Blue Ridge Parkway, Oct 3 - 5, 2022
View from the Looking Glass Rock Overlook on the Blue Ridge Parkway.
On Tuesday, we drove up to the Blue Ridge Parkway on Hwy 276 from Brevard NC. It was a crisp fall day, and we stopped at several overlooks on the way. We travelled to the southern most end of the Parkway, and visited the Great Smokey Mountains visitor’s center. On the way home, we drove through Cherokee then stopped in Sylva, NC at the Guadalupe Cafe for a very late lunch on the way home.
On Wednesday, we had a leisurely walk around Rhododendron Lake in Hendersonville, NC. We had an easy walk around a small lake in the Laurel Park neighborhood. Then we drove up to Jump Off Rock, where we found two short loop trails. These were not easy with a steep decent over rocks. Due to some ambiguous trail markers and a less than accurate online map, we had a more exciting hike than we wanted. Eventually, we (and by we, I mean Julie) chose a less interesting path back to the top of the rock. No bones were broken.
Elk at the Great Smokey Mountains visitor’s center.
At the highest point overlook on the Blue Ridge Parkway, 6053 ft.
The family at Jump Off Rock
