Antler Hill Village at The Biltmore Estate

We woke up early and after a stroll along the stream in the RV park we headed out to experience the Catawba Falls. These falls are a series of waterfalls on the headwaters of the Catawba River, in McDowell County, near Old Fort, North Carolina. The Catawba River flows over 2 major waterfalls in a short distance - lovely sight. 

From the falls we drove to the Biltmore Estate.  We've pre-purchased tickets to the Estate for tomorrow.

Here is a little know travel tip: you may enter the grounds at 4PM on the afternoon before your Estate tour date (the date stated on your ticket). There is so much to see, you don't want to miss the opportunity of having extra time on site. Today at 4PM we arrived at will call to pick up our tickets for tomorrow's tour and drove on to the beautiful grounds, this was a gorgeous curvy ride through the artfully designed landscapes.

George Vanderbilt employed landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted to design the original 125,000 acres grounds. You may have heard his name before, he co-designed New York's Central Park. Olmsted designed a huge park-like setting surrounding the Biltmore home and established farms along the property's river. Then he replanted much of the rest of the land as a commercial timber forest. Gifford Pinchot and later Carl Schenck were hired to manage the forests, with Schenck establishing the first forestry education program in the U.S., the Biltmore Forest School, on the estate grounds in 1898.

The estate today covers approximately 8,000 acres, overseen by The Biltmore Company, a trust set up by the family. The company is one of the largest employers in the Asheville area. Restaurants were opened in 1979 and 1987 as well as gift shops in 1993. The former dairy barn was converted into the Biltmore Winery in 1985. The beautiful 210-room Inn on Biltmore Estate opened in 2001, and in 2010, the estate debuted Antler Hill Village.

I was surprised that we could drive in front of The Biltmore! It was wonderful! We stopped the jeep and took a few pictures of the front lawn. We drove by the gardens and continued on down the road to the village. We enjoyed walking around Antler Village, then we did a little wine tasting - we enjoyed it so much we bought a few bottles.  We had a drink at Cedric’s Tavern (named after the Biltmore's dog) which had a nice pub atmosphere. We decided to stay and have dinner at Cedric's, good food.  We strolled through the village, partaking in an ice-cream cone and sat at the park as we listened to music. We enjoyed the grounds until it was dark and time for us to return to the RV.