Grandfather Mountain!

Today was a day trip to Grandfather Mountain.  The mountain used to be privately owned but sold to the State of North Carolina in 2009 and turned into a State Park.  The Mountain was named Grandfather because it looks like a Grandfather's face laying on his back looking into the sky.

OK, so you have to use a little imagination and you can see it. The scenery along the way was fantastic.  Here are some pictures from the park.

This is a metal suspension bridge that spans one of the gorges.

The park is also an Animal Preserve.  The animals here were hurt and would not have survived in the wild.

These pictures were from inside the museum.

This is Burl from Black Birch.

These pictures were taken along the Blue Ridge Parkway.  Celebrating its 75^th anniversary in 2010, the Blue Ridge Parkway is a product of the New Deal’s efforts to provide jobs to the unemployed of the Great Depression. Construction began in September 1935 at Cumberland Knob near the North Carolina and Virginia state line.

The idea was to create a link between the Shenandoah National Park to the edge of the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. Completed in 1983, the Parkway’s history has been highlighted by documentation Ken Burns in the six-part “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea” series originally aired on PBS.  The Parkway runs for hundreds of miles.  It's theme is "America's Favorite Drive" and I know it's our favorite drive!