My Weekend at the "Dirty Dancing" Lodge {Mountain Lake Lodge for #MixedCon}

November 10, 2014
Mountain-Lake-Lodge-Main-Building

Today I'm in the kitchen baking ... with the soundtrack to "Dirty Dancing" playing in the background.  Want to know why I'm listening to "Dirty Dancing" music?  {Other than because it's totally awesome  music, that is.}  Well, I just got back from a weekend at Mountain Lake Lodge in Virginia, which just so happens to be the lodge at which much of "Dirty Dancing" was filmed.  Cool!

So yeh, I kinda still have "Dirty Dancing" on the brain.

I was in high school when the movie came out and I immediately fell in love with it.  I mean, what teenage high school girl of the 80's didn't fall in love with the star-crossed lovers' story of Baby and Johnny??

Want to see some pictures I took while I was there?  'Cause I'll be more than happy to show them to ya!

It was so fun to see different places on the lodge's grounds that were used in filming "Dirty Dancing" scenes.

Here's the main lodge building ... that served as the main building of Kellerman's, the resort at which Baby's family vacationed in the movie ...

Mountain-Lake-Lodge-Main-Building

When I arrived at the Lodge ... which is at the end of a long and winding {very  winding} road at the very tippy top of a mountain ... I was greeted by trees dusted with snow and a very light snow falling.  This was a bizarre surprise, because even just 500 yards down the road from the lodge, it wasn't snowing.  The snow was only falling right there at the very top of the mountain!


Now, I wasn't so thrilled about the snowy greeting.  See, even though I grew up in Vermont, I'm really not a fan of the white fluffy stuff.  Fortunately, it was just a light dusting that melted away pretty quickly.

Here's  "Baby's cabin" ... the cabin at Mountain Lake Lodge where Baby's family stayed ...

Mountain-Lake-Lodge-Babys-Cabin

And want to know something totally crazy?

That lake in the movie?  That looks about like this?


 All the water has drained out of it!  For real.

It now looks like this ...


Empty-Mountain-Lake

Mountain-Lake-Drained

Isn't that just wild?

{I am definitely not smart enough about these things to explain why ... so I'll give a link in case you want to read more about it.}

I love being able to say I've watched "Dirty Dancing" actually AT the place much of it was filmed!  So fun ...


As much as it sounds like I was, I wasn't at Mountain Lake Lodge simply to pay homage to my all-time favorite movie.  Nope.  

I was actually there to attend the food bloggers' conference, Mixed.  And it was a blast!  I learned a ton of new blogging stuff, met up live with several food bloggers I'd previously only 'met' online, met some new amazing folks, ate a lot of yummy food {it was a food bloggers' conference, after all}, and even got some fabulous goodies to take home with me.



I had the wonderful pleasure of hanging out with these amazing bloggers ...

Tracey-The-Kitchen-Is-My-Playground-Selfie

Back row:  Emily of It Bakes Me Happy, Me, and Janine of Janine's Rustic Kitchen
Front Row:  Liz of Floating Kitchen, Zainab of Blahnik Baker, Carrie of Frugal Foodie Mama, and Erin of Delightful E Made


I had the pleasure of whipping up a few cute little jars of yummy-smelling sugar scrubs, compliments of Dixie Crystals Sugar ...



I never knew sugar scrubs were so easy to make.  I had these whipped up in 5 minutes flat.  Of course, the Dixie Crystals folks had all the ingredients set up for me ... but still ... they're easy.  I swear.

You can find lots of different sugar scrub recipes on Dixie Crystals' website ... I made Mexican Hot Chocolate and Lemon Rosemary.  They smell good enough to eat!


And I had the pleasure of taking home this chocolate-lover's-dream-of-a-gift-basket I won from Hershey's ...


Score!

Seriously, when I opened up and unpacked the basket once I got home, the chocolate treats just kept coming and coming and coming.  I'm stocked up on my chocolate supply for a while.  Thank you, thank you, thank you, Hershey's!

As you can see, I loved every minute of my weekend at the "Dirty Dancing" lodge.  Complete with lots of references to carrying watermelons ... or sitting in corners.  Some could even say I had the time of my life!

Okay, so maybe not the time of my life, but it was indeed lots of fun!


6 comments

  1. Looks like you had a ball. It's good to get out of our routine for awhile. Glad you had fun

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    Replies
    1. Thank you so much, John! Yes, I did have a ball ... It was a nice little trip.

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  2. Lovely to see a photo of you!!

    How nice to meet up with blogging friends in person.

    Jenny from New Zealand

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  3. Great re-cap Tracey. I love all your photos. And I had such a wonderful time meeting you! XOXO

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  4. I was so great meeting you Tracey. I loved your recap and your photos. Hope we can meet up again soon!

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  5. Loved your recap of our weekend! Great photos too! It was so nice meeting you and I hope to see you again soon! Take care my new foodie friend :)

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