{"id":542,"date":"2011-06-21T09:37:49","date_gmt":"2011-06-21T14:37:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/travelingthieles.wordpress.com\/?p=542"},"modified":"2014-08-02T01:36:12","modified_gmt":"2014-08-02T01:36:12","slug":"asheville-nc-and-biltmore-estate-april-2011","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/?p=542","title":{"rendered":"Asheville, NC and Biltmore Estate &#8211; April 2011"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We were trying to find ways to cash in some of Mayne&#8217;s marriott rewards points that he earned during all of his audit travel, and we found a Marriott Autograph collection hotel &#8211; the Grand Bohemian &#8211; in Asheville. It took a free night certificate (from Mayne&#8217;s platinum status anniversary) and some points and we had our long weekend booked!<\/p>\n<p>Elisa had never been and was excited to see what all the fuss about the Biltmore was about. It didn&#8217;t disappoint &#8211; the weather was perfect and all the azaleas and rhododendrons in the sizable gardens were in bloom. We also enjoyed the winery in the complex, and a delightful dinner in the downtown Asheville area.<\/p>\n<p>I don&#8217;t normally get excited about hotels &#8211; we typically just look for a clean room, convenient to sights and activities at a reasonable rate (we don&#8217;t travel to visit hotels, after all) &#8211; but this Marriott property was definitely a treat! The decorations and bedding were as sumptuous and fancy as one would want, there was a huge soaker tub (with revealing glass surround), and the dining room and lobby were fully appointed in lodge-style very fitting of a hotel just outside the Biltmore proper.<\/p>\n<p>As a side note we came back to nashville to a hoard of cicadas! \u00a0The ominously named &#8220;Brood XIX&#8221; had arrived and had already piled up sloughed shells at the base of our trees!<\/p>\nngg_shortcode_0_placeholder\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We were trying to find ways to cash in some of Mayne&#8217;s marriott rewards points that he earned during all of his audit travel, and we found a Marriott Autograph collection hotel &#8211; the Grand Bohemian &#8211; in Asheville. It took a free night certificate (from Mayne&#8217;s platinum status anniversary) and some points and we had our long weekend booked! Elisa had never been and was excited to see what all the fuss about the (more&#8230;) <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2095,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[247,248,31,251,45,253],"class_list":["post-542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-united-states","tag-asheville","tag-biltmore","tag-cicadas","tag-estate","tag-gardens","tag-north-carolina"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011-Asheville-700x210.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=542"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2004,"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542\/revisions\/2004"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.travelingthieles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}