South Mountains State Park and Linville Falls

Day 2 : Visit South Mountains State Park and Linville Falls

On day 2, our plan was to cover 3 main attractions – South Mountains State Park, Linville Falls and Blue Ridge Parkway. We woke up around 6:30 am, got ready and had breakfast provided by the hotel. We took some pictures around the hotel as the view was scenic.

Then we started our drive to South Mountains State Park at 8:30 am. It was around 1 hour 30 mins drive from the hotel. The route was scenic so we kept taking pull outs to take pictures. There was a beautiful lake on our way displaying fall colors and reflection of the nature around.

We reached the park around 10:30 am and went to the visitor center to collect information.

From there we went to the see the High Shoals Falls. It was a mile long trail from the parking area. Walking through the Hemlock Nature Trail, we took a detour to High Shoals fall loop trail to reach the base of the waterfall. From the base, one has to climb the stairs to reach to a point from where the view of waterfall is much closer and just spectacular.

We started our trail back to the parking area and left from the South Mountain State Park around 12:30 pm. Our next destination, Linville Falls, was around 2 hour 45 minute drive.

It is one of the beautiful waterfalls in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina and is popular because of its accessibility to the Blue Ridge Parkway. We reached there around 3:30 pm. There are several overlooks along the trail.

The trail to upper falls is around 0.4-0.5 mile long. From Upper Falls overlook, one can see the view of twin falls which then flows through a small canyon on its way to the main falls.

Then we moved along the trail and reached next overlook from where we could see the main fall. It drops from a height of 90 feet into the Linville Gorge. The view of both, upper and main waterfall; surrounded by the steep walls of the gorge was spectacular.

Linville Falls (Upper and Main) Overlook

From the main falls, the view of Linville River and gorge was also beautiful.

It was almost 5.30 pm when we finished touring the falls area. We left to visit the Blue Ridge Parkway but unfortunately we could not get the expected views as it was dark. To end the day, we started our drive back to the hotel which was around 1 hour 15 minute from Linville Falls.