H.A.M...A weekend that will always remind me of listening to Kanye/Jay Z and stinking up a restaurant...and of course great times with great friends!

The first weekend in November we loaded up the car and headed about an hour north of us to go camping in Dahlonega.  When I say loaded up the car that is an understatement.  Maggie and Ronnie drove up from Newnan and met us at our apartment.  Both of our cars were packed before we even combined all of our stuff into my car so that we could carpool.  We had tents, air mattresses, camping chairs, food, pillows, lots of layers of clothing and LOTS of blankets. Needless to say we sat on blankets and had bags all around our feet and on our laps.  


We got there right as it was getting dark so we had to shine my headlights on the campsite while we set up the tents.

Kevin got our fire going...

And I had the most important job :)

Dinner turned out great!  Chicken and baked potatoes...we were impressed with ourselves :)

Time to relax!

  
The temperature was comfortable while we were around the fire but it got down to about 30 degrees while we were sleeping!  We had lots of blankets and slept in several layers...

haha Brianna go this for me for Christmas last year and it actually came in handy, very warm!

Kevin got up and made us sausage and eggs, yum!!

We had lots of doggie visitors...

Funniest looking dog I've ever seen...he waddled around and looked like a sheep!

Our campsite was right on the river

After breakfast we headed to downtown Dahlonega.  It was such a cute little town!  We got some hot sauce from the General Store, walked through antique stores, bought some beef jerky from the beef jerky store, some chocolate from the chocolate store, and enjoyed the wonderful weather!

Kevin decided on about 10 new hobbies he wants to take up while we were there...glassblowing, lathing (cutting wood), mining for gold, make knives...

Enjoying some beef jerky

We ate at Picnic Cafe...had a nice little soup, salad, and sandwich lunch but nothing too delicious (lunch on Sunday was much more memorable!)

Then we headed to Wolf Mountain Vinyards.  It was beautiful!  The fall leaves were perfect, the weather was great, and the wine was delicious!  

Then we went back to our campsite and made dinner, which was hot dogs, chili, corn, and s'mores for dessert.  Another delicious dinner! 

And now for the stinking up the restaurant story...after dinner and hanging out by the camp fire, we headed back downtown to find somewhere to stay warm for a bit and watch the Alabama/LSU game.  We went to the Back Porch which is a seafood restaurant that looks pretty casual but when we walked in and smelled the food and saw that there were a few people on dates, etc. we realized it was a little nicer than we thought.  In other words our reeking of campfire became more apparent as we walked in!  We were seated in the middle of the restaurant (there was also a bar next to us where people were watching the game so we weren't totally out of place!) and about 30 minutes later Maggie noticed the owner sniffing around and asking some people if they smelled smoke! Maggie knew that it was US that she smelled :)  Then the owner came over to us and asked if we smelled something burning, or something like ham, and we all died laughing and said it was us that she smelled!  She thought it was hilarious.  She came by a few times over the course of the night and got whiffs of us because she said she thought we smelled good!  


The next morning we had sausage and eggs for breakfast again, packed the car back up, and went downtown one last time before heading home.  We ate at Bourbon Street Grille for lunch. We got a nice spot on the upstairs balcony overlooking the square and our food was delicious!  Definitely a nice end to our trip. 

We had a great time with Maggie and Ronnie and I really loved Dahlonega.  Can't believe I'd never been there!  We will definitely go back :)  And I love camping.  I loved it in Yosemite this past September and I loved it again this time.  I hope we do more of it!