it was a beach. We stared at the waves, starting to think that it may be nice to head back to touristtown and swim. Just then, we spotted 2 dolphins diving in and out of the waves. They were close enough to capture a few pictures before they headed out to sea.

We drove back to town, picked up food for lunch and dinner, then grabbed the surfboard and bicycles to go to the beach. We spotted more dolphins, Amanda from the beach, and Eric from his surfboard! A few hours of splashing, playing, and getting whistled at from the lifeguard was enough to cap off our exhaustion, so we returned for a night of cooking and eating. Thank you to Anna and Jon who were fantastic hosts!

Breweries in Asheville

After we spent the morning in the local coffee shop blogging, eating, and indulging in delicious coffee, we met Jordy for adventures in beer. We rode our bikes to the first brewery, French Broad. Named after the street it rests on, French Broad is off the beaten path. With just a small tasting room and a few tables, it was not the typical trendy microbrewery that we have encountered in the past. We ordered a flight and tasted slowly with smacking lips. Decent, for sure. We liked the Rye Hopper the best (we had actually tried it at Barley's), and the 13 Rebels came in second. We chugged a few cups of water each, and rode our bikes the roundabout way to Wedge brewing company.

Wedge was a little more along the lines of the trendy brew house. The outside tables were constructed from old gears and scrap metal from the local metal scrap yard. Inside, the tasting room was a small bar with a window into the tanks full of beer and hops. We enjoyed the belgian wheat beer, and shared a pitcher of it at the end.

Lastly, we trudged uphill to get to Craggie brewing. We rolled up in front of a garage with the door rolled open. A band was setting up and the tasting room was busy. We hurriedly ordered a flight because we felt like we were in the way. After taking a few sips of the first beer, we looked at each other with droopy eyes, as if to say, "I don't know if I can drink any more beer." Had it been fantastic, we may have been able to savor it a little more. And had there not been a noisy electric guitar jam band of middle aged men wearing sunglasses indoors, we may have had the desire to stay and maybe play a little shuffle board. Instead, we got back on the bicycles to seek out a cup of sobering coffee.

The next morning, we packed the car, grabbed an all natural cup of coffee and breakfast burrito, and hit the road for virginia beach.

Arriving in Asheville

We woke up with the sun (aka Amanda woke up and said "lets go lets go lets go lets..." and Eric groaning and saying "but where is my coffee...?" We packed up the car and hit the road again. We took the highway all the way south, and began to see the mountains peeking up from the horizon. We toyed with the idea of taking the blue ridge parkway, but had difficulty deciding what road to take. We knew that if we took the highway all the way there, then we would arrive in a timely fashion, and be able to explore a few breweries before bed. But if we took the parkway, think of all the gorgeous scenery and photo ops along the way! And so clearly we chose to be late (I mean really, come on, we all saw that coming) and took the parkway. The views were breathtaking, the serotonin was pumping and then we saw the first sign, "180 miles to Asheville." Oh man, this is going to take a while.

We cruised on, Amanda occasionally grabbing the Oh-Shit-Handle, Eric refocusing on the road with an "oh come onnn." We came to the next sign "165 miles to Asheville." WHAT? Thats it?! This is going to take a while.

We did finally arrive in Asheville where we met Jordy, our host for the next few days. We went on a 2 wheeled tour of downtown. We ate at Barley, an incredible tap room and restaurant with hundreds of beers both bottled and on tap. We had our waitress create a flight of beers to our specification and she was spot on.

A few brown ales, IPAs, and even a coconut beer later (oh and a large vegetarian pie...with sausage added) we continued our tour of the town.

We arrived at a chocolatier/coffee house that was totally unique. They specialized in truffles and "sipping chocolate," or more simply 5 delicious truffles, melted with other flavors (in our cup, maple and salt) and served in a warm mug. Needless to say, death by chocolate does exist. We sat in total food coma after the delicious escapades of the night. Again we mounted our trusty steeds (mongoose, miada and trek) and rode through the hustle and bustle of the city back to house 320.

This morning we write from a funky coffee shop downtown filled with eclectic decorations from the world. Indian music satisfies our auditory sensors, lemon poppy seed and crisp ice water our gustatory, a chilly air conditioner with the rays of sunshine our tactile, and the african tribe masks our curiosities.

We are ready to explore the rest of Asheville and sip our way through the city. Back to the steeds to make more adventures, be sure to check in later.

cheers,

E and A

...and they're off! The E and A Brew Tour of 2010!

As most people who read this know (does anyone actually read this?!?), our new adventure is a 10 day, East Coast microbrew tour. Why? Because what's better than mixing hundreds of miles of driving with great beer! For the Moms reading this, don't worry, we brought our bikes!

Our first stop was not too far from Saratoga in a town that we have always wanted to visit, New Pulse. I'm not sure if it was the hippie draw or the town's wild obsession with the outdoors, but we both approved. While driving on the thuway, we called the infamous Jan (of Jan-Clean) for some help finding our first brewery. Out of all the websites of breweries in New Pulse (we found out later there were 3), the Gilded Otter Brewery looked the best. Jan explained that this was one of the better sites she had seen!

Our first impression was a massive brewpub hustling with the Friday night crowd. Amanda assumed that with the crazy amount of hub-bub, no would connect with our adventure.

We couldn't have been more wrong!

Sitting at the bar seemed to be the best idea to get full brew knowledge instead of a hurried server. Todd gave us some great hints of the town (like all of the beer names come from local road names and landmarks). AND he came our home-sweet-home, SARATOGA. He spent his life there before moving to New Pulse to climb and become a park ranger.

We split a burger and had a flight of beer. We tried the following beers:

• Huguenot St. American Lager
• Dusseldorf Altbier
• New Paltz Crimson Lager
• Three Pines India Pale Ale
• Stone House Oatmeal Stout
• Back Porch Summer Lager
• Hefeweizen
• Rail Trail Pale Ale

Out of the 8 beers that hit our palate, the unquestionable winner was the Rail Trail Pale Ale. Eric explained that the sweet toasty malts were in perfect balance with the fruity American Style Hops (probably the cascades??). Amanda could have drank it all night long...too bad for an upcoming 3-4 hour car ride! Some of our other favorites was the Oatmeal Stout and of course, the IPA.

Overall, the duo concluded that not only did the Gilded Otter Brewery have a rockin' website, but the beer, food and company were exceptional!

We ended the night sleeping on a utility road under a massive radio antenna...how romantic! Roxie (our Subaru Forester) provided us with the perfect den. Tomorrow...Asheville, NC here we come!

We made it! Complete!!!

After a long week, we made it! In fact, we were so tired and sick of food on Friday we forgot to blog. Saturday, we were so excited to eat that we forgot to blog. And then we had to work and you know the rest.

BUT after much deliberation, here it is, the grand finale.

Friday was just like all the other days, but a little more exhausting. We are used to wrapping up our Friday's downtown at a bar, maybe a little D'Andrea's pizza, but we were still slaves to our project. Jonathan provided some needed distraction by entertaining us with a game of monopoly (pirates of the Caribbean version, obviously). Even when the clock struck midnight we held strong to the decision to eat nothing until breakfast even though the night was technically over. And when breakfast came, how sweet it was. Literally.

We are lucky enough to have friends that understand our irrational ideas, like Tony. We were treated to a breakfast in our own home of homemade cinnamon swirl bread cut texas style and fried up into some of the best french toast ever. And nothing could have been better than soaking it in home made maple syrup. And then the bacon. And the coffee...everyone indulged, maybe over indulged, in all of it.

We would have never guessed how difficult this week could have been. Although we never felt exceptionally hungry, it was so tiring to eat the same stuff ALL THE TIME. For Eric, giving up coffee was the most trying part of the week. Monday and Tuesday were borderline dangerous because of the amount of driving he does. Not to mention the headaches and sleepiness! We also figured out how much we take snacking between meals for granted. We missed being able to pick up a handful of almonds or just an apple or banana. In addition, after dinner there was no cup of tea or ice cream.

We also figured out how much of our life is spent creating masterpieces of the palate. Making slop provided us with no such satisfaction. We had no spices to experiment with or new flavors to indulge. Okay...we also missed the Uncommon Grounds bagels!

Being a week while Eric and Amanda both had meeting that provided free GREAT food also made it difficult. It was such a tease to see our co-workers eating great food at the hospital or Longfellows! Just one bite please?

All in all, we are so happy to have experienced a life with no frills. Good planning and a positive attitude made it bearable. We have so much more appreciation for the flavors and lifestyle that we live and have so much more respect to those living a no frill lifestyle not by choice. Next time you drink your $4 cup of coffee from the bucks or just buy a piece of meat at the grocery, look at the price. Think about how that could fit into a dollar a day week and consider the fact that you don't have to choose enriched white rice over more nourishing brown rice because the price.

Thanks to everyone who has followed us during this project! It sure was interesting! Let us know what you think!

-Eric and Amanda

Thursday

The much anticipated "something other than slop day" has also come and gone. We expected spaghetti day to be a breath of fresh air, but as we slurped our pasta with plain tomato sauce we both grimaced and decided that our slop might be better. The sauce was horrible. We have been used to our home made sauce loaded with garlic, oregano and whatever else we could find in the cupboard. Today our appreciation for our normal food is growing less, and an irritation with ourselves for deciding to do this is what is overriding those feelings. Especially when Eric spent the day at Longfellow's restaurant for work practically drooling over the free food. But, we had decided that free food would not count because not everyone who is forced to eat for this little has that access (such as a job that would offer grilled chicken sandwiches). Friday brings another day of bread and slop, and we are counting down the minutes to Saturday morning!