"What-to-do-in-Charlotte-North-carolina"

A Night Out in Charlotte, North Carolina

"What-To-Do-In-Cancun-Mexico"

Hola, mis amores! 

Last week, Dj and I traveled down to Cancun, Mexico to meet up with my best friend, Sara (remember her from our adventures exploring North Florida?), and her fiance, Waugh. None of had ever been to Cancun before, but Sara + Waugh bought this ridiculous vacation package while in Cozumel a few years ago. Wanting to take advantage of another trip before the package ended, we talked about doing a couples trip… aka Baecation (don’t hate me, hehe.)

So, on a whim, we looked online, found a 5 day block that worked for the 4 of our work schedules and booked the trip all within 48 hours. I’m a huge advocator for traveling as much as possible (I lived in London for a bit, travel out to California pretty frequently, and on months that my schedule is tight, explore nearby cities for weekend getaways, and even scope out local areas for quick day trips!)

Luckily for me, Sara shares my gypsy soul so she is the perfect travel partner. Waugh is also one of my favorite humans on this earth, and him and Dj made their own “brocation” so it was an all around awesome time.

We packed a lot into the short 5 day trip and really made the most of it. To break it down, I’ll do a 3 part series that covers everything from travel tips to extend your stay (aka this post), our trip to Cancun in general, as well as our day trip exploring the Mayan ruins, but other than that, this 3 part travel series is set out to be one of my longer recap posts. 🙂


Thursday:

I’ve always been extremely interested in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Carolinas are beautiful and I kept hearing raving stories of how awesome Charlotte was and how it was one of the coolest up and coming cities for young adults.

Here’s a huge travel trip: look for overnight layovers in cities that you’re interested in seeing! It’s basically free travel since you’re going to your final destination anyways. I always just scope out hotels with discounts and shuttles to and from the airport!

When looking into booking mine & Dj’s flight, I saw one that left from Jacksonville Thursday late afternoon and landed in Charlotte around 4:45 pm. It was an overnight layover, taking off from Charlotte early Friday morning, getting us to Cancun around 11 am. Of course, I booked that flight immediately, excited that we’re packing two destinations + getaways into one plane ticket.

"What-to-do-in-Charlotte-North-carolina"

Dj and I got to the Jacksonville airport a little early, grabbed one last local beer (Dukes, I love ya), and then headed off to Charlotte for the night!

"What-to-do-in-Charlotte-North-carolina"

Once we landed, we called the hotel, waited for the shuttle, then checked in. My friend from when we both went to WVU, Chrissy, moved to Charlotte a little less than a year ago. She travels a ton for her job, but she happened to be in town for the night! We wanted to meet up for happy hour and grab some food, so she recommended that we meet at the Epicentre.

The Epicentre was awesome. It was like a giant donut shaped town center. It was 3 stories tall when a large circle cut out in the middle so that the sky and fresh air was throughout the space. We started off meeting up for dinner and drinks at Tin Roof.

"What-to-do-in-Charlotte-North-carolina"

Tin Roof was a lot of fun. The set up of the restaurant was filled with so much interesting decor to keep looking at. They also brought in a band a little later in the night and they were great.

"What-to-do-in-Charlotte-North-carolina"

Their food is typical bar food, but they did offer lighter options, so I opted for a grilled shrimp salad. Once Chrissy arrived with her friend and the drinks and laughs started, I realized our “calm evening showing us around the city” was a rookie mistake on my part. We used to have SO much fun together at WVU and once we started reminiscing over all the SoCo + lime shots we would take, it was all over from there.

Mother Nature was not on our side and it started pouring rain right when we got inside the Epicentre. That worked out for us, though, since it killed the crowds. There were still a ton of people out, but we didn’t have to wait in any lines for bars, drinks, and it wasn’t overly crowded to the point of not being comfortable.

After spending a good bit of time at Tin Roof, we decided to explore other aspects of the Epicentre. On the third floor, they have two rooftop bars, (I’m pretty sure they were Vault & Suite), and we went to both. They had live music, friendly locals, and plenty of beer. 😉

"What-to-do-in-Charlotte-North-carolina"

Thanks for all the fun, Chrissy! <3

After a few hours out, Dj and I took an Uber back to our hotel and crashed before waking up bright and early to catch our flight to Cancun.

Check out my part two travel series: Traveling to Cancun, Mexico and part three: Exploring the Mayan Ruins!


Questions for you:

  1. Have you ever been to Charlotte before?
  2. If so, what should I do on my next trip to Queen City?
  3. What’s your favorite city you’ve traveled to?

No Comments

Leave a Reply