A Few Good Finds

Ham's Restaurant
1610 South Church Street
Burlington, NC 27215
(336) 570-3099

Owing to a comment by sister-in-law Shelley Roth on a previous post, we put Ham's Restaurant on our dining agenda. She said,

I LOVE Ham's! You should check it out if you've never been there. I seem to remember some really good potato chips (and I'm not a chip fan).

Well, I am a chip fan, big time, and there is nothing finer than a homemade potato chip. Shelley was referring to the Ham's Restaurant on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill, but there's also one about ten minutes away from us in Burlington. After checking the 'net, and finding out that even though Ham's is a chain (something that makes a restaurant lose points in my book,) it is a small, privately-owned, non-franchised chain. . . kind of like In-N-Out Burger. . . so it didn't lose many points. So where to go for lunch? Ham's!

Ham's Hosted on Zooomr

We got a corner booth in the sunny, non-smoking section, and our friendly waitress asked if we wanted to start with a basket of chips. Yeah, I guess so, if you're going to twist our arms and all.

They looked marvelous.

Basket of Fresh Fried Love Hosted on Zooomr

And they tasted great too, with just salt and pepper, and some ranch dressing on the side. Sometimes places that make the chips from scratch give them some sort of seasoning, or cheese crumbles, or scallions, but these were spot-on just as they were. We made quick work of them.

Zoe ordered spaghetti and meatballs (the good little Italian girl that she is. . . sort of), Tristan got the mini-corn dog bites, I had the Caribbean chicken wrap, and Jennifer had a bacon cheddar burger, claiming that she hadn't had a real burger in a long time.

Ham's Burger Hosted on Zooomr

The kids also got Shirley Temples to drink, and they were infinitely refillable, which made T&Z happy, and were included with their meal cost, making Jennifer and I happy.

We were very pleased with Ham's, and will definitely return. Excellent call, Shelley Roth.

Lake Michael Park

On the way home we searched out Lake Michael Park, a lake and a park (duh) that belongs to the City of Mebane. It's a 66 acre lake surrounded by a 200 acre park. You can fish there (license-free for Mebane residents), launch your up-to-17' boat there, play volleyball, picnic, rent a paddle boat or John boat, take a ride ($1) on a pontoon boat, and hike. There are currently two semi-primitive trails that appear to have had a fair amount of eagle scout work done on the convenient parts.

Not having planned on hiking, we didn't bring water nor bother to pick up a trail map, but when we found ourselves near a trail head, we started off on it anyway. We hiked around the lake for about an hour, and then realizing that the trail dead-ended, turned around and came back. I got this shot of Jennifer making a creek crossing.

Modified Star Jump Hosted on Zooomr

She didn't want me to take this picture, for some reason.

It turned out to be a great little park, and we will definitely be returning. We're also thinking of initiating a Traveling Roths' Sunday Dinner kind of a thing involving cooking out with guests after church. Stay tuned for that one.