THE SAN JUAN SKYWAY

TIME | Six to seven hours of driving, best done in two to three days PARK | Mesa Verde National Park, (970) 5294465

START THIS LOOP DRIVE

in the Wild West town of Durango. Heading west you’ll pass Mesa Verde National Park, famous for its ancient Native American cliff dwellings. Traveling north through the San Juan National Forest, you’ll follow the Dolores River before hitting Lizard Head Pass, with views of several 13,000- and 14,000-foot peaks, and entering the Uncompahgre National Forest. Explore the silver mining town of Telluride (where Butch Cassidy robbed his first bank in 1889) before looping up to Ridgway and then south to the Victorian town of Ouray. Take the “Million Dollar Highway” (named for the gold dust supposedly in the fill dirt used to build the road in the late 1800s) to Silverton. Then it parallels the tracks of the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, eventually bringing you back to Durango.

AMERICA’S LONGEST LINEAR PARK (yes, the parkway is a park) connects Great Smoky Mountains National Park (near Cherokee, N.C.) with Shenandoah National Park (near Waynesboro, Va). The speed limit tops out at 45 mph, so prepare for a leisurely trip. “The parkway was designed so you could drive awhile and then stop for an experience—like an exhibit or a hike,” says Leesa Brandon, the parkway’s public information officer.

Cultural highlights include the Folk Art Center near Asheville, N.C. (where you can buy fine Appalachian crafts), the $10 million Linn Cove Viaduct (a 1,243-foot cantilevered concrete bridge around Grandfather Mountain) and the Blue Ridge Music Center (where you can catch a mountain music concert featuring blistering banjos and feisty fiddles) near Galax, Va.