NC Mountains Fall Color Report October 29, 2013

Time for color to come out at our elevation

Late October brings us to Week 5 of our Fall Color Reports for the North Carolina Mountains near Black Mountain, Asheville and Old Fort. Finally! Mother Nature has turned up the color at our elevation of 2,300 feet inside Pisgah National Forest, three miles east of Black Mountain.

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Discounted Biltmore Tickets and 2013 Candlelight Christmas Evening Upgrades

While we’re not quite ready to break out our Christmas decorations and sing carols, we’re definitely looking forward to 2013 Christmas at Biltmore beginning November 2, because, well, they’ve known how to do a spectacular Christmas celebration ever since George Washington Vanderbilt opened his Asheville home to family and friends on Christmas Eve of 1895.

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Loaning with Kiva to Kosovo

As our blog readers know, we participate in pooling our money with other lenders around the world to fund microloans through Kiva to small business owners. Typically, these small business owners live in underprivileged areas but are trying to make a go at their businesses and lift themselves, their families and their communities out of poverty.

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David Holt Performs in Old Fort on October 26, 2013

Exciting news: Four-time Grammy award winner David Holt will be performing in a special live concert, along with Will McIntyre, on Saturday, October 26, 2013, in Old Fort, NC, at the Old Fort Elementary School. Tickets are just $10, with proceeds benefiting the Mountain Gateway Museum and Heritage Center.

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NC Mountains Fall Color Report October 15, 2013

The road past the south lawn at the Inn on Mill Creek B&B

It’s week three of our fall color reports for the North Carolina mountains and fall’s colors are starting to reach our elevation at 2,300 feet near Black Mountain and Asheville! As color descends from elevations above 4,000 feet, this is the week for yellow hues, as birch, beech, hickory, some sassafras, white ash and more start lighting up the ridges near the Inn. In addition to the golds, the reds of sourwoods, dogwoods and sweetgums provide a nice accent.

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Folk Art Center and Pisgah Inn Reopen

The Folk Art Center off the Blue Ridge Parkway in Asheville

The Asheville, North Carolina, area was hit with some hard news earlier this month when the Folk Art Center and the Pisgah Inn and Restaurant both closed as a result of the federal government shutdown. Both are located along the Blue Ridge Parkway, and are popular places for our guests and other visitors to see, especially during the beautiful fall season. The Pisgah Inn’s restaurant serves a fantastic lunch and dinner and is the perfect stop when traveling south on the Parkway to see fall foliage and hike at Mt. Pisgah and Graveyard Fields, while the Folk Art Center is a great destination for viewing regional art and craftwork while traveling the Parkway north toward the fall colors and hiking trails around Craggy Gardens and Mt. Mitchell State Park.

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NC Mountains Fall Color Report October 8, 2013

It’s Week 2 of our fall color reports for the North Carolina mountains around the Inn on Mill Creek Bed & Breakfast. While Black Mountain, Asheville and our neck of the woods at 2,300 feet above sea level are starting to show signs of color, the peaks above 4,000 feet are decked out in velvety golds, oranges and reds as beech, birch, maple, sassafras, sweetgum, dogwood and more light up with color.

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NC Mountains Fall Color Report October 1, 2013

Welcome to the beginning of our fall color reports for 2013! Each Tuesday for the next six weeks, we’ll be sharing updates on fall foliage in the North Carolina mountains, namely, what trees are changing and where you can see fall color each week. Sometimes the fall color season stretches to the second week of November, and if it does this year, we’ll do a bonus Week 7.

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