NC Heintooga Ridge Road
Motorcyclist Map
Route Filter: Backroads
View In Google Maps: https://maps.google.com/?q=35.55077690512,-83.1655773650012
You Tube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECu-97gglFk
Description: To take a road less traveled, drive to Balsam Mountain via the Heintooga Ridge Road that starts at the Blue Ridge Parkway at Milepost 458.2, just 11 miles from the south end of the Parkway. (Not to be confused with Black Balsam Knob, 38 miles north on the Parkway.) For the first four miles of this paved, two-lane road, you are still in the Blue Ridge Parkway National Park boundaries, complete with some nice high-elevation overlooks looking down on the mountain ridges. Then you enter the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and continue another five miles to the end of the paved section. Here you will find a picnic area and the beautiful Heintooga Overlook. The one-lane unpaved Heintooga Round Bottom Road begins there. Heintooga Ridge and Balsam Mountain Roads are usually open from late May through October.