The Great Smoky Mountains were beautiful with changing leaves as we dropped into North Carolina. I had been in this area once before and saved a few things for a return trip with KR. One of them was the Biltmore in Asheville. The Biltmore is aptly named. It certainly couldn't have been named the
Biltless. It is dubbed as the largest home in America. If you can't get
all of it in one picture with a large lens from several hundred yards
away - that IS a large home. It has 250 rooms, with 35 bedrooms and 43
baths. If that piques your interest, a lot has been written about the
house and I am sure you will find it interesting. The big piece of grass
is the front lawn. The view from the back porch is to die for. The
current estate contains 8,000 acres and has 75 of those in formal
gardens. We toured the house, but they don't allow you to take pictures.
The place is quite incredible. One of my favorite films is "The Last of the Mohicans" (the edited
version, of course). The last 17 minutes of the movie were filmed in
Chimney Rock State Park, just down the road from Asheville. Coming back
here and seeing this park has been on my list of things to do for ages -
so we did it! You drive up to the visitor center with Chimney Rock
looming over it. Then you take an elevator carved into the rock up to a
path that leads you to the viewpoint. It was crowded, but well worth the
visit. The rock faces that are so impressive in the movie, run along
the hills for miles. We also took a hike to Hickory Nut Falls. It was
good to get out of the car and stretch our legs. We did a great job of keeping up with what might have looked like an
impossible schedule. Our itinerary for the 25th had one more item on it
and it was getting dark as we left Chimney Rock. So we raced in
the fading light to Flat Rock (the name of the town) to see the Carl
Sandberg NHS. Fortunately, most of the exhibit was outside with lights.
The picture was taken with a flash - it was actually pitch dark outside
with a rising moon! We got a nice room just south of Flat Rock for the night.
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