The Little Town That Could

Perched at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains in northern Greenville County, South Carolina, Travelers Rest comes by its name literally. The tiny hamlet, established in 1808, claims a long history as a stopover.

In the 19th century, settlers heading west in their wagons sought shelter in the local taverns for the night, while drovers from Kentucky and Tennessee paused here with their herds of cattle, sheep, and hogs en route to markets to the east. In more recent decades, Travelers Rest became a place to refuel on the way to excursions in the nearby mountains. It wasn’t until the 21st century that the town came into its own.

Today “TR,” as it’s affectionately known in these parts, has blossomed into what the Huffington Post recently dubbed “one of America’s coolest small towns” with a landscaped Main Street that bustles day and night with cyclists, Upstate residents, and visitors who come here for reasons as diverse as the town’s attractions. Some come to browse the locally owned shops, some to bike the Greenville Hospital System Swamp Rabbit Trail, some to sample beer and wine, and others to dine at the excellent restaurants.

TR’s renaissance took off in earnest in 2009, when the city began to implement a $4.5 million master plan to spiff up Main Street in hopes of attracting private investment. As part of the plan, U.S. 276, which cuts through the town’s center, was narrowed to create a two-lane Main Street, and new pedestrian-scale lighting, pocket parks, and on-street parking were added.

The result was a slow but steady influx of new business along Main Street that dovetailed with the construction of the Swamp Rabbit Trail and helped this beguiling town hit its stride. No longer just a place to pass through on your way to somewhere else, Travelers Rest has become a destination of its own.

The Great Outdoors 

Lying within 25 miles or less of four South Carolina state parks, Travelers Rest is perfectly positioned as a jumping-off point for outdoor escapades, and Sunrift Adventures is your one-stop for gear. Kayaks, canoes, bicycles, hiking boots: If it’s related to outdoor exploring, you’ll find it at Sunrift.

When local outdoorsmen Bo Terry and Jim Kelly established Sunrift at the corner of Main and Center streets in 1981, there wasn’t much to keep anyone in TR. Sunrift Adventures arose as a natural offshoot of the two men’s guide service. “People kept coming to us for gear, so we finally decided to open a store,” recalls Terry, who still owns and operates Sunrift.

Sunrift occupies a century-old cotton gin that contains a veritable Disneyland of outdoor gear. Walls and racks are chock-full of backpacks, standing paddleboards, climbing gear, tents, and apparel. If you don’t want to invest in equipment, Sunrift also rents kayaks, canoes, road and mountain bikes, and tents. 

What’s On Tap?

Brewmaster Ben Pierson happened on his current career largely by accident. Teresa, his wife and co-owner of Swamp Rabbit Brewery, gave him a home brewer’s kit for Christmas in 1982, thinking it would give her beer-loving husband a pleasant hobby. Turns out, it gave him a job—many of them, in fact. 

Over the past 24 years, Ben has helped open 17 different breweries around the country. He has trained with many masters of the trade, including Dan Carey (New Glarus) and the late Karl Strauss (Pabst), in both the U.S. and Germany. After years of working for others, in 2014 the New Jersey native opened his own brewery at 26 S. Main Street in TR. 

The brewery is decked out with recycled and salvaged elements—including redwood panels from an old cotton mill in Clinton, South Carolina—a long bar and picnic-style tables, and a covered porch out back.

On any day, there are at least four beers on tap, including a malty American Pale Ale, a full-bodied German-style Marzen, and the coriander-infused Belgian-style White Ale, the brewery’s best seller. Among Ben’s favorites are his seasonal fruit ales. “We use 280 pounds of fresh fruit—either raspberries or Montmorency sour cherries from Michigan,” he explains. “The fruit ales are difficult to make, but I like them because they’re so delicate.”

Since opening Swamp Rabbit Brewery, Pierson has won noteworthy accolades for his brews. In 2016, he won a silver medal at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver for his Maibock lager. This year his American-style stout took a silver at the World Beer Cup, a competition Pierson describes as “the Olympics of beer.”

Bevy of Boutiques

Dotting a half-mile along Main Street, a cluster of locally owned boutiques provide locals and visitors alike with a host of unique shopping opportunities. The Carolina Honey Bee Company, at 10 S. Main, feeds the farm-to-table craze by featuring beekeeping equipment as well as honey from the owners’ hives. A few blocks down the street (27 S. Main) at Swamp Rabbit Tees, Shelby Robinson sells soft, comfy tee shirts with regionally inspired designs.

Next door, Silver Lily offers updated ladies’ clothing at prices that won’t break the budget. Owner Lisa Whitlock wondered if she’d done the right thing when she opened her shop six years ago, but now she’s glad she did. “TR has changed so much,” she says. “On weekends now, most of my customers are from somewhere else.”

Across Main Street, Goose Feathers caters to female customers with knit maxi dresses, trendy tops and shoes. Accessorize your finds with artisan-made jewelry and pick up gifts of locally crafted pottery and soaps. 

Jan and Curt Finnamore opened Finnamore’s General Store & Merchant Market at the south end of Main a year ago. The shop, sandwiched between Farmhouse Tacos and Rocket Surgery restaurants, stocks a smorgasbord of artisan-made gift items, some local and some from around the nation. “People appreciate that they can buy something made locally,” says Jan. “Visitors from out of town love to take a little piece of TR home with them.”

A Classic Combination

It has been said that you can measure a town’s viability by whether it can support its own wine shop. If that’s true, TR has definitely come of age. Furman alum Evan Rutter admittedly took a chance on TR when he opened a boutique wine shop in a tiny space on the north end of Main Street in spring 2015. Since then, he has built a loyal customer base who trek to The Tasting Room from around the area to buy wine, sample from the by-the-glass list at the wine bar, and attend monthly tastings.

In early 2017, Rutter outgrew his first digs and moved down the street behind Farmhouse Tacos (164 S. Main Street) into a space that almost quadrupled the size of the original. Shelves hold a carefully curated selection of small-production wines and craft beers from around the globe. “Our focus is on artisan, boutique and family wines,” Rutter said. “We taste between 30 and 50 wines a week and try to pick wines that both please our customers and suit our geeky wine-nerd styles. We aim to expand people’s palates.”

For cheese to pair with that wine, consider Blue Ridge Creamery on U.S. 25, two miles from Main Street (14 Blue Ridge Drive). In a former auto body shop, Denmark-born Christian Hansen set up a cheese-making facility in 2015. There, he turns local milk from pasture-raised Jersey cows into a variety of artisanal cheeses from creamy mozzarella to pungent Blue Ridge Blue. “We currently make five cheeses consistently,” Hansen said. “I also do a dozen or so seasonal batches throughout the year. That’s really where my passion lies.” 

In addition to his on-site retail store, you can find Blue Ridge Creamery cheeses on the menu in TR at Hare and Field, Farmhouse Tacos, and Tandem creperie, all on Main Street. Chef Nick Graves at Restaurant 17, a farm-to-fork fine-dining restaurant 11 miles north in the Hotel Domestique, consistently features Hansen’s cheeses in his outstanding cuisine.

Hansen’s nutty, mild Jocassee Tomme has been his best seller, but the Migration washed-rind cheese seems to be winning hearts of late. “We have a couple of French customers who say that Migration is the first American cheese they’ve tasted that’s on a par with their favorites from home,” Hansen says. “That affirms my belief that we’re on to something special, because the French aren’t loose with their compliments when it comes to cheese.”

To Market, To Market

Complete with an open-air amphitheater and mountain views, Trailblazer Park was added to the city’s attractions in 2014 as a place for the community to play. The park, at 235 Trailblazer Drive (off the south end of Main Street), hosts a year-round roster of events, including concerts, free movies in summer, sporting events and seasonal festivals. Adjacent to the park, a lovely new City Hall and Visitor Center are slated to open this fall.

A covered pavilion shades some of the more than 60 farmers and artisans who come to Trailblazer Park to sell their wares every Saturday morning from May to September at the Travelers Rest Farmers Market. Beyond the pavilion, white market tents spill out onto the lawn, offering local goods ranging from produce to pottery, while food trucks park nearby. And there’s always something—balloon animals, bubble blowing, ice-cream—for kids. In late July, the market holds the popular Tomato Sandwich Taste Off, where market goers get to vote for their favorite tomato sammie. The best entry wins the coveted title of “Big Tomato” and bragging rights for the year to come.

Hop on the Swamp Rabbit Trail

As the Upstate’s most treasured greenway, the GHS Swamp Rabbit Trail traces an abandoned rail bed from Greenville to Travelers Rest, with a southern spur that skirts Lake Conestee Nature Park. On any given weekend, the trail teems with cyclists, runners and pedestrians.

The paved 22-mile (and ever-expanding) trail, takes its name from the Swamp Rabbit Railroad, the sobriquet given to a regional freight carrier established in the late 1800s. In 2009, when the trail opened, Travelers Rest was working on revitalizing its Main Street and courting new business. This coincidence was a happy one for the development of the trail’s terminus town, as TR’s new shops and restaurants provided places for the influx of visitors riding the trail to shop and refuel. Today the trail sees more than half-a-million users a year.

You can rent a bike at Sunrift Adventures and explore the immediate area, or ride the 11 miles south to Greenville. New attractions, including bike rentals, breweries and taco shops, are constantly popping up along the trail.

For trail details and etiquette, visit greenvillerec.com/ghs-swamp-rabbit-trail.

TR Rising

For a town of 7,400 people, Travelers Rest boasts a surprising number of independent restaurants. Thanks to a host of entrepreneurs who took a chance on TR, the town buzzes with foodies who find everything from Southern-inspired small plates to artisan-made bread.

Joyce McCarrell and her sister, Nancy, are often credited with being the pioneers of TR’s burgeoning food scene. The two Travelers Rest natives stirred things up in late 2008 when they opened the Café at Williams Hardware at 13 S. Main Street. “We were the first new restaurant on Main Street as the city was implementing their streetscape project,” Joyce recalls. 

Housed in a former hardware store bordering the Swamp Rabbit Trail, the café shows off the building’s original hardwood floors, ceiling beams, and cast-iron wood stove. The front of the space functions as a small shop, displaying South Carolina-made food items (jams, hot sauce, stone-milled grits) as well as a panoply of general-store wares. A blackboard lists the daily specials, while the menu leans toward homey fare such as a pimiento cheese sandwich and the signature Reuben. Inside the glass case, house-made layer cakes dare you not to skip dessert.

The Swamp Rabbit Trail was just being completed in 2012 when French Culinary Institute-trained bakers Cheryl and Steve Kraus opened their bakery/café, Upcountry Provisions, at 6809 State Park Road, just around the corner from Main Street. Beyond the café menu of tasty sandwiches, salads, and soups, their repertoire of daily bread includes two loaf breads (perhaps a buttery brioche and a hearty oatmeal and whole-wheat bread called Trail Mix) and stecca, an Italian baguette, in four savory varieties. To satisfy your sweet tooth, go for the irresistible Nanna’s Triple Chocolate Brownies (Cheryl’s Aunt Gwen’s recipe, passed on to Gwen by her mother).

Serial entrepreneur Andy O’Mara and his life and business partner, Loren Frant, are relative newcomers to TR. O’Mara, from upstate New York, moved to the area in 2013 with the intention of relocating his canoe manufacturing company from Tennessee to Travelers Rest. He purchased a building on Main Street, but soon realized its small size would not be adequate for his needs. 

As he and Loren got to know TR, they recognized the niche for a pizza restaurant and dove in head-first, despite their lack of restaurant experience. “We saw the opportunity to start something new and use our entrepreneurial skills,” O’Mara says. “We love being part of this thriving community and contributing to its growth.”

Sidewall Pizza opened at 35 S. Main Street in that former tire shop—thus the name—with garage-style doors that open to create one large indoor-outdoor space. Gourmet thin-crust pizzas pack in the crowds, and each day brings a new flavor of house-made ice cream (they even have a non-dairy version made with coconut milk).

Since opening Sidewall (and its two satellites in Greenville), O’Mara has expanded his restaurant group with Rocket Surgery at 164 S. Main Street. This casual spot, named “Best Small Town Restaurant in South Carolina” by Thrillist earlier this year, hones in on well-executed small plates and weekly specials with a killer cocktail program. The most recent addition to O’Mara’s restaurant portfolio is Monkey Wrench Smokehouse, where, under the experienced eye of the group’s culinary director, Chef Steven Musolf, the meat is smoked daily over oak, and the whimsical sides are made from scratch.

Any good foodie burg needs a taco shop, and in 2017, Chris and Katie Williamson provided one, in the form of Farmhouse Tacos. In the same Main Street complex as The Tasting Room and Rocket Surgery, Farmhouse Tacos sources local ingredients when dreaming up tacos like verde-braised pork shoulder and blackberry duck.

Across Main Street, the Williamson’s newest restaurant, Hare & Field, joined the mix this spring. The gastropub concept fulfills the couple’s penchant for “urban comfort food” (think hot buttered pretzels with beer cheese fondue and house-made ale mustard). Seating in the cozy eatery is nearly doubled by the outdoor patio that can be enclosed when the weather turns chilly.

“These days, people come to TR just for the food, and they have high expectations,” observes O’Mara. In this regard, the town doesn’t disappoint. All in all, Travelers Rest is one delicious place to linger.