Minneapolis to Tennessee, north and/or South Carolina

[S4sarah]

Planning a 7-10 day trip with kids. We've road tripped to Texas 18 hours in one night with our kids they slept and woke to sun and palm trees. Looking to do a road trip to Tennessee/North Carolina possibly South Carolina. We want to hike in the smoky mountains and see the blue ridge mountains. Go to the Biltmore Estate, possibly stop at a beach. Any one have some clever road trip ideas for this location and what to see and do?

[AZBuck]

Welcome aboard the RoadTrip America Forums!

We really can't recommend, or even condone, such reckless behavior as driving 18 hours at a sitting. The fact that you have done it in the past and gotten away with it does not mean that it is safe any more than having 'won' at Russian Roulette means that it is safe to put a loaded gun to your head and pull the trigger. If you were an experienced, professional, licensed long-haul trucker it would be illegal for you to drive 11 hours with nothing more than somebody's bric-a-brac in your trunk. That an inexperienced nonprofessional thinks nothing of driving 18 hours with their children in the car simply boggles my mind. Study after study has shown that is simply unsafe. and NO, having another driver does nothing to alter that fact.

If you want to take the trip you outline in a reasonable, safe and enjoyable manner, then you are looking at a MINIMUM of two full days each way between Minneapolis and Asheville with an overnight stop for a solid eight hours of sleep in the Indianapolis area. Then you will need another half day each way between Asheville and the coast, with Charleston and its nearby beaches as your best option. So you're going to be using up at least five days of your vacation driving. If you only have seven days total, then you can have a day in the mountains and a day at the beach - hardly worth all that effort. If you can get a full ten days free to devote to the trip, then you can begin to have a pleasant and memorable (for the right reasons!) trip.

AZBuck