The Blue Ridge Parkway is only about 5.5 miles from our Asheville bed and breakfast, so it’s very easy to get to it. And my first visit to Asheville was 20 years ago. I was here for just six days and walked out of Asheville saying, “Except for my freshman year at Duke university, my home has always been with 25 miles of the Empire State Building, but I am supposed to be in Asheville.”  Less than 18 months later, I was permanently in Asheville as a bed and breakfast owner.

   Yesterday was one of those days that you wish you could put in a bottle and save for  remembering.  In Asheville, temperatures started out in the low-50s and by afternoon, were about 80 degrees. After some errands were done, the Blue Ridge Parkway was ‘calling my name’.  So I drove south, my favorite way to go.  And the air smelled sweet of grasses and trees.

   You don’t need to drive very far from Asheville to get to beautiful views and higher elevation. So I headed for Mt. Pisgah, just 14 miles from where I got on the Parkway. To get there you pass through seven small tunnels, all created during the Great Depression. Overlooks are abundant and on a couple of them you can see both south and north from one overlook. There are place where you can look out and see nothing that man has made! Stunningly beautiful.We are the everlastingly grateful beneficiaries of those efforts.

   When you get to Mt Pisgah, you not only can walk to the summit, or see the place where George Vanderbilt, first owner of Biltmore House had a hunting lodge, but there’s a small lodge and restaurant just a few hundred yards away.. The overlook from the lodge offers fabulous views including Looking Glass Rock.  Driving beyond Mt Pisgah, there are several other places to enjoy Looking Glass Rock,  in particular. It’s a great granite-face mountain the glistens like a mirror when its wet. Truly an inspiring sight. And I met a couple at one of the roadside overlooks who were on their honeymoon. They are  from Wisconsin and they had climbed that impressive rock earlier in the day!  And the young man was born in the Wisconsin town where my daughter had lived for several years…truly a small World! You’ve simply got to love this area!