Somewhere past Blowing Rock I put the atlas face down on my lap, because the road had started its long curves and my stomach doesn't care how pretty the view is. That's the deal in our car: on mountain roads Wes drives and I look out the window and read nothing. It works out. He likes the curves, and I like the overlooks.
This was our June trip, the first weekend of the month, Friday the 6th through Sunday the 8th. June stayed with Tonya. We left the house at 5:40 a.m. and were in Boone before lunch, about 200 miles, most of it on four-lane roads until the last hour.
Checking the road before we drove it
Hurricane Helene tore up a lot of the North Carolina mountains in September 2024, and the Blue Ridge Parkway took real damage. Before we went, I checked the park service's road status page and the state DOT's travel map twice, once the week before and again the night before. Several stretches near Boone and around Linville Falls were open. Some sections farther south, between there and Asheville, were still closed for repairs.
So our "Boone to Asheville" drive was really Boone to Linville Falls on the Parkway, then down off the mountain on the regular highways into Asheville. If you're planning this, check the closures yourself the week you go. They change, and I'd hate for anyone to follow an old blog post into a gate across the road.
Friday afternoon we walked around downtown Boone, which was busy with summer folks and college kids who'd stayed for the summer. Our motel was an older two-story place on the edge of town, $94 out the door for the night. Clean, quiet, a window unit that rattled, and a little breakfast in the lobby that saved us one meal. Supper was burgers at a local spot, $24 with tip.
Overlooks and a picnic at Linville Falls
Saturday was the slow day, which was the whole point. We got on the Parkway early, before the traffic, and stopped at nearly every overlook. Some had a view to the Piedmont that went on forever, and some were just a pull-off and a bank of rhododendron that hadn't quite finished blooming. Wes stopped at the Linn Cove Viaduct area so I could take a picture of the road curling around Grandfather Mountain. Driving that bridge, you'd never know it's hanging off a mountainside until you look at it from the trail.
We got to Linville Falls around eleven. The trails there are free. We walked the easier trail out toward the upper overlooks, about a mile and a half round trip with some climbing, and the falls were loud and full from a rainy week. Then we ate lunch at a picnic table out of the cooler: pimento cheese sandwiches, grapes, chips and a thermos of tea. I had packed the cooler Thursday night with $20 worth of groceries, and it fed us lunch both days plus snacks.
From there we dropped down to Marion and took the highway into Asheville. Our second motel was on the north side of town, $109 for the night with taxes, and it was fine. We ate tacos for supper for $16, ice and coffee here and there added $5 more, and we were asleep by ten.
Sunday we drove through downtown Asheville, walked an hour, and bought nothing but coffee. A lot of the city was open and busy, and some of it was still clearly rebuilding. Then we came home the long, easy way on I-26 and US-74.
What the Parkway weekend cost
The drive came to about 540 miles. In the mountains the CR-V doesn't get its usual 31; I figure closer to 29. That's about 18.6 gallons, and we paid around $2.92, so gas was right about $54 across two fill-ups.
- Gas: $54
- Motel in Boone: $94
- Motel near Asheville: $109
- Cooler groceries: $20
- Supper in Boone: $24
- Supper in Asheville: $16
- Ice, coffee and snacks: $5
- Admission and parking: $0
- Total: $322
That's $22 over our $300 target. I'm calling it fine. Two nights in the mountains in June, two waterfalls' worth of noise and an entire Saturday of not hurrying, for less than one night at some of the cabins we used to rent. Wes says next time we'll come back in the fall and do the stretches that were closed. I've already written that on the list.
