Hidden Ships Distillery

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
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Hello everyone and welcome toTopsail Insider.

(02:19):
My name is Krista and I am yourhost.
Today we are talking to Amy andAndy Zwebka.
They are the husband and wifeowners of Hidden Ships
Distillery.
Welcome, amy and Andy.
Thank you so much for lettingus come in here today and do
this, including we just did atasting, which was so much fun.

Speaker 2 (02:37):
Yeah, thank you so much for coming in today.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
Yes, everyone here knows Hidden Ships Distillery
because it's a very popularplace, and rightfully so.
For those who may not know whatHidden Ships Distillery is,
please give us the nutshellversion of what you have going
on here.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah, so we are Topsail Island's first and only
distillery.
We're actually the first inPenner County.
We're what we callpre-prohibition inspired.
So our cocktail menu featurescocktails from the late 1800s or
inspired by that era, I think.
In our lounge area we kind ofcarry over that theme and
feeling.
It's a unique atmosphere forthe area.
We like to call it a little bitof speakeasy without being too

(03:13):
too dark and dim, a little bitof coastal without being too
bright, and so you kind ofcombine that atmosphere with the
menu that we've created andthat's what you get.
We get a pre-prohibitioncocktail lounge with the menu
that we've created and that'swhat you get.

Speaker 1 (03:26):
We get a pre-prohibition cocktail lounge.
You nailed it.
I was thinking about how todescribe this place.
It's very velvety and warmfeeling in here, but you still
have a lot of fun here, withpeople coming during the day,
and I came in the other day andthey were playing cards.
I was a little jealous, likethat's what a great place to
hang out.
You also have like football andthemed evenings and events here
, so you did.

(03:47):
you caught that speakeasy,darker vibe, but it's not too
dark, it's perfect.
I want to jump right into thebackstory and then we're going
to go through what you offer,from your cocktails to what
you're distilling and yourclasses, which are amazing, and
all that.
But first let's talk about thatbackstory.

(04:07):
So you did something that Ionly dream about doing.
I dream about it.
I even bought an RV because Iwanted to do it so badly, but I
couldn't get my family on boardBefore we get there.
Where did you two meet?
We met in high school?
Where?
At what part of the country?
In Western New York?
Where were you when you startedthe RV trip around the US?

Speaker 2 (04:27):
Yeah, we were here.
So my background, which we mayget to.
But I just retired after 21years in the Marine Corps that
was June of 2021.
And so we were here.
As I retired, we left NorthCarolina and then headed out on
that trip.

Speaker 1 (04:41):
Was it a honey?
Let's sell everything and justtravel around the country with
our children and show themeverything?
Or was it you had a plan inplace that you knew ultimately
would lead to hidden ships?

Speaker 2 (04:54):
I think we had a plan that the trip would only be one
year long, so that wasdefinitive.
Some people that we met out onthe road like do it.
When they say full-time, theymean there's no ending date.

Speaker 1 (05:05):
For us.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
We were full-time for that year, but we knew that it
was going to end, and so, priorto the trip, we had certainly
dreamed of having hidden ships.
We had spent some time thinkingabout it, planning.
I had done some preparationprior to, but certainly nothing
was solidified before leaving onthe trip.
Well, when we left NorthCarolina, we actually went
basically straight to theKentucky Bourbon Trail.
That was kind of our firstmajor stop, spent 10 or 11 days

(05:27):
there up in Kentucky and did alot of the big distillery tours
but also a lot of craftdistilleries, because that's
what we were more interested inseeing at that time.

Speaker 1 (05:36):
Okay, you were retired.
You have a background innursing.
What made you do the jump from,or were you already thinking
about a distillery while youwere in the military?

Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yeah for sure.
So our origin story that welike to tell we're here today
because Amy and I had a greatexperience in early 2019.
That was at another distilleryup in North Carolina called
Murto's Made.
It's in Huntersville, so ifyou're in that area, go check
them out and they have a similarbusiness model with a back of
the house distillery, front ofthe house cocktail bar.
They're much more speakeasythough in terms of their lounge,

(06:07):
much darker but similarbusiness model.
And that was early.
2019 was the first time I'd kindof ever had a smoked old
fashion.
It was beautifully presented tous and at that point in my life
, for probably the 10 yearsleading up to it, every time I
saw a brewery open I would lookat it and say, darn it, I should
have done that, and that'scertainly not to take away from

(06:27):
all the unique challenges thatare in that industry, but that
was just my mindset.
And so then we have this greatexperience at a distillery and I
just started to research thecraft distilling as an industry,
doing as much as I could.
The assessment I made from abusiness perspective was I think
craft distilling is where craftbreweries were maybe 10 or 15
years ago, just in terms of howoften you see them or how

(06:48):
popular they are.
And so I thought well, if we'regoing to jump in, it makes sense
to do that now.
Again, I still had two yearsleft to serve in the Marine
Corps, so I did what I could.
University of Louisville ofcourse, louisville is the heart
of bourbon country in Kentucky.
That school offers a graduateprogram in distilled spirits, so
that's an online program,nothing hands-on for distilling,
but a great background inregulatory issues, legal issues.

(07:11):
We're a very highly regulatedindustry, as you could probably
imagine, and so it gave me afirm foundation in those
concepts, but also branding,marketing, a little bit of
operations.
And then my favorite was thehistory of distilled spirits.
I was a history undergrad so Ireally nerded out in that class.

Speaker 1 (07:27):
Okay, it's all starting to come together now,
yeah.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
So really loved that one and again finished that
course right at the same time asI was retiring.
It was a two-year program andso finished up June of 2021,
retired June of 2021.
And actually when we went toKentucky for the bourbon show,
we stopped by the university.
I was able to pick up mydiploma.

Speaker 1 (07:46):
So that was fun Nice.

Speaker 2 (07:47):
Worked out.

Speaker 1 (07:49):
A husband and wife team, usually one has that
passion?
Yes, and the other person isvery supportive.

Speaker 3 (08:00):
You educated yourself as well for distilling how did
you get so immersed in it aswell?
Okay, so for 21 years I watchedmy husband provide for our
family and sacrifice, and atthat point, when he retired, I
said you need to be doingsomething that you enjoy.
There's no point in justgetting any job.
What is it that you want to dothat you?

Speaker 1 (08:17):
enjoy.

Speaker 3 (08:18):
You know he's always been an entrepreneurial spirit.
He's several businesses beforeeven getting out of the Marine
Corps that he's made work or hasworked with, and I knew that
that was something that he'svery passionate about.
He's brought several ideas tothe table and sometimes I roll
my eyes and sometimes I'm like,okay, he brought this to the
table and I was like heck, yeah,like that sounds like a good

(08:41):
idea.
And he, of course, like he said, does a lot of research.
He doesn't do anything from thehip.
He brought the research withthe distilleries, you know,
coming right behind thebreweries saying how they're the
up and coming, our personalexperience at that one
distillery and then our multiplepersonal experiences at other
breweries and distilleries,because we very much enjoy

(09:02):
visiting those anywhere we goand all around the country.
When we went for our year trip,for sure we hit up as many as we
could.
That's something we definitelyhave always enjoyed.
So when he came up with thisidea, I was like heck, yeah,
like that's a good idea.
There's nothing here in thearea like that.
It could be a really good thingand I am definitely on board
and I want to be involved.
He's definitely the lead here,like I lead our home, because we

(09:29):
homeschool our children too.
Somebody has to be there to dothat mostly.
So we definitely lead more atthe house.
But I was like I'm a hundredpercent going to be involved and
know more about distilling thanthan just like we have one you
know what I mean I wanted to, sous going to, we attended
Moonshine University.

Speaker 1 (09:41):
Yeah, okay, so I did read that you were top of the
class at Moonshine University,but I didn't.

Speaker 2 (09:46):
So I finished last but even if you finish last, you
still graduate.
Amy was the honor graduategraduating number one.

Speaker 1 (09:55):
Okay, but while we're talking about the Moonshine
University, which totallydoesn't sound like a real thing,
but it is a real thing.
Tell me about that.
It's a shorter course.
Why is that course so importantto people who are going into
distilling?

Speaker 2 (10:08):
It was actually during the RV trip.
Again, I'd done, I'd finishedup with that University of
Louisville program had afoundation.
About halfway through that trip,amy and I were talking about it
and we had spent the lastcouple years dreaming about it.
We had pages and pages ofnotebooks filled with possible
names of a place Like we had.
It was all in the dream kind ofphase, but we made the first
decision during that trip thatkind of really solidified it and

(10:29):
made what I call the firstbusiness investment, which was
to attend Moonshine Universityit is a funny sounding name but
I promise it's legitimatecurriculum Again back in
Louisville, heart of bourboncountry, and so it's a six-day
course that is hands-ondistilling.
So for Amy and I that wasactually our first experience
with working, you know, fromgrain through the whole process
of distilling and then at theend of the week you get a bottle

(10:52):
that you made aged one wholehour in a barrel, which we still
have.

Speaker 1 (10:56):
How does that taste?
Out of curiosity, you know it'sunaged bourbon.

Speaker 2 (11:00):
They call it white dog for a reason, so so yeah,
that was a great but that wasit's.
You know they call it white dogfor a reason.
So, yeah, that was great, butthat was.
It was important to me that weboth attend that right, because
it wasn't enough for me to justgo and I would bring back the
notes, and then that was part ofAmy being heavily involved in
the business and, frankly, Ididn't want to be responsible
for taking all those notes bymyself, because she ended up
gravitating towards some of theother classes, like branding and

(11:22):
marketing, and she picked up onthings that I would have missed
, and so it was very beneficialand it wasn't cheap and I say it
was an investment.
It truly was for us both toattend.
That was critical.
One of the things I learnedthere was the staff.
There has a core staff thatthey keep, but then they also
bring in outside instructors forvarious topics, and a lot of
those instructors wereconsultants for distilling, and

(11:43):
so one of my takeaways was Ineed a consultant, and I knew I
couldn't afford thoseconsultants because they work
with all the big companies and Ididn't have that kind of budget
.
So we got back and I knew Ineeded a consultant.
So I found one again in NorthCarolina.
His name's Steve.
He runs a company calledKindred Spirits Consulting, so
shout out to Steve.
He was the master distiller atEnd of Days Distillery down in

(12:04):
Wilmington when they opened.
So he was critical for oursuccess in getting open,
certainly, but put him onretainer basically as soon as we
got back from that course.
The thing about the course thatwas important was you know, you
can't learn it all in six days,obviously, but really all it
did was give us the confidenceto think that we could pull it
off.
And so when we went into thatcourse at least for me, I think

(12:25):
both of us our plan was we'll dothe course, We'll spend two,
three years probably getting itup and running.
That was kind of the game planwhen we went into the course.
And then we graduated thecourse and what we did instead
was get back to the area andsign a lease for this place
three days later.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
Wow, you know no business plan it did give you
confidence, maybe too much, Idon't know.

Speaker 2 (12:47):
We signed the lease, not a business plan in place, no
funding secured, just again abelief that we would figure it
out, and so that course wasimportant.
For that there was knowledgeand ultimately allowed me to
have better conversations withSteve, the guy that I was
putting on retainer asconsultant.
So you know I trust himobviously with his knowledge,
but now I had a foundation inthat knowledge that allowed me

(13:08):
to have better conversations, soit was a really important
course for us.

Speaker 1 (13:13):
So you said you sort of gravitated towards the
marketing here today.
Have you guys sort ofgravitated to different aspects
of the business, like you preferto run this part and you run
that part?
How have y'all divided andconquered.

Speaker 3 (13:28):
Divide and conquered is a great term, I think, and we
kind of do that in our personallife as well, with the kids
when he was in the military.
But, yeah, same similarapproach.
There's a lot of things that wework on together and we almost
always consult each other forpretty much every decision, even
if it's right after the fact,we're both aware of everything
that's going on at all times.
Yeah, I definitely take themarketing, the social media, the

(13:49):
merchandise, the events, thatkind of stuff.
Okay, when we were opening, Iwas in charge of, like, the
decor and working with, you know, getting all that in place.
I'm not a bartender and I neverwill be, so that's Andy's.
Andy runs the bar, got it thebar and then the whole
distilling side, like I'm awareand a part of the process, but
he runs, he's the masterdistiller for sure.
Okay.

Speaker 1 (14:09):
So since you're doing the distilling primarily when
you have that recipe, especiallyaward-winning recipes, you
don't mix that up very much,right.

Speaker 2 (14:18):
No, I mean continuity across batches is what we're
going for.
We want a consistent flavorprofile, because that's what
becomes a customer expectation,right?
So if they bought one bottleonce, whether it's a year later
or a couple years later, theywould expect to have that same
taste profile.
It's important, so certainlyimportant to us.
So I would say no, we want tobe very consistent with flavor

(14:39):
profile.
The only thing I would add toit is, like between batch one
and batch two of vodka, forexample, we didn't change the
recipe, but we did refine how wefilter it, and so that was not
so much changing the the tasteof it, but just kind of making a
cleaner product.

Speaker 1 (14:56):
and so that's some of the smaller changes we made in
between batches do you tweak thepercentages like you were
saying earlier, like this is 15%rye and you're like I think we
need to up that just a littlebit on the next batch, or is
that deviating too much for yourcustomers who already know what
you're selling?

Speaker 2 (15:12):
Yeah, so something like that.
You know, you mentioned rye orif we did a corn bourbon right.
So typically a bourbon willhave corn as a base, at least
51%, and then rye or wheat andthen barley, and so for us we
want to focus on making a weededbourbon.
We're going to keep that mashbill that's a fancy word for
recipe we're going to keep thatmash bill consistent.

(15:32):
There are different tastes thatcome out for different various
reasons, a little bit differentin each barrel, a little bit
different aging, and so that's alot of times when we get to
barrel blending, that's whereyou can kind of get that
consistent taste profile becauseyou're blending multiple
barrels.
But you mentioned kind ofchanging the recipe.
We did tweak our gin recipedespite being award-winning it

(15:55):
was but we saw an opportunity tojust lessen the juniper a
little bit and we were veryhappy with the results in batch
two from that.

Speaker 1 (16:05):
The gin that won the gold award.
After it won the award, youtweaked it.

Speaker 2 (16:08):
Yeah, I mean, since you talked about timelines, when
I tweaked it I had alreadyshipped it off for competition.
I didn't know that it was goingto win gold.

Speaker 1 (16:19):
Oh, that's funny.

Speaker 2 (16:21):
I think batch two is even better.
I think every change we madewas for the better.

Speaker 1 (16:26):
So the vodka won the gold recently.

Speaker 2 (16:28):
It was like two weeks ago right A couple weeks ago we
got those results and then therum, the gin, the gin.
So we have two gold medals onefor our gin that won at New York
International Spirit Comp, andthen vodka just won gold at
something called USA SpiritRating, which is an
international competition.
The way they run all of thoseis, it's all blind taste testing

(16:48):
, oh that's cool.
And you get a panel of judges.
Typically three judges do blindtaste testing of all your
spirits, and then you gettasting notes and so they'll let
you know what kind of thingsthey're picking up on.
And then they're great as well,and so you know you go against
all the big distilleries thatare still submitting their
products to compete on thoseplatforms.

Speaker 1 (17:08):
So after the competition and you've been
awarded or not awarded,depending on who you are they
give you.
You said they give you notes,so like hey, you know you need
to improve here, or hey, youkilled it here.
This was amazing.

Speaker 2 (17:21):
Most of the notes are just tasting profiles.
So you mentioned that we did atasting before we recorded this,
so I tried to take them throughsome tasting notes, things that
they may be smelling or tasting, and that's that's some of what
I got back from thosecompetitions.
Uh, are tasting notes.
Now there is one competitionthat the american distilling
institute runs, called adi, andthat particular competition is

(17:42):
very, very big on saying here'swhat we liked, here's what we
didn't like, and so that was.
You know it's interesting toread and to certainly consider.
Are there areas of improvement?

Speaker 1 (17:51):
Yeah, and one of your earlier answers too.
You mentioned getting thefunding for here.
Tell me about the wall overhere, the wall of fame.
Tell me about why that is whatit is and how you got started
here.

Speaker 2 (18:05):
Yeah.
So in March of 2023, which wasabout six, seven months before
we opened last year we ran aKickstarter campaign.
Kickstarter is calledcrowdfunding.
It's an opportunity for peopleto contribute financially at
different levels of support, andso we had everything from a $2
sticker to, you know, a hat, at-shirt.
It was really an opportunityfor people to show their support

(18:26):
before we opened.
But the wall of famerepresented two levels of
support.
One, you know, for a hundredbucks.
There's a plaque in the center.
They can get their name on that.
And then the larger tiles thatsurrounded those were really
pretty affordable as well 250bucks and you get your.
What we liked about it was wesaw a lot of business support,
so a lot of those are localbusinesses that showed early

(18:47):
support for us, which weappreciated, and really for them
, 250 bucks for you know, amarketing tool, right?

Speaker 3 (18:52):
So they're up there forever.

Speaker 2 (18:53):
So that was, I think, a great deal for them.
But we raised that money inMarch of 2023.
And then we coordinated thatactually with our soft opening.
So we mentioned our one yearanniversary coming up.
We opened September 29th oflast year, but on September 28th
I used our soft opening as atool and everyone on that wall

(19:15):
is who was invited to that softopening.

Speaker 1 (19:18):
So we called it a.

Speaker 2 (19:19):
VIP party, but I knew it was going to be our soft
opening opportunity as well.

Speaker 1 (19:24):
And what are you doing for the one year
anniversary celebration?

Speaker 2 (19:27):
Yeah, big party.
We certainly hope so.
I think it will be.
We're throwing a tent up out inthe parking lot.
We're going to have a stagebuilt out there.
We have two bands on Friday,the 27th, and three bands on
Saturday.

Speaker 1 (19:39):
September this month.

Speaker 2 (19:40):
This month a couple of weeks away, and then Sunday
because the tent can't get torndown until Monday we decided to
go ahead and host a little craftshow as well.

Speaker 1 (19:48):
Nice.

Speaker 2 (19:48):
Since the tent will already be up.
So we kind of have a Friday,saturday, sunday schedule.
So, yeah, we expect a bigturnout for that.

Speaker 1 (19:54):
I just want to say congratulations, because I think
you had a stellar year, and tobe able to celebrate that a year
later with the success thatyou've seen so far, and I think
it's only going to get better.
I just wanted to say my hat'soff to you.

Speaker 3 (20:07):
Well, thank you, it's impressive.

Speaker 1 (20:09):
Where do y'all live in the Topsail area.

Speaker 3 (20:11):
We live on the Hampstead-Surf City border.

Speaker 1 (20:13):
Okay, right there.
And did you know that it wasalways going to be Surf City
where you were going to open thestore, or were you looking at
other areas?

Speaker 3 (20:20):
We wanted Surf City.
You did yeah, based on what wasavailable.
We were looking at differentreal estate.
We searched Surf City first andthen we started like well,
maybe we have to go out to HollyRidge or maybe we have to go
out to Sneasbury.
But when this became available,we knew immediately like yeah
this is right.

Speaker 1 (20:39):
Was this development here, charlie Medlin?
Was it up and running when youguys made the decision or it was
just breaking ground here?
Right, it was about half full.

Speaker 3 (20:45):
Oh, okay, like all of these.

Speaker 1 (20:47):
This building was nothing.

Speaker 3 (20:49):
These last couple of buildings had nobody in them yet
.
Dirt floor still.

Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yeah, but the building was here.
What was the most challengingthing that you guys ran up
against when you were opening?

Speaker 2 (21:00):
Oh, I mean, that's probably a loaded question.
So I think we had a very, verygreat outfit in terms of
construction.
I had a great generalcontractor shout out to Steven
Masonboro Construction just anawesome company to work with.
And I'll tell you, I talked toother owners and they had horror
stories about working withtheir general contractor and.
Steven and his team.

(21:20):
He was proactive about whenproblems came up.
He he was helping me solve themand so can't can't say enough
about it and you know you lookat our timeline.
We did it, I think, as fast asanyone can.
We signed the lease July of2022 and we were open by
September of 23.
So really about a 14 monthstart to finish.
We didn't break ground.
This place where we're sittingstill had dirt floors on April

(21:43):
12th of 2023.
And by September 29th we wereopen.
And so when you talk aboutchallenges, I think you know
Steven had his kind of timelinefor construction and what I did
was I overlaid everything thatwe needed to do, particularly
with the distillery side of thehouse, like when are we
receiving equipment?
When are we setting up thestills?

(22:04):
When can we actually bedistilling product?
All that had to be synced verytightly in order to make the
deadline.
We got a federal license to be adistiller pretty early on and
it's a bureaucratic kind ofprocess and there's quite a bit
involved, but frankly, it waspretty straightforward.
That was at the federal level.
At the state level, it was alittle bit more stressful, and

(22:25):
it was stressful because youcan't apply for your permits
until construction is over.
So we had to act as if,throughout the whole process,
that we would get approved forthese permits, but not knowing
until really the very end.
So construction was officiallyfinished August 30th.
I had all my paperwork preparedin advance and I went up the

(22:48):
next day.
I drove my packets to Raleigh,I had an appointment to sit with
them and I walked away withboth the commercial permit to be
a distillery and then theretail permit to run a bar.
But all that had to happen sothat we could actually make
product, and we had alreadyannounced our grand opening, so
we had a month which wasSeptember 29th 30th.

Speaker 1 (23:12):
September 30th, so August, you're getting the end
of August.

Speaker 2 (23:16):
They call it a certificate of occupancy, when
you talk construction and you'redone, and it's all part of the
permit process, and so we didn'tget that, though, till August
30th, and I had a month then toturn on everything.

Speaker 1 (23:34):
I've never said that distilling equipment was pretty.
It's really pretty.
The copper and I don't knowwhat he called all the vessels
that you have back there.
Everything is so it's pretty.
So you had all of that in placeand you had to distill a batch
before you could do the grandopening.

(23:56):
So let's talk about that batch.
How long does it take frombeginning to end to get a batch
completed?

Speaker 2 (24:02):
Yeah, a little bit different for each one.
So vodka is the quickest andeasiest when we put it in the
still.
It takes about six hours todistill it total and from each
run.
So you mentioned the copperback there, our copper still is
250 gallons and so after we getabout 130 gallons after about
six hours off of the still.
But that's a very, very highproof, right?

(24:24):
So we're talking 160 plus proofthat 130 gallons.
We have to proof it down.
Proofing down just means we'readding water to get it to the
right proof that we want to putit in a bottle at.
So we get that off the still Imentioned earlier.
I think that we take it througha four-day filtering process.
So then we start that four-dayfiltering process and then
basically after that it's readyto bottle.

Speaker 1 (24:46):
Do you bottle here?

Speaker 2 (24:48):
We bottle all in-house, and so that's vodka.
Gin is very, very similar.
Gin is really just like the teaof spirits.
We soak botanicals in the stillovernight and it's about 40
total pounds of botanicals foreach batch and those go in
brewer's bags, actually like bigtea bags, and we put those in
the still the night prior, welet it steep overnight and then

(25:11):
we distill it the next day.
But, same kind of process.
About six hours total todistill it, getting about that
130 gallons off the still atvery, very high proof Gin then
takes a month to sit and so, ifwe go back to grand opening, I
only launched with bourbon, bachand rum because the gin hadn't
sat long enough.
About a month later we did agin release party mid -October

(25:35):
because it needed that monthbefore we could actually bottle
that.
I did bottle about a hundredbottles of it for behind the bar
only, so it didn't have itsfull month.
It still tasted good, certainlygood to be in cocktails, but I
wasn't confident to send it outin the world for bottle sales in
the merchandise boom.
So we held it for anothercouple of weeks before we sold

(25:57):
bottles.

Speaker 1 (25:59):
Okay, so interesting.
I know nothing about yourbusiness at all, so it's really
cool to hear all this.
Do you plan on scaling yourdistillery business in the
future?

Speaker 2 (26:10):
I think the quick answer is we have some not plans
.
I'd still call them dream phaseof what year five may look like
.

Speaker 1 (26:16):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (26:17):
But in our current space, which is certainly a
small space, we have a lot ofcapacity for clear spirits.
So vodka, gin and rum we couldramp up production quite a bit.
So, to go back to the example Imentioned, 130 gallons of
high-proof gin and vodka comesoff the still.
That 130 gallons, after youproof it down, ends up making
almost 1,200 bottles of product,finished product.

(26:37):
We distill about once a month,give or take based on production
and based on sales.
But we've been open a year.

Speaker 1 (26:46):
We're we're on batch three of vodka right.

Speaker 2 (26:47):
So we've done it three times and that's 1200
bottles.
I could very easily, in ourspace, scale and produce 6,000
bottles if the demand was there.
One of our focuses movingforward into the fall here, our
next kind of phase of growth isreally going to be focused on
distribution across the NorthCarolina ABCs, and so we'll be
focused on building thatdistribution, building those

(27:08):
sales.
And the way we do that isactually going to bars and
restaurants that order from theABC system and saying, hey,
we're a North Carolinadistillery, we're an
award-winning distillery.
Would you taste our spirits?
Would you bring them in and putthem on your cocktail?

Speaker 1 (27:21):
menu.

Speaker 2 (27:22):
And that's our plan to grow sales and we have the
space to scale to meet thoseproduction demands.
On the vodka, gin and rumspecifically, I did not know.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
it took six hours to distill.
How many gallons?
Is that again About 130 gallons.
I had no idea that it was thatshort amount of time, but then
you age it.

Speaker 2 (27:41):
Right.
So you know, vodka needsfiltering.
Rum doesn't really need anytime after distillation, but rum
to go back to it, we have toferment that for four days on
the front end, and so we do arum wash, we ferment it and then
we distill it, but rum is readyto go into a bottle right after
.
Okay, If it's our white unagedrum, Okay, so that's a little
bit different.
But six hours, I'll tell you,is fast.

(28:03):
But that's also based on thefact that we have super
efficient, well-made equipment.
There are distilleries that youknow 12 hours is a short day
for them, and so we're able todo that, in part because we have
great equipment.

Speaker 1 (28:13):
Yeah, that's awesome as far as getting your stuff out
and into other bars andultimately distributed
throughout the state or the USat some point.

Speaker 2 (28:23):
I would assume.

Speaker 1 (28:24):
That's a sales team, right.

Speaker 2 (28:26):
Yeah, eventually for sure, and we won't look at
out-of-state distribution untilat least year five.
We'll spend the next four yearsreally focused on North
Carolina.
The sales team is a sales teamof one, which is me right now.
We do have someone that willprobably assist us with that.
She has a background in doingsome of that and so we'll bring
her in, but I wanted to be me.
Right now, I am the number onebrand ambassador for Hidden

(28:51):
Ships.

Speaker 1 (28:51):
Absolutely, it's your baby.

Speaker 2 (28:52):
Certainly, you know, when we did tours, I started the
tours and that was intentionaland so you know I'll be the
first one that's out therehitting the road.
Here Again, as I mentioned,that's our focus this fall is to
really put a lot of time ofeffort into hitting the road and
going to have those, and I'lldo those tastings, like we did
earlier with bar managers thatare doing the ordering.

Speaker 1 (29:11):
Tell me about the name and the logo and the hidden
gem in the bottle.
How did y'all come up with thelogo and the name oh my goodness
Hidden Ships originated.

Speaker 3 (29:22):
It's a nod to Topsail Island itself.
So the folklore is that thepirate ships learned to hide,
like at the sound side, on theinlets, so that when passing
merchant ships went by, theywould come out in an ambush and
pirate as they would.
The merchant ships soonrealized they were doing this
and started to look over theisland for the ships and the

(29:44):
only thing they could see werethe topsails Right, so they
called it Topsail.

Speaker 1 (29:48):
Island.

Speaker 3 (29:50):
So the hidden ships is definitely a nod to Topsail
itself, and then some of ourjewel tones and everything we
have going on here nod to PirateBecause when we first came up
with this, we were explainingthis to our interior decorator
like, hey, this is where ourname came from Hidden Chips
da-da.
They're like, oh so you want apirate theme bar?
We're like, oh no, so it was aweird mashup to get them to.

Speaker 2 (30:12):
We didn't go with that interior designer.

Speaker 1 (30:13):
No, no, no, we hired someone else I was wondering if
you had an interior designer.
For sure you did, yeah.

Speaker 3 (30:18):
Yes, for sure, because I'm not this talented,
but they were like I felt likeit was going to be really
challenging to be like okay,we'll combine our hidden ship's
name with, like a speakeasy.
Speakeasy yeah, but they did abeautiful job, incredible job.

Speaker 1 (30:35):
The colors in here it's turquoise.
They've got the most beautifultufted bar stools I've ever seen
in a bar before.
But, like we were sayingearlier, it definitely does have
that speakeasy feel.
But you're still at the beachand we're still kind of light.
But I do love the name and Ilove that you took that from the
history of Topsail Island solovely.

(30:56):
I love the name and I love thatyou took that from the history
of Topsail Island so lovely.
So you have a little Easter eggthat I want to talk about that
I just saw today for the firsttime.

Speaker 3 (31:02):
Tell me about that we know we named it Hidden Ships
and there's not like piratethemed, but we definitely kept a
little hidden ship on the backof the label.
So if you turn the bottlearound and you look through, you
will see a hidden ship on theback of all the labels.
We also have 10 hidden ships inour bar, oh really.
So we had little tiny ships,gold ships, placed within our

(31:24):
bar.
So if you're ever sitting atour bar, we had 10 little golden
ships.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
If we find all 10, we get a free cocktail.

Speaker 3 (31:31):
There's 10 ships, yep , and then there's one buffalo,
one golden buffalo.

Speaker 1 (31:35):
One buffalo One golden buffalo.

Speaker 3 (31:36):
in there too, one golden buffalo.

Speaker 1 (31:38):
All right, let's talk about your signature cocktails.
Who came up with the signaturecocktail menu?

Speaker 2 (31:45):
Yeah, so the menu was my baby.
So after I retired from theMarine Corps, one of the things
that I wanted to dointentionally was to become a
bartender, and specifically forthe experience of being a
bartender, but also trying tolearn bar management as much as
I could.
And so I think I picked upwhile being a bartender at a
couple of different places thatthere was this growing appetite
amongst customers for return tosome of these drinks right.

(32:09):
So 15 years ago you couldn'twalk into a bar and ask for an
old fashioned not really.
They wouldn't really know whatyou're talking about.
And now it's become much morecommon.
It doesn't mean it's a good oldfashioned, but they'll at least
have heard of it and we'll makeyou something, and so that
trend is increasing.
Now you have a little bit moresophistication with a customer.
They know what a Manhattan is,they may know what a Tom Collins

(32:29):
is, and so one as I saw adesire to return to those drinks
, and two, what I experienced asa bartender sometimes for
people they're just veryintimidated by the whole process
of going to sit at a bar,walking up to a bar and ordering
something because they don'treally know what they want.

(32:49):
They can't remember they had adrink once that they liked, but
they don't know how to ask forit again.
And one of the benefits ofgoing with classic cocktails is
these names have been around fora long time, so someone maybe
they remember.
You know what I did, like a TomCollins.
Let me just order that again,because I know I like it.
So that was kind of twofold inthat way.
The other philosophy that Ideveloped during that time was
that if we've been making thesecocktails for 150 years, there's
a reason for it.

(33:09):
It's because they're the goodones, right, like we stopped
making the bad ones.
Those recipes weren't saved,and so there's a reason these
have existed and continued aslong as they have, because
they're good cocktails.
There's a lot of bars now thattry to create their own
cocktails and good on them.
I appreciate creativity as muchas anyone else, but just
because you create a cocktaildoesn't mean it's going to be a

(33:30):
good cocktail, and so we reallyfocus on well-balanced,
classically made cocktails, yeah.
So I think what's great abouttaking cocktails from that era
is that they are classicallymade right.
When we say that, we mean threeto four ingredients, but also
really really well-balancedright.
There's not going to beanything that's, you know,
that's out of balance.
Certainly that's important tous.

Speaker 1 (33:51):
So another thing that is really popular here in your
bars the smoked drinks.
It's fun to watch you guys makeit and then the aroma that is
left lingering in the airafterward.
That wasn't donepre-prohibition, right?
This is a new thing.

Speaker 2 (34:07):
Yeah.
So you know, I say we'repre-prohibition, but then I pick
and choose what I really wantthey didn't have TVs on the wall
back then either, and we do,and so I will say that there's a
lot of different ways to smokea cocktail.
There's some products on themarket right now where you can
put it right on the top of therocks glass, and those are cool.
And there's products that inthe dome has like a tube that

(34:28):
pumps smoke into it from like alittle heating gun, and so
there's those were kind of toomodern for me.
We decided to do it under thedome because even if they didn't
do it that way in 1890, theymaybe could have right.
They had the tools and theresources right.
So that's kind of why we decidedon why to do it that way?

Speaker 1 (34:47):
What kind of chips do you use in there Like I'm only
familiar with what you'resmoking meat with when you go to
buy your chips.
Are these specialty chips fordrinks?

Speaker 2 (34:55):
The good news is it's the exact same chips.

Speaker 1 (34:57):
Is it really?

Speaker 2 (34:58):
Yeah, same brand, nothing special, they're Cherry.
We started with Cherry.
I figured that we'd change itup, and we might still in the
future.
But again, from a customerexperience perspective, we're
trying to replicate experiencesevery time you come in.
So if you had it one way andyou liked it, we want to be able
to replicate that experiencefor you the next time you come
in, whether that's next week ornext year, and so we've been
sticking with Cherry Chips orthe same brand that you would

(35:21):
buy for your smoker at home tosmoke meat on.

Speaker 1 (35:24):
You have this wonderful menu of drinks.
Can anyone come here and orderanything that you would get at a
bar, no matter if it's one ofthe not so great cocktails?

Speaker 3 (35:33):
Yes, pretty much, for sure, you can order anything
you want here.
Pretty much Okay.
We have our bartenders are verytalented and even if they don't
have exactly what you want, andthey tell me what you want and
they'll create something.
I think that would be verycomparable to what you're used
to or what you like.

Speaker 1 (35:49):
For folks such as myself that we don't drink
alcohol.
Don't drink alcohol.
You offer a really wonderfullist of non-alcoholic beverages.

Speaker 2 (36:00):
Can you tell me a little bit?

Speaker 1 (36:01):
about those.
Yeah, which one did I have,which one did I tell you?

Speaker 2 (36:03):
You had an NA non-alcoholic Negroni.

Speaker 1 (36:06):
Negroni.
It was amazing, and what Iloved about this drink was
usually, if I do go into a bar,I'll ask for a mocktail, and the
mocktails are syrupy sweetgenerally speaking.
But this drink it actually didtaste like it had gin in it, but
a very mild flavor to it, butit wasn't frou-frou, it wasn't

(36:27):
over the top, but it was.
So it's such a nice flavor andit made me feel like I was
having an alcoholic beverage.

Speaker 2 (36:35):
Yeah, it was a better experience.

Speaker 1 (36:37):
Tell me about what you're using for those
non-alcoholic beverages.

Speaker 2 (36:41):
Yeah, so number one I'll just go back to.
It was really important, amyand I, to have that on the menu,
specifically for people likeyourself that you mentioned.
I do think there's a growingtrend whether people that just
want to be more health conscious, people that just want to drink
less.
Perhaps We've seen people sayI'm going to go every other
tonight, and so that's atechnique that they use just to
drink less, and so I thinkthat's a growing trend as

(37:06):
drinkers become a little bitmore health conscious.
So from a business perspective,it was important to us to have
it on the menu.
We went with a brand calledLiars non-alcoholic beverages
and I have a friend of minewho's been sober 12 years
probably 14 years now and and hesaid he's tried all the brands
that was his favorite.
I said that's a solidrecommendation, that's what I'm
going with.
So that's what we carry.
We have two that are, uh,non-alcoholic bourbon drinks

(37:29):
well, a whiskey, sour, uh, andan old-fashioned, and then oh,
it's already flavored for thatcocktail that you buy like a
bottle of non-alcoholic bourbon,okay, or a bottle of
non-alcoholic gin.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
Oh, okay, yeah, Okay.

Speaker 2 (37:42):
So it is a non-alcoholic kind of substitute
for a base spirit.
So we carry the non-alcoholicbourbon, the non-alcoholic gin.
We also carry the non-alcoholic.
They call it a spritzer, it'slike an Aperol or Campari, and
then one more.
I forget the name of it off thetop of my head, but it's like a
non-alcoholic triple secessentially so those are the

(38:03):
four kind of products that wecarry from that company and
we're able to make four distinctand unique non-alcoholic
cocktails with them.
Okay.

Speaker 1 (38:10):
I loved it.
I highly recommend that foranyone who is living a sober or
semi-sober lifestyle that youcome in and you give that a try.

Speaker 2 (38:23):
And just a note on that again, we fully support Dry
January.
No reason to stay home.
You can come in and, as youmentioned, have a great
experience with something thatstill tastes great.

Speaker 1 (38:29):
Yeah, it tasted amazing.
So mixing up these old schoolcocktails, you're right, is not
normal for today, but you offerclasses to help people who just
want to come in and learn how tomake these amazing cocktails at
home.

Speaker 2 (38:43):
Yeah, so just a quick overview on our kind of monthly
class schedule.
We do offer what we callMixology 101.
And frankly I don't like theword mixology, but people
recognize kind of what we'regetting at.
We're teaching bartendingskills and so we did name it
that we have a charcuterie andspirit or cocktails pairing
class and then a chocolate andcocktail pairing class, and then

(39:04):
we offer that on a kind of arotating monthly basis.
But to go back to mixology, yeah, we want to teach certain
skills that people can use athome, and I think people wonder
you know, why would we teachthose skills?
Maybe people will come in less.
Well, maybe I don't.
I really don't think so.
I think a great cocktail islike a great sandwich.
Sometimes it just tastes betterwhen someone else makes it for

(39:24):
you.
So for me it's not so muchabout, oh, people will come in
less, it's more about teachingsome of these skills because
there is a desire to learn them,and so the class kind of
changes up.
There's always one drink thatyou have to stir, because that's
a very specific skill set andwhy we talk about why we would
stir and when we would stir adrink.
And then there's always acocktail that you have to shake,

(39:45):
which again is another skill wehave to teach when you would do
it, why you would do it, what'sthe purpose of doing it.
And in the class, not only doyou get to make those two drinks
, you get to drink them.
So that's kind of a funexperience for the night as well
, I teach one of the techniqueswe call speed pours in the
industry as a bartender.
Now speed pours is probably notanything you're going to need

(40:08):
to do at home, unless you'retalking like very, very big
cocktail party.
But really the reason I taughtit is because now I think if you
know that skill and you go to abar and watch a bartender, now
you kind of have a better ideaof what's going on and it kind
of makes it more fun for youjust to watch a bartender.

Speaker 1 (40:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (40:23):
Because you were taught what speed pours are
You're going to be counting them?
How much was in that count?
Did he overpour, did heunderpour?
So I think it's just a funthing to teach people.

Speaker 1 (40:32):
So fun.
Let's talk about the tastingtours.
So you have the pairings whichwould be the charcuterie with a
drink, a cocktail, but you alsoallow people to come in and tour
the facility.
Also do a tasting at the sametime?

Speaker 2 (40:47):
Yes, yeah, so that's kind of our.
We offer those tours every weekon Friday, saturday and Sundays
.
People can go online and signfor that, sign up for that stuff
.
It is a five dollar tour, butwe give you a five dollar shot
glass at the end, so it'sessentially free and you do get
a full tasting with all six ofthe spirits that we offer so
that the tour comes in.
We have a fantastic tour guideright now.
He's done a really, reallygreat job of taking over that

(41:08):
program for us.
So you'll come in, you'll learna little bit about the, the
background of of the company.
So things like where did thename come from?
How did the logo come apart?
We cover that because I thinkit's good foundational
background information and thenwe give a very broad overview of
distillation as a process.
What are we trying to do?
What are we trying to captureduring that?
How does that look for us hereat Hidden Ships?

(41:30):
So you get a high level view ofthe process.
But then they all end with thetasting.
And that was actually one of thethings that Amy and I took from
our tours in Kentucky duringour RV trip was those companies
generally all do a very, verygood job of doing tastings,
where they're really trying toteach you what you may be
smelling, what you may betasting.
And what I've found over timewith doing tastings with people

(41:53):
is they really just lack thelanguage to describe what they
may smell or taste.
Right, they kind of have anidea of what it might be, but
maybe they're embarrassed to saywhat it is.
They're tasting, and you know,if it tastes like Skittles to
you, it tastes like Skittles,that's okay, but maybe we can
teach you a better word, morelanguage, to describe that, and
so that was really important,that we incorporate that into
all of our tours, and I thinkwe've done that.

(42:15):
I do think that makes us uniqueto this area in terms of other
distilleries around us is wereally focus a lot of attention
on that tasting portion of thetour, and I think it goes back
to just being that.
Experience for people is theycan remember some of that stuff
what were they tasting, and sowe've taught them something.

Speaker 1 (42:32):
And it is fun to learn the language of a new
industry that you don't live andbreathe and you don't know how
to describe it I woulddefinitely feel that way.
How long does a tour andtasting take from beginning to
end?

Speaker 2 (42:43):
About 45 minutes and we do them on the hour, Like
Friday and Saturday I think.
We start at 4, 5, 6 and 7o'clock pm.
Okay, and so you're going tostart, you're going to get that
background, you're going to getthat distillation overview and
then you're going to get thattasting at the end, yeah, and
then a couple minutes to resetand then the next one goes so
pretty much every hour in thehour.

Speaker 1 (43:03):
You also have some really great events here.
I know that you had Vaughn Penncome in with the Chill Cats and
did some jazz a jazz evening.

Speaker 2 (43:11):
She was great, loved having them.

Speaker 3 (43:16):
What other events do you have coming up that people
can look forward to?
So that was actually our firstsort of big live music event
that we've had a lot of peoplerequest live music.
It's a little.
We're a little hesitant ormaybe a little more challenged,
because we still want to keepthe vibe of what we got going on
here.
There's a lot of great localartists, but they simply just
don't play what would kind ofmatch the feel.
I can see that Because themusic is the same era as the

(43:36):
drinks, which is the same era asthe decor.
So they kind of keep that going.
So Vaughn is fantastic and theChill Cats are just wonderful.
We're actually featuring themon a Friday night of our
anniversary.

Speaker 2 (43:46):
Oh really, yeah, she's coming back.
Yeah, they're our featureFriday night.

Speaker 3 (43:51):
We're going to have a jazz night Friday night.
Do we need?

Speaker 1 (43:53):
to buy tickets for that.
No, no tickets, just show up.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
Just show up, okay, I will mention, since we just
brought it up, it is the sameweekend as Salty Turtle.
They're a big brewery at thefront of this complex, that's
right, yeah.
And so it is their Oktoberfestweekend, so they will also have
a tent with bands, and so Italked to the owners over there
and have a beer and then walk ondown to us.

(44:15):
Don't walk down here with yourbeer.

Speaker 3 (44:17):
Finish your beer there and then walk to us.

Speaker 2 (44:21):
Get a cocktail here.
We're going to have two outdoorbars.
We'll have beer out there andwe'll have simple cocktails.

Speaker 1 (44:31):
And then we'll obviously have the full bar
indoors.
I do want to talk more aboutthe Buffalo Bills really fast.
Before we close this up.
You had to go through a process.
You had to apply to be aBuffalo Bills site.
Am I saying that right, yoursite?
We're a Bills backers bar, aBills backers bar.
What sort of red tape or whathoops did you have to jump
through?

Speaker 3 (44:47):
for that Wasn't that hard.
I had to go on buffalobillscomand register and apply to become
a Bills backers bar.
We just promise to play all thegames is really what we do, all
right, and then to draw.
You know, we have decor that weput out.
We don't keep it up becausewe're not a sports bar, so don't
keep it up like all the time.
But we have it in the back.
So on Sundays, or, like thisweek, it'll be Thursday and

(45:08):
Monday nights we will open andwe will have the game playing.
So we have a projector screenthat drops down.

Speaker 1 (45:13):
Oh okay, I was just looking around.
I was trying to find when areyou playing.

Speaker 3 (45:16):
It's a large projector screen that drops down
, and we had our season openeron Sunday.

Speaker 1 (45:21):
How was the turnout Fantastic, do people?
You got a lot of Buffalo Billsfans in the area, a lot of the
Woodward, do they really?
Yes?

Speaker 3 (45:28):
When we traveled for a year we would hit up and we'd
try to find a Bills Backers Barso you can go to a map that
shows where all the BillsBackers Bar are.
That's why you get registeredwith them to be on their little
map.
And we hit up several on our RVtrip and we were always like,
dang, they are everywhere.
I didn't know that was a thingI know.

Speaker 2 (45:47):
And I bet all the sport-based fans have something
similar.
For us, I think the connectionwas Amy and I both being from
Western New York, growing upthere and then seeing it on our
RV trip, seeing these Bills fansjust come out of the woodwork.
They do call it Bills Mafia fora reason, and so it didn't
matter where we were.
In the middle of Montanathere's two people that live in

(46:08):
Montana and they both came tothe Bills backer game and so
just everywhere we went NorthernCalifornia all the way through.
Texas, and so we, just becausewe observed it firsthand and
because we grew up there is whywe decided to do a be a Bills
backer bar.
Again, it's a tough balancesometimes because we're not a
sports bar.

Speaker 1 (46:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (46:27):
You can go anywhere in town almost and catch all
nine games on Sunday.
For us it was just hey, we'rejust going to do this Bills
thing.
Now, the rule is that we had todevelop is, if there are other
games on and a Bills game is notcurrently playing, I'll allow
it to be on the TV, but no audio.
It's still, it's house musicduring those other games.

Speaker 1 (46:44):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (46:44):
So that's kind of the rule.

Speaker 1 (46:50):
I got to go back to the RV one more time.

Speaker 3 (46:53):
You just mentioned that.

Speaker 1 (46:53):
RV trip.
You're in an RV with the two ofyou, the four kids and the dog.
When do you get sick of eachother Like?
When do you say, like I got toget?

Speaker 3 (47:02):
out of this RV.
That didn't happen.
Was there like?

Speaker 1 (47:05):
the three months were tough and then, after that,
everything starts to feel normal.

Speaker 3 (47:09):
Nothing was tough about it.
Really, I found the only thingI missed from our house was a
fenced in backyard, like thefenced in backyard area is what
I missed, because we had the dogand then the kids just to like
peace of mind.
But every campground is in.
Places we were at had thingsfor the kids to do yeah, the dog
was on a leash the whole time,so that was like the biggest

(47:31):
difference.
But going from the house the 3000 square foot house to the 40
foot RV, everything was justsimpler.
I think it would take me fiveminutes to clean up instead of
two hours.
That I would like I do it moreoften, but it was great.

Speaker 2 (47:46):
In terms of getting a single share, that actually
didn't happen.
Relationship-wise it was greatand just to not be too cavalier
about it, amy and I have donevacations where it's just her
and I and like that happensRight.
But but, truly on this RV trip.
I don't think we experiencedthat.
When I said well, I just kindof meant unique challenges to
being on the road Right.
So for me, and, and we wentfrom tent camping to 40 foot

(48:07):
fifth wheel, we didn't have asmall RV.
I bought the fifth wheel.
I said, here I go, I guess I'mgoing to pull off with this
thing, I own it now, but there'sno licensing requirement.
I watch YouTube videos, so just, we had to learn everything.
And it felt like they saypulling your RV down the road is
like putting it through atornado, and so I felt for me

(48:28):
there was, like always,something breaking in there
something to fix.
Everything's just a little bitdifferent.
I know how to fix a toilet, butan RV toilet's a little bit
different right and so some ofthe mechanics of the legs on the
RV were challenging.
And so our relationship didn'tstruggle but, like some of that,
it was just always there was aunique new challenge and it was

(48:51):
so new to me I didn't have ananswer to it.
I'm going to jump on YouTube.

Speaker 3 (48:54):
Yes, yeah, so new to me.
I didn't have an answer to it.
I'm going to jump on YouTube.
I feel like we traded somestressors.
That was new, that wasdifferent.
So we traded some of thosestressors for some of the stuff
that we don't have normally atthe house anymore.
We homeschool our kids.
Obviously, we were travelingfor a year, but we don't have
the stressors of no more soccerpractices, no more places we had
to be at certain times we werefree to do whatever we wanted,
wherever we wanted, I thinkthat's what I crave, I think.

Speaker 1 (49:16):
That's why I want to do it so badly.
It's like get rid of every allthe outside noise and just focus
on the family and having fun.
I'm so envious of that.
How old were your kids whenyou're in that rv?

Speaker 2 (49:26):
so seven, nine, fourteen and seventeen did they
have any complaints?

Speaker 3 (49:30):
the wi-fi oh, that was always the wi-fi.
Yeah, we would get to likeyosemite.

Speaker 2 (49:35):
There's no you can't, you can't escape that so our
oldest, 17 year old.
They graduated high school yearearly.
I said don't rush off tocollege, do this trip with us.
Yeah, it was a unique set ofcircumstances that allowed us to
do it all right.
I just retired, figured out away to do it financially.
I said don't run off to school,just do this.
Do you have a gap year?
Right, right, do it with us.

(49:55):
I think he did surprisingly wellfor being cramped into a back
cabin and with cause, all fourof them shared like a single
room back there.

Speaker 1 (50:04):
Yeah, Bunks.

Speaker 2 (50:05):
RV bunks and they really did great, you know,
together.
And then it was, you know,smaller, everything's smaller,
but it was the wifi that waslike the biggest complaint.

Speaker 3 (50:17):
That was the 14-year-old.

Speaker 2 (50:19):
We'd get to a new RV spot and be like, oh, this
Wi-Fi's buns Not going to beable to get on the Xbox.
That's what he would call itOther than that.
Yeah, I mean it was awesome.
Amy mentioned the worldschooling that we did that year,
like I remember going to MountRushmore and the day we drove
there we just learned aboutMount Rushmore.
We went to Custard, last Standand we learned all about that.

(50:42):
We really planned our route bynational parks and the weather,
so during the summer we were upnorth, during the winter we were
down south, but then, in termsof route planning, it was you
know what national park are wegoing to get to?
And one of the really coolfeatures that they have in
national parks now is this appand Amy probably remembers the
name.
Gypsy.
It's as you're driving GPS-wise.

(51:03):
It knows where you're at in thepark, so it's telling you about
things that you're seeing.
Oh, I love that, and so wewould just drive through the
park, and that was school forthe day.

Speaker 3 (51:12):
Yeah, we learned about anything from the
landmarks and stuff thathappened there to like.
This lake now has invasive fishbecause of XYZ Started from a
volcano.
Right.

Speaker 2 (51:24):
Whenever?
So, it was awesome, super great.

Speaker 1 (51:28):
I'm going to hold on to that dream.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
Although everyone's like sell the camper, I say do
the opposite, sell the house.

Speaker 1 (51:36):
Yeah, sell the house, I the house, I gotta work on
them.
Alright, so we're gonna wrapthis up here.
What is the one takeaway thatyou want listeners to leave this
podcast episode with today?

Speaker 2 (51:45):
well, I would say, if you're listening to this
podcast, you're probably fromthe area.
You visit the area, so makesure that you come visit us guys
, thank you so much.

Speaker 1 (51:54):
This has been a pleasure.
I enjoyed having my friends sithere and video with us, my new
friend, ernie Mezek, and then wehad that wonderful tasting and
y'all have been very generouswith your time and also your
patience, because there wasquite a few reschedules, and I'm
really sorry about that.
No, I'm good.

Speaker 2 (52:10):
You made it happen.

Speaker 1 (52:11):
You guys rock.
I wish you the very best.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Thanks so much.
Hey.
If you enjoyed today's episodeof Top Soul Insider, please show
your support by clicking thefollow or subscribe button on
your favorite podcast listeningplatform.
You can also follow us onFacebook, Instagram, Twitter and
YouTube.
Please also go totopsoulinsidercom and join our

(52:32):
mailing list by clicking on theMake Me a Topsoul Insider button
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While you're there, you canclick the Send Me a Voicemail
button and let me know exactlywhat you're thinking your
message just might be on anepisode of Topsoul Insider.
You can email me at Krista attopsoulinsidercom, or call or
text me at 910-800-0111.

(52:54):
Thank you for listening andsupporting Topsail Insider and
our local businesses andnonprofits.
These are our neighbors and ourfriends, and together we build
a mighty and a beautifulcommunity I'm super proud to be
a part of.
I'll see you around Topsail.

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