Why Skyline Drive is My Favorite American Highway

History Fangirl is turning seven years old in 2022! To make sure all travel guides are up to date, some posts are getting overhauled, which means you may come across posts that are under construction. Note: This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure page for more details.

Skyline Drive is a stunning section of Shenandoah National Park in the middle of Virginia, easily accessible for those driving from Charlottesville to Washington, DC. The drive overlooks the Blue Ridge Mountains and stretches for a little over a hundred miles. This length makes it a short enough to enjoy in the middle of a longer driving day, but long enough that it can be it’s own activity.

My first introduction to Skyline Drive was in 2009, on a friends’ road trip through Virginia Wine Country. At twenty-five, this was right about the time we were all starting to ditch keg parties for events where people referenced their drinks with words like oak and vintage. I was shocked to learn a six-dollar bottle of Yellow Tail even had a vintage. I think we thought we were becoming adults. Seven years later I’m not sure if I’ll ever be one.

Shenandoah was the perfect way to end that weekend and drive back to Washington, DC (where I caught I Chinatown bus back to Philadelphia, the least grown-up form of transportation invented by man. Remind me sometime to tell the story of my last Chinatown Bus ride, circa 2011, and why I promised myself never again). Since then, I’ve gone back twice, most recently time was in January, while I was on my crazy, scatter-shot USA extravaganza.

Here are photographs from my three drives, in three different seasons: winter, summer, and autumn. Spring, I’ll have to come back for you.