The Blue Ridge Parkway

    The famous Blue Ridge Parkway is renowned as America's favorite drive, and it's not difficult to understand why. Passing by infinite blue mountain vistas and a staggering diversity of plant and animal life, the meandering drive snakes 469 miles from Shenandoah National Park in Virginia to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina. Each overlook gives travelers fresh perspectives of the ancient mountains, the towns in the valleys below, and the fascinating and diverse array of flora and fauna. Clouds and fogs, fickle in their movements, huddle around the crests of mountains like the ripples of waves around islands. Down below, ramshackle farms are tucked into valley corners and balanced on slopes. Wooded dells alternate with cleared pastures full of goldenrod, chicory and Queen Anne's lace swaying with each Appalachian breeze. The vistas are always ever-changing, and always beautiful. The Blue Ridge Parkway is a road, after all, and all travelers inevitably have a destination in mind. However, if you fully embrace the drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway, you'll understand that sometimes the journey is truly more important than the destination.

Virginia

Wingstem, native and attractive to local pollinators

Potentially American Chestnut??

Marby Mill

Puckett Cabin, home of legendary midwife Orlean Hawks Puckett 

Bladder Campion, invasive 

Cedar Ridge, a bluegrass band, playing at the Blue Ridge Music Center 

North Carolina

Bumble Bee on Sunflower

Flat Top Manor, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park

Price Lake

Virgin's Bower, native

Great Mullein, invasive

Common Yarrow, native

Linn Cove Viaduct

Little Switzerland, Population: 46