Fall Road Trip to Tail of the Dragon, Cherohala, Smoky Mountains (Work in Progress)
Many of us are members of this forum because we share a common passion for our cars. Whether you own one or youre just an enthusiast/fan, I think its safe to say that we all believe that these cars arent just about going from point A to point B, but the fun you have along the way. And the driving experience is always more fun if you have great roads to drive on, where you can really experience and enjoy the dynamics of the car and extract just a little bit more excitement (within the confines of the law, of course).
Unfortunately, I live in South Florida. Im from here, I love it here, Ill likely never leave. But alas, South Florida is as flat as a sheet of paper and its roads are straight and dull. Moreover, for the past several years I have found myself driving less and less. Partly because COVID led to more remote work and less commutes to the office, and partly because my wife and I have a baby daughter and her X3 is the vehicle of choice for any outings. My G82 was delivered in July 2023, and as of the end of October, I had only 5,300 miles on it.
The above circumstances, combined with unhealthy doses of Top Gear/Grand Tour (and a few of the awesome threads on this forum), got me thinking about taking a road trip in the fall. The itinerary would have to fit within my work and family schedule, so the trip couldnt be overly ambitious. By most standards, it would have to be modest. I convinced my father and two of my brothers to join me. He drives a C8 Corvette Stringray Z51 that he took delivery of a couple of months before I got my car. He was enthusiastically in.
We thought that the Smoky/Blue Ridge Mountains were a perfect destination, particularly during this time of the year when the leaves and temperatures are changing. I went over a ton of different options. I did a ton of research and planning, to the point where my wife got VERY jealous and remarked that I never took so much time to plan any of our family vacations. She could tell I was locked in. After several weeks of planning, I came up with a 4 day itinerary that included:
– Tail of the Dragon This road doesnt really need much of a description, I think most of you know it. 11 miles, 318 curves along North Carolina/Tennessee border. Basically a car/motorcycle enthusiast Mecca.
– Cherohala Skyway – 43-mile scenic byway connecting Tennessee and North Carlina, and passing up the mountains along two national forests.
– Newfound Gap Road – A scenic road, overlapping with U.S. Route 441 into and through Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
– Foothills Parkway West – a national parkway which traverses the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains, connecting to historic U.S. Route 129.
The way I organized the routes, wed effectively split these routes up into two days of driving, each day covering about 225 miles or so. The distance was a little bit longer than it could have been, because we chose to set up home base at my friends cabin in Blue Ridge, GA, which is about an hour south of Tail of the Dragon. That’s about as far as we could comfortably drive in one day (about 12-13 hours north of Miami, where I live). There were plenty of other choices which were closer to the area, in places like Gatlinburg, Cherokee, etc.
Im sharing some screenshots from Google Maps of the routes we took, in case anyone is interested in doing the same or similar loop. Also, if anyone from the area has his/her own fun experiences, Id be interested in reading, because I may go back to further explore the area. Sadly, we werent able to get everything done on our itinerary, but it was nonetheless a pretty awesome trip, and I thought it was worth sharing with you.
I’m still going through photos and videos and trying to put some stuf together to share, so I will update this thread as I finish editing. I already have some Tail of the Dragon stuff I can share in next post. I’ll also have some GoPro video etc. that I’ll be able to share once I get it uploaded. In the meantime, here are some photos of the cars.