Meet the MULES

Possibly 13.5 of the easiest miles you’ll find in the Smokies. This lollipop loop heads up Deep Creek, the first mile or so of which is popular with tubers (not...

The Cataloochee Valley sits isolated on the northeast end of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, its flat valley floor encircled by ridgeline that gives the feel of an old-time...

This popular 14-mile hike, more frequently done as a two-day backpack trip, is one of the best hikes in the state (to be geopolitically correct, it dribbles over into Tennessee)....

The beauty of this hike is that it escapes the maddening crowds of Mount Mitchell State Park, yet embraces the 6,000-foot hiking that makes the Black Mountains special. From the...

Oyster Point The Oyster Point Campground provides the perfect base camp for exploring the 20-mile Neusiok Trail, which runs from near the campground north to the Pine Cliff Recreation Area....

The park has two lakes, one 20 acres, one 12, good for bass, bream and catfish. And, every winter the lakes are stocked with trout. The park also has six...

You’re the anal type: you like the idea of getting away for a weekend escape, but you just don’t feel good about being completely detached from work. We’re not crazy...

How do you keep an 18,000-acre state park secret — so secret it doesn’t even show up on Google Maps? Hiding it in a surprisingly open area south of Morganton...

There are several winter camping options at New River State Park, a linear park following its namesake river and known for one thing: paddling. The Wagoner Road Access has 10...

Technically, yes, it’s a horse camp. But if they don’t mind, should you? Not once you see the 15-mile trail network that includes a pair of 7.5-mile loops. One climbs...

If ever there was an area set up to accommodate the avid camper, it’s Hot Springs. Located on the Appalachian Trail — the AT runs along a sidewalk through the...

The trails in this section of the Pisgah District of the Pisgah National Forest are open to hiking, mountain biking and horseback riding. From here, you can hike up to...

There’s primitive camping galore in the Fires Creek Recreation Area, particularly along the trail leading up to the rim and along the 25-mile rim itself. Which brings us to the...

Perhaps you’ve been driving down a gravel road in one of our four fine National Forests — Croatan, Uwharrie, Pisgah, and in the case of Ammons Branch, Nantahala — and...

Located on the southern shores of Lake Joacassee, this would seem the ideal winter getaway for paddlers interested in exploring the the lake’s many fingers. And it is — for...

The Big Ivy Area — “big ivy” is what the locals call mountain laurel — is one of those areas you may have scoped out on a map — the...

Looking for a cheap mountain getaway this winter? Highlands and Panthertown Valley are not much more than 10 miles from the roadside campsites along Blue Valley Road. Primitive, yes, but...

Johnny Malloy, in his “The Best in Tent Camping: The Carolinas” (see below), writes evocatively of this primitive escape on the edge of the Ellicott Rock Wilderness: “The Chattooga runs...