With 2023 designated the Year of the Trail in North Carolina, it’s the perfect time to check out one of the fabulous trails in western North Carolina. To get you started on your early springtime trail exploration, we’ve put together some featured trails for March.
Finally(!), oak trees are changing en masse, with bold orange and rust-colored tones dominate the landscape at our elevation of 2,300 feet in the North Carolina mountains. This will be our final fall color report for 2016, and it’s been a beautiful fall season.
Week 5 of our fall color reporting is hereby declared Peak Fall Color Week at our elevation (2,300) and for surrounding areas like Black Mountain and Asheville.
Into week 3 of our fall color reports we go, on this rainy Tuesday! While not very common in October around these parts, the rain is actually doing a bit of good “clean up” duty, sending some of the early, dull-colored leaves to the ground and making way for the stars of the fall color show that are just starting to shine.
| View from Mt. Mitchell, highest peak in the eastern U.S. |
You really can’t beat summertime in the mountains of Western
North Carolina. The average highs are in the low-80s at the hottest point of
summer. And that’s just our elevation. Drive 20 minutes to the Blue Ridge
Parkway and hop on for a scenic drive up to elevations of 5,000+ feet and
you’ll often experience high temperatures in the 70s, and sometimes even the
60s, in July and August.
Asheville and western North Carolina are often on top ten lists (top ten cities for art, top ten places to retire, top ten cities for beer lovers, and the list of lists goes on, and on, and on…). Now, Asheville has been recognized as one of ten affordable summer driving destinations by weather.com. Specifically, they give a shout out to the Atlanta-to-Asheville road trip, which is just under four hours.
Getting gorgeous here! Oh, mountain autumn, how we love you so. We’re being treated to a brilliant fall this year thanks to Mother Nature. Sourwoods and dogwoods are in full color mode. And it seems like some trees in our neck of the woods are changing earlier than the past three years, including hickory, beeches and sassafras (one of Brigette’s favorites):
