The views are, when the mist clears, jaw-dropping. On day one, we reached the highest point of the Blue Ridge Parkway at an elevation of 6,053 feet (1,845 m). The Blue Ridge range is said to be the second oldest mountain range, created a billion years ago. There is no shortage of stunning scenery and many opportunities for adventure. We started our day with a homestyle American breakfast at Mabel’s Kitchen and weaved and wound our way up the Blue Ridge Mountains, stopping along the way to view the world beyond, from the numerous ‘overlooks’ along the way. The only constant is the blue colour of the mountains that stays till the end. For perspective, The Blue Ridge province consists of two national parks - The Great Smoky Mountains national park (where we began) and Shenandoah National Park (the end point of our drive) and includes eight national forests like Cherokee, Pisgah, George Washington, Jefferson etc. The entire stretch of Blue Ridge Parkway and Skyline Drive, that run one after the other is asphalted, which means, you can quite easily, ride, bike or drive a regular car through the heart of the southern Appalachia. Yo-yoing along the crest of the mountain however, there was one thing I was thankful for.

There was one challenge though - the weather and the fact that very often the phone network blinked off, leaving us to consult the map (yeah, the paper kind) and peering through the windshield to look at the nature of the sky, something that proved hard because things changed rapidly on the Blue Ridge. This drive makes it to every list of must-do things in the US and is quite charming in its own John Denver ways.

Shenandoah skyline drive map