Browns Mountain

Not far from Washington, D.C., Shenandoah National Park beckons folk away from the big city with its sylvan hills and scenic motor routes. Covering the bucolic Blue Ridge Mountains, the park is long and thin, centering on the 105-mile Skyline Drive that offers a new vista of valley bottom or distant peak at every turn in the road. The park is rich in history, with notable sites including Rapidan Camp, which was the summer retreat of President Herbert Hoover, and the ruins of a 19th-century resort called Brown’s Mountain that was destroyed by fire in 1909. Waterfalls and lovely backcountry campsites are all ripe for the taking if you’re looking to leave the asphalt and hit the trails instead. For those looking for a more strenuous adventure, the park has over 500 miles of hiking trails. The Appalachian Trail runs through the park, providing hikers with access to some of the most beautiful vistas in the eastern United States. In the fall, the park’s forests burst into a kaleidoscope of colors, making it a popular spot for leaf-peeping.