In fall 2024, I had an eagerly awaited family trip planned to the mountains — a chance to explore the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Smoky Mountains. But everything came to a halt when Hurricane Helene devastated Western North Carolina and the surrounding communities.
READ: On the Road: Jax to Blowing Rock, North Carolina (and Other Nearby Mountain Towns)
Fast forward to this year: as towns and roads slowly reopened, I began planning again. This time, the perfect leaf-peeping getaway just so happened to coincide with my birthday.
I packed the itinerary with all the fall things — I wanted to get in as much as we could in a few days. Pumpkin patches, skate parks, one day in Gatlinburg, another day in Asheville, and another day in Chattanooga to visit some family. My family and I are accustomed to packing in all the fun in a short amount of time, but this time I realized this was not a Florida day trip with the kids; this was a long drive with long stretches of travel in between. Could we do it? Of course, we could, and we had a great time, but would I do it again? Well, yes and no, so here are some of my lessons learned when traveling with my crew through the mountains.
Stick to one mountain chain per trip.
I don’t know what I was thinking. I tried to cram in the Smoky Mountains (in Tennessee) one day and the Blue Ridge Parkway (in Asheville) the next day. I wanted to explore it all and show the kids our favorite places, and although both places are only a couple of hours away from each other, with it being “peak” leaf-peeping season, the traffic and crowds sometimes put a damper on our plans. All the hot spots like Clingmans Dome (now named Kuwohi) were packed, many waiting on the parkway to get in to find a parking spot.
Had we not had a full day planned for the next day, this would have been the perfect time to pivot and go back early the next morning to catch the sunrise. The flip side to this is that when we turned around to head back down, we ended up finding a non-crowded off-the-beaten-path spot to get out and explore, which is now one of our favorite spots.
Decide whether you want to do touristy things or nature things; this will determine where you want to stay.
I had planned a mix of touristy and nature-based activities, so I thought staying in downtown Gatlinburg was the perfect spot. Close to the touristy things like Anakeesta, and at the foothill of the Smokies, I found a cute little place right on the Roaring Fork River, but what I didn’t realize is that the traffic and noise would go on through the night.
Mix in that it was also fall break for the locals, and I ended up learning the hard way that being that close is not always the best option. My family and I also realized we were more there for the nature things and will skip the touristy things next time. We’ll stay a little further outside of Gatlinburg, but still close enough to make it a fun day.
If you really want to explore, don’t go at one of the busiest times of the year.
We have gone to the mountains at different times of the year. Still, this time my boys wanted to see real fall colors, and although the colors were amazing up in the higher elevations, I realized that if we had just waited a week or so and not gone for my birthday (mid October), the crowds would be less intense (maybe) and the colors would be making their way down to the lower elevations, making it easier for us to enjoy “fall vibes” and also explore the city we were staying in at the same time.
I got overexcited since we’d missed out the previous year, and I aggressively packed the itinerary so much that, looking back, I really don’t know how I intended to accomplish it all. I’m just a mom trying to create those core memories, and I got carried away, I suppose.
Biggest lesson learned on this trip: Keep the trip on the shorter end. We missed home!
Don’t get me wrong, we had an amazing time despite the trip not going exactly as we had envisioned. We bonded as a family during our trip (lots of driving means lots of conversations), and now we have lessons learned under our belts with new places to discover and return to. We will have a lighter itinerary next time and a more open schedule for exploring and pivoting when needed.
We learned that we are a family more for nature than the touristy stuff, so we will plan accordingly next time. We learned we are a family that likes smaller, quicker trips instead of longer ones, and on our drive home, our boys said to us, “We had fun, but we really miss Florida, and we just want to see palm trees, blue crabs, and a red fish.”
Same, boys. Same. I miss Florida, too.
The mountains have a way of calling for me, and we’ll definitely be back, but Florida has our hearts, and that was the biggest lesson learned. You can take us out of Florida, but you can’t take Florida out of us.
I would love to hear some of your tips for traveling in the mountains, and which mountains are your favorite! Sound off in the comments.
We love Blue Ridge, Ga and it’s surrounding areas! We are trying to make it an annual family trip and have also found that we enjoy the nature adventures better than the touristy ones. That being said, we usually try to find one touristy thing to do. This year is The Lost Sea, a cave with a lake, and the little town, Helen. Last year it was Rock City, which we loved but didn’t enjoy the 4ish hour round trip to and from Chattanooga. Well, I did but my husband wasn’t too thrilled to know he could have taken a less mountainous route, oops hehe. We try to stay 5-7 days and usually have a couple hikes and activities sprinkled in between family days at the cabin. We also try and make a little stop somewhere along the way (usually Atlanta) for something short to break up the drive up. We like going in January because it’s not usually very busy and it may or may not snow, but want to go one year in Fall for the leaves.