| The Inn on Mill Creek B&B in late October |
“Peak week” for fall color has arrived in our neck of the woods, between Black Mountain and Old Fort, NC (2,300 feet in elevation). The Inn on Mill Creek B&B is situated two miles inside Pisgah National Forest, and with so many different tree types, we are seeing large bursts of varying color all around!
| Color has reached 2,500 to 3,500 feet |
This week brings more color to our elevation (2,300 feet), and it looks like peak color at elevations around Asheville and Black Mountain, NC, will be happening over several days through the very end of October. As usual, we are still waiting on the oak trees! Gah! However, other tree types, such as sugar and red maples and sassafras, are beginning to change more rapidly. As it stands, this year’s predominant fall color is velvety gold, with birch, beech, hickory, sassafras and others providing different shades of yellow, bronze, and yellowish-orange. Early changers, such as sourwood, dogwood and sourgum are still showing color (mostly red hues) while tall tulip poplars are now bare after a rainstorm on October 14th caused their brown-tipped yellow leaves to drop.
| Early fall color at the Inn on Mill Creek B&B |
Exciting news! Fall has most definitely arrived in the mountains of North Carolina. You know what that means…time to begin our annual tradition of weekly fall foliage reports for our area around Asheville, Black Mountain, Old Fort, Pisgah National Forest, and the Blue Ridge Parkway between Mt. Pisgah and Grandfather Mountain! Each Tuesday through the fall season, we’ll let you know which trees are changing and the best places to capture great fall color.
| Roaring Fork Falls |
A lot of our guests like to hike to waterfalls, and while choices are limited east of Asheville and involve a little bit of driving (scenic routes, of course), the quality of the waterfalls near Black Mountain and in McDowell County near Old Fort more than make up for it. Here’s a short list, in order of drive time from the Inn on Mill Creek Bed & Breakfast to each waterfall hike’s trailhead:
| Exploring the outdoors at Biltmore |
We know that most people who visit Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC, can’t wait to go through the 175,000 square-foot, fully furnished and ornate, Downton Abbey-esque house, but we tend to recommend heading outdoors at Biltmore, especially in late summer/early fall.
Looking for some incredible views when you visit the mountains of Western North Carolina? Combine a day of scenic driving along the Blue Ridge Parkway north of Asheville with an easy hike, such as the Chestoa View Trail (0.6 miles long).
| Hops drying [photo credit: Hop’n Blueberry Farm] |
Here’s an activity for those of you who dig agritourism and local farm tours and who want to get a behind-the-scenes look at hops production: Hop’n Blueberry Farm in Black Mountain, one of the first hop farms in the state of North Carolina, is offering one-hour specialty tours at 2pm every Saturday in April. The farm is about 20 minutes from the Inn on Mill Creek B&B.
With Spring just a week away, we’re daydreaming of warm breezes, verdant mountain vistas, wildflowers galore, spring songbirds and…well, we thought we’d go ahead and make a list of ten reasons to visit the mountains of Western North Carolina in springtime. What is there to see and do in Spring in the NC mountains?
Winter blahs getting you down? Looking forward to thawing out and getting outdoors this spring? It’s not too far away for us here in the mountains of western North Carolina! The Inn on Mill Creek B&B is located in McDowell County, North Carolina, about halfway between the towns of Old Fort and Black Mountain. Our county is known for its outdoor recreation, with awesome hiking trails and mountain biking trails, trout fishing streams and waterfalls, great places to walk and plenty of areas to explore nature.
