Blue Ridge Parkway: Asheville to Blowing Rock

About this drive

The Blue Ridge Parkway runs 469 miles in total between Shenandoah National Park in Virginia and Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina — the longest rural parkway in the United States. The section between Asheville and Blowing Rock in western North Carolina is among the most accessible and most visited, sitting in the southern Appalachians at elevations mostly between 3,000 and 5,500 feet with consistent views east across the Piedmont. Like Skyline Drive in Virginia, the Parkway is a National Park Service road: no commercial vehicles, no billboards, no development. The speed limit is 45 mph and is appropriately unhurried. Stops along the Asheville-Blowing Rock section include Craggy Gardens — short walks through rhododendron tunnels that bloom spectacularly in June — and Linn Cove Viaduct, a curving concrete bridge around the flank of Grandfather Mountain considered an engineering landmark. Blowing Rock is a small resort town at the northern end of this section, at about 3,600 feet consistently cooler than the surrounding lowlands through summer. October color on this section runs from mid-October at the highest elevations through early November lower down, with the drive at its most visited and most spectacular during the third week of October.

Stops along the way

• 📸 Linn Cove Viaduct · Scenic Viewpoint

  An elevated section of road curving around the base of Grandfather Mountain.