5 Must-Visit Fall Foliage Road Trip Stops
Five routes worth the extra tank of gas
A good foliage road trip isn’t really about the destination, it’s about what you drive through to get there. These five routes turn the drive itself into the main event, no leaf-peeping town required.
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1. Kancamagus Highway, New Hampshire
A 34.5-mile stretch through the White Mountain National Forest with pull-offs at Sabbaday Falls and the Hancock and Kancamagus overlooks. Peak color usually hits late September into early October, among the earliest windows on this list.
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2. Skyline Drive, Shenandoah National Park, Virginia
105 miles along the ridge of the Blue Ridge Mountains with 75 overlooks to pick from, most of them a short pull-off from the road itself. Mid-to-late October is the sweet spot here, with the Shenandoah Valley spread out on one side the whole way.
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3. Tunnel of Trees (M-119), Northern Michigan
A narrow, twisting 20 miles between Harbor Springs and Cross Village along Lake Michigan’s shoreline, with the canopy closing overhead for most of the drive. Early-to-mid October usually lines up with peak color here.
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4. Columbia River Gorge, Oregon
The Historic Columbia River Highway winds past waterfalls (Multnomah Falls is the big one) with cottonwoods and big-leaf maples turning gold against the basalt cliffs. Late October tends to be the peak here, later than most of the rest of the list.
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5. Hocking Hills Scenic Byway, Ohio
A loop through sandstone gorges, Old Man’s Cave, and Ash Cave, with hardwood forest turning color around the rock formations. Mid-October is usually the window, and it’s an easy day trip rather than a multi-day haul.
A road trip like this has a way of turning into more cargo than the trunk planned on, the extra layers, the cider mill haul, the box of apples you swore you’d eat on the drive home. If this loop bookends a flight, ship the extra ahead or back instead of wedging it into the trunk for the return leg.
And when you’re ready to skip the stress for real, ship your bags with LugLess. No hauling, no baggage claim, no waiting around, just your stuff, already there when you are.