Perfect Weekend Itinerary in Nashville

Before the world had to stay at home, the last trip we went on was with our best friends heading to the Honky Tonk capitol of Tennessee. We were excited to get our eat on and our dance on! Luckily we did both and now we can tell you where all the best food, bars, and instagram spots are. (when we’re allowed to travel again)

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We stayed at an airbnb with our best friends Alisha & Salman in 12 South nearby the I believe in Nashville mural and five daughters bakery. We really liked how Nashville has many neighborhoods that all had different vibes, Nashville Guru does a great job breaking down each neighborhood with where to eat, where to stay and cute places to shop.

DAY ONE.

We started off the day by going to a yoga class at Inner Light Yoga which was downstairs from our airbnb. Luckily we got a workout in because our next stop was Five Daughters Bakery. Look at the size of these doughnuts and they are croissant style filled with cream and custard. We got 5 for the 4 of us and I wasn’t able to get a photo because we ate them so fast!

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We had the below flavors, in order of my favorites:

  1. Chocolate Sea Salt
  2. The Purist
  3. King Kong (this one had bacon on top!)
  4. Vanilla Cream
  5. Seasonal Doughnut

Photo of Five Daughters Bakery 12south - Nashville, TN, United States. Vanilla cream. The best!
(Yelp)

The area around 12 South is very quaint, nice houses and good restaurants. Reese Witherspoon’s Draper James flagship has lots of adorable y’all merchandise if you’re looking for a southern souvenir or some free sweet tea!

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Next up mural time, since we only had a weekend in Nashville we did not stand in line for murals. Just because every influence and her mother has taken a photo with these murals doesn’t mean you need to waste 20-30 minutes of your precious life standing in line to get a photo. We took some really cute photos with the striped wall against Draper James and I think it’s way cuter!

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Not saying you shouldn’t try to take photos of the murals but because we were in Nashville over President’s Day weekend I think it was a lot busier than usual.

For brunch we went to Urban Grub, I had the shrimp and grits which were AMAZING but they also have an amazing brunch buffet spread with snow crab legs!

(Image source: yelp)

Photo of Urban Grub - Nashville, TN, United States(Image source: yelp)

After we stuffed ourselves (forgot how big portions were in the south), we headed downtown. We rented a car and drove downtown because we didn’t realize how expensive parking would be! Every lot we pulled into was around $30-40 until we miraculously found street parking which was about $1.25/hour until 4 PM. Sweeet!

We strolled down to Broadway in search of a good Honky Tonk, the street was extremely crowded and had country music blasting out of every Honky Tonk! With so many options, it was hard to pick one.

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We ended up going to Honky Tonk Central because they had nice large balconies and 3 floors, we grooved to the bands and drank a couple Bud Lights and White Claws and went on our way.

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Here are some other Honky Tonk options:

  1. Robert’s Western World
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    (Image source: Tripadviser)
  2. Rippy’s Honky Tonk
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    (Nashvile Guru)
  3. If you want a honky tonk but make it fashion? Check out Acme Feed & Seed with an awesome rooftop
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    (Acme Feed & Seed)
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    (The Tenneseean)
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We walked over to the bridge to take some photos and see the river, found a guy who took at least 30 photos of us from all different angles. Must have been a well trained instagram husband/boyfriend!

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Next we were on a mission to find a speakeasy on Painters Alley.

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We stumbled into Skull’s Rainbow Room a jazz bar that does burlesque shows starting at 11 pm.  We had some pre dinner cocktails since we were all still stuffed from brunch.

Image result for skulls rainbow room(Earth Trekkers)

We tried to get into Puckett’s Grocery & Restaurant but the wait was over an hour and a half long so we took our chances and went to Party Fowl where we got sat at the bar and got some hot chicken and beer.

(Photo credit: Party Fowl)

Here are some other amazing restaurants to get dinner:

  1. Hattie’s B’s Hot Chicken(Image credit: Joseph Woodley)
  2. Puckett’s Grocery
    Photo of Puckett's Grocery & Restaurant - Nashville, TN, United States

We ended our day at The Patterson House to get some curated cocktails which had another wait of around 45 minutes but we decided to stick it out since we hadn’t waited for anything else during our day. The atmosphere and ambiance was great but the cocktails were extremely sweet but what do you expect in the land of sweet tea?

*PRO tip, get a whiskey or bourbon sampler instead of a cocktail

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(The Opinionator)

DAY TWO.

We started our day with the most amazing brunch from Henrietta Red. Everything we ordered was beyond delicious and we got to explore Germantown which is a neighborhood with chic restaurants in restored Victorian buildings and eclectic boutiques.

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We stopped by a couple small boutiques, Alexis + Bolt was converted from a house and had mimosas in their kitchen which is a pretty cute concept for a store.

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(Alexis + Bolt)

Even though we were stuffed from brunch, we love checking our farmers markets wherever we go. Nashville Farmers Market would great if you’re looking for a casual meal in between site seeing. The farmers market had everything from Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream to fresh produce to a garden center at the end.

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Image result for nashville farmers market(Nashville Farmers Market)

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Afterward we drove downtown to find some posters and records, we stopped by the Hatch Show Print museum and Record store.

We bought a record at Third Man Records which had people recording live inside the store but it is definitely not in the best area. We also went to some thrift shops that had lots of vintage records for way cheaper.

The wings mural is located downtown but the line wrapped around the corner so we found these chicken wings instead outside of Porky.

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If we had more time we would have loved to go to a hockey game or drive out to Cheekwood Estates.

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(Cheeckwood Estates)

On our way to the airport, we stopped by the beautiful Vanderbuilt campus and the Parthenon. We didn’t get to go inside but it houses many 19th and 20th century artists along with rotating exhibits.

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Until next time!

Xoxo,

Nina & Ross

Weekend in Cape Winelands, Cape Town South Africa

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The landscape of Cape Winelands completely blew Napa out of the water!  The wines were also really great, looking back one of the wines from our wedding was from South Africa.

We drove from Cellars-Hoehenort directly to our first vineyard, Fairview Wine & Cheese, where there were lots of goats!  The wine and cheese pairing was perfect!

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Our next stop was my favorite winery, Babylonstoren!  It is not only a vineyard but also a beautiful farm and garden, I wanted to go to Babel but there were no more reservations for the rest of the year!  So if you want to go there too, I suggest you make a reservation as soon as you book your flight.  We ended up getting some snacks and meeting the cutest baby at Greenhouse, food was very good and the greenhouse next to it inspired me to one day make Ross build me a greenhouse just like it!

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Here’s a map of the grounds- babylonstoren_garden_map

Cape Winelands has three major areas: Paarl, Stellenbosch, and Franschhenok.  We decided to stay in Franschhenok because of the world’s best boutique hotel- Akademie Street Boutique Hotel. 

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The photos seriously don’t even do the hotel justice, everything about it was absolutely perfect.  We had custom made cocktails before dinner and sun downers after dinner.

IMG_1166Don’t even get me started on the breakfast! Breakfast and drinks were served in the amazing greenhouse and in the afternoon they have a fire going in the fireplace!

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We were reluctant to leave Akademie Street Boutique but we also wanted to go to other vineyards so we started the day driving up the hill to Mont Rochelle Nature Reserve where there is a beautiful scenic vista.

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Our next stop was Delaire Graff because it’s a Relaix & Chateau hotel.  We were a bit disappointed because it was a bit more commercial than the other ones we had been to but we did go into the Graff diamond store where I tried on a beautiful pair of diamond butterfly earrings!  Our 5 year anniversary is coming up Ross!

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My friend Abby had just gone to Cape Town earlier this year and one of her recommendations was to book a picnic at Boschendal, luckily I looked into it earlier since I’m such a planner because you need to book the picnic 24 hours in advanced!  We are so glad we booked it because the food and views and photos came out amazingly!

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Transportation:

If drinking and driving isn’t your thing, you can take the Franschhoek wine tram.  Pricing is very reasonable, only $16.63/adult!

We checked out the town of Stellenbosch before heading to the last vineyard we went to on our way to the airport was Hidden Valley Wines.

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Our second favorite meal in Cape Winelands was at Foliage, everything we ordered was delicious!  What we liked was that it was a tasting menu but you could select how many courses so you weren’t stuck with a 7 course meal!

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For other food in Cape Town, check out our What to Eat in Cape Town page.

Since coming back from Cape Winelands, we have tried many other South African wines in New York!

What’s your favorite vineyard?

XOXO,

Nina & Ross

One year anniversary in Nantucket

Image may contain: 2 people, including Nina Han Butler, people smiling, people standing, ocean, wedding, child, outdoor and waterDSC_0286

On our one year anniversary, we went back to our favorite island Nantucket!  We stayed at the Wauwinet where we got married and got to stay in the Coatue suite.  The Wauwinet is a magical retreat away from everything, even though Nantucket is just on the coast of Massachusetts it feels like you are in another world!

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And the sunsets are incredible!

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Our goal is to back to Nantucket to celebrate our anniversary every year and try all of the restaurants on the island.  So far we have tried the following restaurants and we’ve ranked them in the order of our favorites:

  1. Toppers – $$$$ in the summer you can take a boat from the White Elephant to the Wauwinet or a 30 minute shuttle ride from downtown Nantucket Photo of Topper's - Nantucket, MA, United States. The beach area.
  2. Black Eyed Susans – $ best breakfast on the island (CASH ONLY and BYOB!)Photo of Black-Eyed Susan's - Nantucket, MA, United States. Thai curry omelette + huevos
  3. The Nautilus – $$$ best tapas and most inventive menuPhoto of The Nautilus - Nantucket, MA, United States. Asian food
  4. The Proprietors Bar & Table – $$$ we had our rehearsal dinner here and everything was amazing!Image may contain: 1 person, sitting, table and indoor
  5. The Pearl  – $$$$ came here one of the first times we were on island,  incredible fresh seafood
    Photo of The Pearl - Nantucket, MA, United States. tuna martini
  6. CRU – $$$$ great scene, food is very expensive!
  7. Dune – $$$ great food and atmosphere
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  8. The Club Car – $$ great food and also great cocktails Photo of The Club Car - Nantucket, MA, United States
  9. LoLa 41 – good sushiPhoto of Lo La 41 - Nantucket, MA, United States
  10. Fifty Six Union – $$$ family owned, delicious food!

When shopping, we stumbled upon James Cromartie’s gallery and met James!  We loved hearing all about his stories of Princess Diana and his other patrons.  We ended up going home with one of his famous 007 paintings.

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If you’re going off season, make sure to check to see which restaurants are open because some are closed during off season.  Here’s a great website to check which are open all year round.

Another great time to visit Nantucket is when they have annual events such as:

Daffodil Festival ~ end of April

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Cranberry Festival ~ mid October

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Christmas Stroll ~ beginning of December

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How to get to Nantucket:

Having our wedding in Nantucket, we researched all of the different ways to get to the island.

Option 1: Fly via Jetblue from LGA, JFK, Boston or DC to Nantucket

Option 2: Fly to Boston and take CapeAir directly to Nantucket

Option 3: Drive to Hyannis and take the ferry
Two types of ferries go from Hyannis to Nantucket
Hy-Line fast speed ferry – $  77/round trip takes 1 hour each way
Steamship Authority fast ferry – $ 69/round trip takes 1 hour each way
Steamship Authority slow ferry – $ 37/round trip takes 2 hours and 15 mins
each way
*TIP- if you plan on going to Nantucket more than once or are traveling with a larger group, you can buy 10 one-way tickets on Hy-line for $275.

Next time we want to try doing some hikes.  Does anyone know of any hikes that we can try?

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