Enforcement of regulations is a part of the Parkway rangers' job, but
the rangers are eager also to help you enjoy your visit. A copy of the
regulations may be seen in the superintendent's office. The regulations
are for your protection and for the protection of your property--The
Parkway.
While on the Blue Ridge Parkway please remember the following:
Fire is the forest's greatest foe; build fires only in places provided,
and be cautious generally.
Drive carefully. Speed zones are posted. Not all the guard rail has been
built.
The Parkway is for passenger cars. Commercial vehicles may not be used
on it.
Park only in parking areas along the way--not on Parkway shoulders
unless in emergency.
The flowers, the game, the woods, the land, belong to everyone; please
be careful not to damage them.
Address inquiries to: Superintendent, Blue Ridge Parkway, P.O. Box 1710,
Roanoke, Va.
[Illustration: Grandfather Mountain, North Carolina.]
[Illustration: Fox Hunters Paradise Overlook, North Carolina.]
BLUE RIDGE PARKWAY
VIRGINIA--NORTH CAROLINA
Blue Ridge Parkway, high road through Virginia and North Carolina,
designed especially for the leisurely tourist, represents a new
conception in roads. It is not an express parkway of the type built
about the big cities, but a quiet way through a distinctive part of the
American scene--a road intended for gypsy-like travel on the
ride-awhile, stop-awhile basis.
You travel the Southern Highlands, a land of forested mountains,
exquisite during the flower of spring, cool in the green summer,
colorful in the red autumn. The stretches of woodland, the clustered
mountains, and the views out to the lowlands are enlivened by the fields
and pastures of highland farms, where split rail fences, weathered
cabins, and gray barns compose the "hill culture."
Not all is completed of this scenic parkway, the first of its kind to be
developed by the Nation; but long portions are paved and were enjoyed by
more than a million visitors last year.
Among the national parks in the East are Shenandoah, in northern
Virginia, and Great Smoky Mountains, in North Carolina and Tennessee.
One of the purposes of the Parkway is to connect these wilderness areas
over a mountainous distance of nearly 500 miles. The Parkway, about
two-thirds completed, leads through an "elongated park" which protects a
roadside of varied highland character. The roadway slopes are
naturalistically planted in many places with rhododendron, azalea, white
pine, and other native species. Parking overlooks to the side are
convenient balconies. Along the Parkway at intervals are recreational
areas with picnic grounds, campgrounds, trailer sites, and hiking trails
which lead to exhibits of unspoiled nature and to spots of native folk
lore.