Blue Ridge Parkway
The Blue Ridge Parkway is a stretch of road that was built to connect Shenandoah National Park to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. This 469 mile roadway is well noted for its scenic beauty. It is America’s longest linear park, which runs through Virginia and North Carolina states. The scenic beauty that this park offers is what draws in the crowds. The parkway, while not a National Park, has been the most visited unit of the National Park System every year since 1946 except two (1949, 2013). In the year 2015 it was visited by about 15.1 million people as reported by U.S. News.
A slow-paced and relaxing drive through the parkway reveals some of the stunning long-range vistas, rugged mountains and pastoral landscapes of the Appalachian Highlands. This is one to be experienced in person. It’s often called one of the most scenic byways in the world.
The Blue Ridge Parkway is also very well known for its vibrant exhibit of Fall colors. The colors of the leaves of the trees in the parkway begin to change during the month of October, usually mid to late month, but it depends on the elevation. Leaves will begin changing first on the highest peaks and conclude in the lower elevations. I was very interested to experience this grandeur of Fall colors on the parkway and hence planned to visit it during the second week of October 2016.
Lin Cove Viaduct
We started our drive from Columbus, IN on a Friday evening and had a 5 hour drive ahead of us. We had our dinner at an Indian restaurant in Lexington and called it a day once we reached Knoxville. We had an Airbnb booked for ourselves here.
The next morning we started our trip to the Blue Ridge Parkway at about 8AM. We had some freshly cooked hash brown at a local Waffle House and then continued our journey towards the parkway. The drive accompanied by early morning sun and pleasant weather was very beautiful and satisfying. We initially had plans to visit the Grandfather Mountain and do a hike there to one of its peaks. Grandfather Mountain is the highest point in the parkway. We felt from here; we would be treated to some of the most amazing views of the Blue Ridge Mountains. But on reaching the Grandfather Mountain we were told that the site was closed due to high winds. We then hence started driving towards our next point of interest — Lin Cove Viaduct.
Lin Cove viaduct is a 1243-foot concrete segmental bridge on the Blue Ridge Parkway that snakes around the slopes of Grandfather Mountain in North Carolina. It was completed in 1987 at a cost of $10 million and was the last section of the Blue Ridge Parkway to be finished. The viaduct was needed because of the damage that a traditional cut-and-fill road would have caused to Grandfather Mountain. The viaduct was designed by Figg and Muller Engineers, Inc. and construction began in 1979. It consists of 153 segments weighing 50 tons each.
The views from the viaduct were simply spectacular to say the least. This is one of the most visited points at the Blue Ridge Parkway. The history and the details of the construction are very well highlighted at the Lin Cove viaduct visitor center.
Linville Falls
From the Lin Cove viaduct we made a short drive towards the Linville Falls. Linville Falls is the most popular waterfall in the Blue Ridge Mountains because of its accessibility to the Blue Ridge Parkway. It is a spectacular three-tiered waterfall plunging into Linville Gorge, the “Grand Canyon of the Southern Appalachians.” The Falls Trail distance is 1.6 miles round trip and is easy. The Gorge Trail distance is 1.4 miles round trip and is moderate. The Plunge Basin Trail is 1 mile round trip and is moderate.
Crabtree Falls
Crabtree Falls is located in the Crabtree Falls & Meadows Recreation Area at Milepost 339.5 of the Blue Ridge Parkway and is accessed by a small hike. It’s a beautiful hike, complete with plenty of wildflowers.
This popular, short loop hike descends on a moderate path to a majestic 70 foot waterfall, which is widely touted as one of the most photogenic in the area. You’ll climb steeply up the opposite ridge for a short distance, then hike a wide, smooth trail beside the stream. Many very large trees populate the forest in this area. We finish out the loop by climbing gently through a beautiful hardwood forest. The hike starts in a Blue Ridge Parkway campground, which makes a good base camp for further explorations into the area. This trail is shared with many others during the summer.
Craggy Gardens
After a moderate hike at the Crabtree Falls we started driving down towards Craggy Gardens. The Great Craggy Mountains are an area of exposed rock surfaces and high peaks that provide breathtaking views of distant southern Appalachian ridges. Large expanses of native trees cover the slopes and summits of the Craggies. Craggy Gardens offers some of the most stunning sunset views at the Blue Ridge Parkway.
In mid-June, pink and purple blooms of Catawba rhododendron peak. Throughout the summer, smaller native wildflowers cover the ground with vibrant splashes of color. These natural garden meadows are “balds.”
Red berry bouquets of the mountain ash appear each fall. The berries are often encased in ice in the fall and winter. The combination of high altitude, cool weather, and exposed rocky outcrops creates the necessary habitat for a number of rare and endangered plants. Craggy Gardens has been recognized by the state of North Carolina as a Natural Heritage Area.
We hiked the Craggy Pinnacle trail to catch the best glimpse of the sunset at the Blue Ridge Parkway. This short mile-high hike offers huge rewards. It’s only a 1.4-miles roundtrip hike to the top of the 5,892-foot summit Craggy Pinnacle at Craggy Gardens. The exceptional panoramic 360-degree views are hard to beat in Western North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains. The hiking trail goes through tunnels of rhododendron, gnarled sweet birch trees and wildflowers. Near the top, there are side trails to explore.
On the day we made it to the summit it was very cold at. The temperature was around 32 deg. F (0 deg. C) and we weren’t prepared. I had worn a light wind cheater and it surely wasn’t enough to beat the cold. I hiked up the trail quickly, caught the glimpse of the sunset and was down within a few minutes. The cold at the Craggy Pinnacle was not bearable due to high winds.
From the Craggy Gardens we then started our 2 hour long drive to Knoxville. The trip to the Blue Ridge Mountains was an eventful one and I would highly recommend anyone around this place to visit. The Blue Ridge Mountains looks beautiful anytime in the year. Overall this trip was very satisfying and an enjoyable one.