Roan Mountain - Gardens????

OK, every good vacation has to have one big mistake...right? Well, this was ours. We had this wonderful brochure advertising the gorgeous Rhododendron Gardens at the top of Roan Mountain. It said peak blooming time was the 3rd week in June. We were close (end of May) and there were these flowers in bloom everywhere we'd been in the mountains. So, we asked and found out it was about a 30 minute drive so we decided to give it a whirl...not a good idea.

We found our own way there using a map we had in the car (there was no "easy" way unfortunately). It took at LEAST an hour to get there. Turns out Roan Mountain is pretty high up and it was COLD there...and the flowers were not anywhere near ready to bloom! OOPS!

I was disappointed because I wanted to see the flowers but Matt and Spencer seemed to kind of enjoy themselves. I think Spencer was excited just to be able to run around and stretch his legs. Matt liked the look of the spooky gardens. They honestly looked like something out of a scary kids storybook - like where a witch would live or something. These pictures don't even do them justice because it was much darker in real life. Plus, you could have easily gotten lost! The pictures aren't much to look at but I had to take them so I could tell this story.