Beech Mountain Love
The mountains speak. They change almost every minute with the clouds and light, yet they are also stable and true, something solid to count on. They beckon us to explore, to adventure, to journey on. To see from afar and also examine up close…a single tiny mushroom on the forest floor, or a landscape of layered, ombré peaks that makes you feel like you’re living inside a watercolored canvas.
I’ll never tire of gazing at the Blue Ridge Mountains. I love everything about them - the coziness, the infinite shades of green mixed with every shade of blue, dirt and ferns and magical woods, a hiking/walking lifestyle, campfires even in summer, the way you could mistake the mountain range for water at certain times of day.
This August, we spent some time with Steven’s sister’s family (who traveled from Queens, NY) in Beech Mountain, NC, about an hour northeast of Asheville in the high country of North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains. Beech Mountain is at the northwestern tip of North Carolina just over the Tennessee border and is the highest elevation town east of the Rocky Mountains at 5,506 ft!
And ya’ll…it rarely (if ever) gets above 80 degrees there in summer. I can’t even fathom. But now I know what it feels like, even if I just had a small taste.
We usually travel to the Maggie Valley/Waynesville area around Thanksgiving, which is west of Asheville, and we’ve visited other NC mountain towns like Black Mountain, Sylva, and Lake Junaluska, so we already knew we loved that area. Beech Mountain was a totally different experience! Being at such a high elevation and exploring a different part of the NC mountains - in summer - was so special. There’s something very whimsical about the way things are on Beech - it’s casual, funky, wild, artsy. There seem to be wonderful things to do outdoor in every season, and I absolutely fell in love with the vibe.
So many of the rental houses there have balconies because the views are just spectacular. Even if you don’t have a mountain view, most homes look out on the ancient forests and mountain creeks. We always find a place with a kitchen - even a small one - so we can buy groceries and cook all of our meals. We definitely soaked up every possible moment having a drink or eating a meal with a mountain view on the balcony…
My idea of a perfect trip is always a combination of both rest and adventure, and we all definitely wanted to check out some of Beech Mountain’s hiking trails. The first one we chose is the Emerald Outback, which has trails named after The Wizard of Oz. (Sidenote: If you’re an Oz fan, Beech Mountain has a real-life Oz theme park that opens a few times a year, complete with a yellow brick road!)
The Emerald Outback had the cleanest trails, so well-marked, with lots of options for different levels. And it was definitely enchanted - I swear there were gnomes peeking out from behind these trees and grassy glades…
In between swimming and exploring creeks around our rental house, we took one more epic adventure. Here’s the story of the day I scaled a waterfall with my sister-in-law in the Blue Ridge Mountains wilderness…
We selected this hike on Beech Mountain because it was less than a mile and went along a creek. Sounds perfect, right? We started off, and along the way, there was a stunning rushing creek, paths covered in gnarly tree roots, and the cutest mushrooms ever. Thanks to the Seek app by iNaturalist, I was able to ID almost all of the mushrooms. So fascinating! Steven even found some chanterelles, which are totally edible and prized, but by the time we got back to our car, they were too wilted to be edible. Haha.
The best part? When we made it to the end of the trail with 3 adults (me, Steven, and his sister) and kids ages 12, 9, 8, and 7 (all girl cousins, the youngest of whom was wearing a princess dress and Saltwater sandals) and then realized we had to hike the entire trail again to get back to our car. 😬
Turns out this hike was only about 1.5 miles total but took 2.5 hours with a 500 ft elevation change. And guess which way the elevation went on the way back?
Not gonna lie, I was a little nervous about the fact that we had only like 2 gulps of water left, but at least it was cooler and shaded! NOTE: next time, read the trail map FIRST. 🤦🏻♀️
But we made it! Not without a lot of pep talks, one bloody knee, one butt bruise, and one 7-year old cheering us on saying, “We can DO this!” SO proud of these cousins for pushing through!
“Adventures we share - especially the ones that are scary in the best possible ways - are permanently seared into our memories, glowing, conveniently allowing the actual scary parts to fade away with time, because we went through something together. We took a risk, faced an unknown, made a discovery. We did something crazy and lived to tell the tale. Let’s do more of this…”
I still believe it. Because what did we all say was one of our favorite things we did in North Carolina?
THIS CRAZY HIKE.
After we checked out of our rental house, we still didn’t want to leave Beech, so our last few hours were spent enjoying the cool mountain morning air before we headed back down the mountain to 80s and hot weather. We found this delightful butterfly garden that was so inspiring for what we’d love to create here on the farm for people (and our family!) to walk through, slow down, and enjoy the beauty of perennial plants that get better each season.
Beech Mountain, you have my 💚! Can’t wait to return…
“When I am fully alive I look around me with eyes that are open, astonished, and ears that are attentive, and as a result I experience all of life as a gift.”
