The Parkway

Cruella (Deville) and I on The Parkway

Have you ever been drawn to a place? Is there a place to where you almost seem called to be? For many, it is an ocean side or lake side, or river side location that is special to you. For others it might be a mountain top or maybe a meadow or a canyon. Still others may yearn for wind in their sail as they skip over a calm sea. There is so much beauty around us that it is no surprise that we find ourselves drawn to certain special places. For me...one of those special places is a road. It's not just any road...it is is a stretch of pavement that ribbons 469 miles over the ridges of the Appalachian Mountains from Virginia to North Carolina. It is the Blue Ridge Parkway. With its back to Shenandoah National Park, the parkway begins at Rockfish Gap near Waynesville, VA and it reaches its end at the Oconaluftee River at the entrance of Great Smoky Mountains National Park near Cherokee, NC. What is in between those two points is a road rich in history, culture, scenery, foliage and fauna.

Kancamagus Hwy- Rte 112 in New Hampshire

I have been traveling (camping/ hiking/ lazing) on and around the parkway since the mid 1970's, not long after moving from New Hampshire to Georgia. My wife and kids likely cannot remember a time when they weren't riding on the parkway with Dad (Oh gee Dad, look, there is another mountain or ...tree or...my gosh are we ever going to get off this parkway?) I was skeptical, upon my first visit, that this road would be at all comparable to the great highways like those that that snake through the White Mountains of New Hampshire and Green Moutains of Vermont. In particular, I was certain that this Blue Ridge Parkway was no match for the Kancamagus Highway that cuts 34.5 miles through White Mountain National Forest in New Hampshire. But I was wrong. The Blue Ridge Parkway's beauty owes no apology to any other of our country's magnificent motorways.

Cabin at Humpback Rocks, VA

One of the things that makes this parkway unique is that it stretches across the backbone and valleys of the southern Appalachians and cuts through the mountain culture of the German and Scotch-Irish people that populated this area from the early days of our country's history. Unlike what happened when the Skyline Drive was built through Shenandoah National Park, this time the Department of the Interior was intentional in not evacuating the people and razing their cabins after purchasing their land. They were determined to maintain as many of the physical structures as possible that depicted the early 20th century mountain culture. In most ways, this isolated culture more resembled life from the preceding century. The depression era road building project began in 1935 utilizing the many unemployed of Virginia and North Carolina through the recently created Civilian Conservation Corp and was a project on the grandest scale. The final section around Grandfather's Mountain, NC, which included the building of the Linn Cove Viaduct, was completed in 1987.

Linn Cove Viaduct

Over the last week, I spent some time traveling along the parkway... once again being reminded of the beauty that is this region. While dodging deer, turkey, rabbits, squirrels and spandex clothed cyclists on my 45 mph journey, my senses were in overdrive as I was in awe once again to behold the majesty of God's creation. We always associate God's proximity to us as being....up. I think the mountains give us a sense of being closer to the One that created them...and us. I'll be back.

John Brown's a-Hanging on a Sour Apple Tree