Oh! Now I can hardly wait to be there!!! Such a pleasure to read these posts, thank you so much! Spaw, you make it sound irresitable! Want to see that Skyline drive, and Cherokee, Blowing Rock, Clingman's Dome ... not sure if we'll have enough time but I've copied all the posts above. Digging out my maps to find/circle the places mentioned so I can plan a route. I love hiking and mountains and especially waterfalls ...

and its very helpful to know in advance about the hazards of speeding on this stretch of road. My son will be doing most of the driving, at 27 he still has a bit of a heavy foot so I'll warn him, thanks much, Rapaire! What's the point of speeding anyway, in a gorgeous place like this - just miss out on everything that way

Royston, thanks for the link to your Flickr pages -- awesome work! I've bookmarked it, will be back later, thanks again everyone