I’ve written ad nauseam about how Zadie’s Cafe in Marshall is one of my favorite places in Western North Carolina. The food is excellent (particularly their honey chipotle wings and their smash burger, which differentiates itself from all the other smash burgers because it has bacon in the patty). The small-town river views are relaxing (not to mention lovely in the summer with a perennial breeze). You can get a $3.00 beer, which is unheard of in Asheville (is it the champagne of beers? Absolutely!). And if you’re not looking to imbibe, their “n/a” selection is top-tier. They also get pretty decent music.
Generally, I’m a big Marshall fan. It’s got all the small-town charm of the other Western North Carolina small towns that make this such a great place to live—Black Mountain, Brevard, Sylva, Weaverville—but without the crowds and…I was going to say, “without the blatant gentrification,” but if I recall, there was a store in Marshall selling fashion Carhartt, so I’ll just go with “with less blatant gentrification.”
I’m also mainly here to talk about what can absolutely be considered a “boutique hotel”, which is a cornerstone of rural, gentrification lexicon, along with “artisinally made,” “farm-to-table,” “locally curated,” and “handcrafted,” of course. The hotel in question is the Old Marshall Jail Hotel. It’s a six-room, “art hotel and historic preservation project” (per their website; good play to them for avoiding “boutique hotel”) located, true to its title, in the old Marshall jail, which was built in 1910 and decommissioned in just 2012.
The hotel rooms are all on the second floor, accessible via barred doors on the building’s first, which houses my beloved Zadie’s, and are outfitted in a way that doesn’t let you forget that despite the curated artwork and hand-thrown pottery bedecking the rooms, you’re in a jail (the floors, for example, are concrete; I don’t know that I’ve ever stayed in a concrete-floored hotel room before).
I’ve been wanting to stay at the Old Marshall Jail Hotel for a weekend since I first discovered it two summers back, but for a while, I told myself I couldn’t exactly justify the price, since I can get to Marshall from my apartment in less than 30 minutes if I’m really huffing it. However, in the past year, I’ve really started embracing more staycation-type weekends away, and last summer, with a new job slated to begin on October 1st, I remember telling myself that a weekend in Marshall would be my treat-yo-self gift for my first new paycheck.
That didn’t end up happening.
I started my new job in Pennsylvania, where I’d been for a childhood friend’s wedding, because last October 1st was just four days after Hurricane Helene came up and devastated Western North Carolina. As someone who works remotely from home, I didn’t return to my Asheville apartment full-time until the week of Halloween, when the Wi-Fi was restored. My first treat-yo-self money from the new job was spent on various AirBnBs and gas money, taking me to Louisville and Wilmington as I embraced the digital nomad life.
I also didn’t spend that first paycheck at the Old Marshall Jail because Marshall was particularly devastated by Helene, and Zadie’s, right on the banks of the French Broad, was inundated with water.
It was a very strange phenomenon to watch your now home be destroyed via social media clips eleven hours away. Though I was at my friend’s wedding—and mostly, truly—having a great time, I kept sneaking away to view clips of Asheville and Western North Carolina, and check in with friends who were here, though at the time most didn’t have the service to answer back and let me know how things were. I remember the morning of the wedding, waking up, and my mom showing me a news clip talking about how bad Helene was expected to be. I remember checking Zadie’s Instagram shortly after. The water was flush to the train tracks running alongside their patio.
At the wedding, a well-meaning former high school classmate came up and asked how I was holding up. “It’s just weird,” was all I could really say, which was the truth. “I saw this on Facebook,” he said, and showed me a video clip I can’t re-find of Marshall from across the French Broad. You could clearly see the Old Jail underwater.
When, a couple of weeks after the flood, Zadie’s Instagram said that they were committed to reopening and gift cards were available for purchase, I purchased enough gift cards to cover a weekend stay. When they reopened for reservations this past spring, I emailed them and booked for this past Labor Day weekend, inviting my brother and friend Jacki—both back in PA, and both frequent visitors to WNC—to stay with me.
We booked The Riverview Suite, which, true to its title, has a view of the river. It has one queen bed, a full kitchen, and a loft with an additional futon and twin bed, so it was perfect for three people to share. The windows look out onto the deck that’s reserved for hotel guests, which looks over the river and Zadie’s patio.
When we arrived Saturday afternoon, fresh from a day at the Laurel River Trail, we showered and were going to have dinner at Zadie’s, but Pleasure Chest, a very popular Asheville cover band, was playing, and the line to order food was out the door. Jacki needed to nap, so Shawn and I walked up to Mad Co. Brew House and had a couple of drinks on their back deck. I want to reiterate, whether Zadie’s or Mad Co., I find very few things as relaxing as sitting riverside in Marshall.
We returned to Zadie’s when Jacki texted that she was back amongst the living, and went back for food, which we ate on the upper deck, watching the band below. I often complain that too many musicians in Asheville prioritize “taste” over “fun,” but Pleasure Chest ended their set with a cover of Suspicious Minds…and then an encore of Battle Hymn of the Republic. That, to me, is peak fun.
We went back to Mad Co. for a drink after dinner since Jacki wanted to check it out, and that was my first time being on the river at Marshall after dark (I typically stop in the daytime, or summer evenings that take a long time to end here in WNC). It almost had a beach-at-night quality to it. When we returned to the jail, the three of us sat on the deck and read, watching the moon play off the water (ok, fine, Shawn and Jacki read, I lasted 5 minutes and then went to bed).
After a sunrise hike (an hour and some change drive away up in Burnsville), we basically just hung out on the deck again all afternoon, reading, catching some sun, and just basking in—as the kids these days say—the immaculate vibes. I thought maybe we’d do some walking around the shops—and one other bar, Mal’s—in Marshall, but we were more than happy just to hang out. One of my Asheville friends came over, and we had dinner again at Zadie’s. I had two burgers (two for two), while Shawn and Jacki split the chicken and waffles, which I’d never had before and which were excellent. We went to a show in Weaverville that night (Jimmy Buffett tribute band; one can’t miss that on the anniversary of his passing), and I spent another night post-show on the deck reading. People throw around the word “restorative” often when discussing travel, and it’s fitting here. The Old Jail was restorative in a way.
And to my knowledge, the Old Jail is not haunted. Every time I told anyone I was or had stayed there, the top question was, “Well, is it haunted?” I didn’t hear anything that went bump in the night. And there was nothing even remotely creepy about the stay. I also think that had there been Old Jail ghost stories, they would’ve leaned into that in their marketing and literature, but there’s no mention. Restorative and ghost-free! Truly, what more could you want?
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