For two and a half months I had been working on building my van into a camper. When I got the van in mid July I was working two jobs and would spend all my free time working on the van. I had given myself a deadline of October to finish the van and leave for a trip. I was working on the van up until the day before we left.
I went on this trip with my girlfriend Brooke (https://uproutelifestyle.com/). We left for the trip from her house in South Carolina and drove five and a half hours to our first campsite outside of Highlands NC. When we got near the site we lost service and started to get lost on the National Forest roads. After driving for what felt like forever through dirt roads and after almost getting stuck we finally found a site we could set up at for the night. The next day we started with hiking in the national forest around our site and then headed towards Highlands to explore the town and to visit some waterfalls. We spent some time in town so Brooke could do some school work. After we were done in town we drove up Route 64 towards Bridal Veil Falls, Dry Falls, and Bust Your Butt Falls. Bridal Veil Falls you can see from the road and you can walk underneath. A little further down the road is Dry Falls. To reach Dry Falls you have to walk down many flights of stairs and you can also go underneath the 80 foot falls. Bust Your Butt Falls was the last one when we went to this day. This fall is visible from the road and you can also get in the water. This was the smallest of the three falls. After visiting the falls we headed back towards the forest and camped at Ammons Branch Campground for the next few nights.
We stayed in Highlands for three nights before we headed east. We stopped at Whitewater Falls which is 411 foot tall and has two look out points. After Whitewater Falls we drove to Toxaway Falls on Lake Toxaway. This fall is very unique but you can only see the falls from on top of the bridge. If you didn’t know it was there it would be very easy to miss it while driving.
Once we were trying to leave the falls our van wouldn’t start. A tow truck driver saw us and pulled over, we tried to jump start the van but no luck. We ended up getting towed to Hendersonville where we got the van looked at by a mechanic. The issue ended up being a not good connection to the battery.
That night we wanted to stay in town just in case there were more issues with the van starting. We stayed the night at the Walmart in Hendersonville. The next day we went up to the Blue Ridge Parkway and stopped at many of the overlooks. We also went to Fryingpan Mountain Lookout Tower, Sliding rock, and Looking Glass Falls. That night we stayed at the Walmart in Brevard.
The next day we drove two hours to Lake Santeetlah near Robbinsville. We stayed at dispersed campsites along the lake. This was by far the best place we stayed, however we couldn’t get the van down to the site. We parked the van on the side of the road and could walk down to the site and lake. Here we could swim in the lake and use the rope swing that was there. The water however was very cold this time of year. We also made a trip over to Bryson City to visit the Road to Nowhere Tunnel.
We spent a few days here before we headed up to Cades Cove in Tennessee. On the drive up to Cades Cove we drove the Tail of The Dragon and Foothills Parkway. Cades Cove is an 11 mile one way loop with views of the mountains, fields, and historic structures. While there we were able to see horses and two bears. After completing the loop we headed to Sevierville to sleep at the Walmart.
The next morning we drove back to Lake Santeetlah in North Carolina. This was our favorite campsite so we wanted to stay there again. Along the way we passed through Cherokee and made a stop at the local skatepark. We spent a couple more days at Lake Santeetlah just relaxing and doing a little bit of fishing. We were nearing the end of our trip and would have a long drive back home so we broke the drive up by staying another night in Hendersonville. On the drive we went back onto the Blue Ridge Parkway and then to the skatepark in Hendersonville. We spent that night at the same Walmart as before.
