Chicago to Louisville into Charleston and up to Myrtle Beach

We are taking a roadtrip this summer and will be going from Chicago to the Carolinas stopping anywhere with great road food along the way, does anyone have any must stop tips along the way we should know about?

One route:

http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=4686

Another

http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=4203

(one of the all-time greats)

And you might also consider taking a more leisurely route through NC for BBQ:

http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=5633

(Ditto)

These trips are a hell of a start. You could do a roundtrip, with the scenic Appalachian route (KY/WV/Western VA) one way and the more urban one (Toledo/Cleveland/P'Burgh/DC) back or vice versa. I'd also add bourbon distilleries to the mix. I did quite a bit of research for both routes in '04 and '05, and I'm confident that really good advice has been distilled in the posts above.

Charleston is discussed extensively in this thread:

http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.ph ... charleston

If you're driving between Charleston and Myrtle Beach, by all means, don't miss the simple but excellent See Wee Restaurant in Awendaw.

Myrtle Beach can be a bit of a challenge. By all means, avoid the all you can eat seafood buffets. They are one tick on the side of human consumption from cat food. That doesn't stop those who know don't know better from lining up at the trough for seafood that was flash fried in April, then dumped back in the fryer right before its arrival at the buffet in August.

Two notable places where I had good meals were Greg Norman's Australian Grill which served good grilled steaks (but nothing better than you'll get at Gibson's or Morton's here). The other was Umberto's at Barefoot Landing, a Pittsburgh style Italian serving huge , solid, portions of meat and pasta.