Every fall, visitors seeking out fall colors throng to hot spots like the Green Mountains of Vermont, the White Mountains of New Hampshire and the Berkshires in Massachusetts.
But North America is vast and rich in forests, so why does New England get so much love?
According to Prof. William Keeton, a forest ecosystem scientist at the University of Vermont, the region’s diverse array of trees — including beech, birch, maple and oak — produces a wide variety of colors when the leaves begin to change. Add to this, Dr. Keeton said, a mix of elevations, as well as slopes that face in different directions, producing climate variation, and you have a wide range of colors and stages of revealing.
OK, sure, New England is beautiful, but stunning autumn colors don’t belong to any one region: Picture the deep orange dogwood trees of the Pacific Northwest, the golden shimmer of the aspens in Colorado and the rusty red of swamp chestnut oak in West Virginia. Here are seven places beyond New England where you can get an eyeful.
West Virginia
New River Gorge National Park
The New River Gorge National Park & Preserve in southern West Virginia offers more than 70,000 acres of public lands that burst into shades of red, orange and yellow during its peak autumn foliage, between mid-October and early November.
Fayetteville, a small town just outside the park, offers plenty of dining and lodging and a downtown rich in Civil War history, where walking tours explore local historical sites. If you’re up for an adventure, try white-water rafting on the nearby Gauley River or gawk at colorful mountain ridges from about 200 feet in the air while zooming down a zip line.
Scenic roads wind about 83 miles around the park, offering scenic views of forest, gorge and river. Along the way, catch a view of the 876-foot-high New River Gorge Bridge, one of the longest single-arch bridges in the Western Hemisphere.
And of course, there are plenty of trails that reward hikers with scenic views and cascades like Glade Creek Falls.
Arkansas
Fayetteville
You’ll want a mountain bike to fully experience the fall splendor of this corner of the Ozarks. Fayetteville is a small city with plenty of cycling trails, art galleries, restaurants and the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks, a 44-acre site where you’ll find bats, butterflies and beehives.
As the air gets chilly and hues of burnt orange and splashes of yellow and red stretch across the hills and plateaus of the Ozarks from mid-October to early November, what could feel more peak fall than pumpkin patches, corn mazes and hay rides? If you’re in Fayetteville between Sept. 14 and Nov. 3, you can find all of these activities at Rivercrest Orchard’s fall festival.
Southeast of Fayetteville, the 19-mile Pig Trail Scenic Byway through the Ozark National Forest, popular with motorcycle riders, squiggles through a leafy canopy between scenic overlooks. And about 30 miles south of the city, hop on your mountain bike and explore rock formations, caverns and an eight-acre lake in Devil’s Den State Park.
Quebec
Bas-St.-Laurent
The sweep of autumn colors in this picturesque region sandwiched between the northern tip of Maine and the St. Lawrence River begins in Témiscouata — a lush area of forests, lakes and national parks — in mid-September and peaks through the end of October.
Around Témiscouata, you’ll find plenty of hiking trails and a scenic route that meanders through the Notre Dame Mountains, offering vistas of placid Lake Témiscouata.
In Parc National du Lac-Témiscouata, the wildlife rivals the colors. Catch a glimpse of some of the more than 150 species of birds that inhabit the area, including bald eagles, which you might see soaring over one of the lakes.
From Sept. 20 to 22, the Kamouraska Forest Mushroom Festival, in the riverside town of Kamouraska, celebrates “mycotourism” with a wide selection of mushroom dishes. (September is Mushroom Month in the region.)
Have a sip of the local harvest as you savor the fall colors. At Vignoble Amouraska, a winery in St.-Alexandre-de-Kamouraska, you can try fruit wines made with pear, raspberry or black currant, as well as classic reds and whites.
Oregon
McKenzie Pass-Santiam Pass Scenic Byway
Oregon’s state tree, the Douglas fir, provides an evergreen backdrop for the leafy splashes of red, orange and yellow along the 82-mile McKenzie Pass-Santiam Pass Scenic Byway, a loop in the Cascade mountains between the cities of Eugene and Bend. Colors peak around mid-October.
Cyclists can ride the McKenzie Pass Scenic Bikeway, a roughly 36-mile stretch along Highway 242 that traces a wagon route from the 1860s.
For a truly unexpected sight, visit the Dee Wright Observatory, on Highway 242 near the summit of McKenzie Pass, which offers 65 square miles’ worth of panoramic views of moonlike black lava rock — NASA conducted drills here in the 1960s to prepare astronauts for lunar travel. Also along Highway 242, Proxy Falls Trail will take you to a 226-foot mossy cascade that seems to disappear at its base as the water sinks through porous lava rock. (The highway over McKenzie Pass is typically closed from November to mid-June.)
Pennsylvania
New Hope
On the banks of the Delaware River, about an hour’s drive north of Philadelphia, New Hope, Pa., is packed with antique shops, historic buildings and museums. The town, which hosts the Bucks County Playhouse, is a theater hot spot as well as a popular L.G.B.T.Q. destination.
In surrounding Bucks County, you can drive though red- and gold-dappled groves to more than 50 covered bridges. If you’d rather take the train, the New Hope Railroad carries passengers in restored 1920s vintage passenger coaches on a roughly two-hour train ride through the autumn splendor, which peaks in mid-October. As the train traces the historical Reading Railroad’s New Hope Branch route to the town of Buckingham and back, a guide recounts the rich history of the area.
Colorado
Kebler Pass
Robert Frost once wrote that nothing gold can stay. But gold can certainly return year after year — spectacularly so, in the case of Kebler Pass in Colorado.
The route, about a three-hour drive south of Aspen, is a gravel road that reaches over 10,000 feet above sea level at some points, connecting the towns of Crested Butte and Paonia as it passes through the Gunnison National Forest.
Beginning in mid-September, one of the largest aspen groves in the country becomes a blanket of bright yellow and deep orange. Driving across the pass, which winds through rugged peaks and aspen and evergreen forests, takes about two hours. (The road is typically closed from November to May.)
If you’re up for a hike, the moderately difficult Three Lakes trail meanders through aspens and meadows and past alpine lakes as it nears timberline, offering views of the Ruby Range and jagged Marcellina Mountain. Camping is available at the nearby Lost Lake Campground.
Michigan
Tahquamenon Falls State Park
Expect shades of deep crimson, bright orange and yellow to go with the roaring waters in the 50,000-acre Tahquamenon Falls State Park, in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.
Upper Tahquamenon Falls, at 50 feet high, is the largest waterfall in Michigan, and it offers multiple viewing areas via a paved trail. Just several miles east, at the Lower Falls, visitors can follow a boardwalk through coniferous forest to viewing platforms. Keep an eye out for moose among those kaleidoscopic leaves, which change from mid-September through mid-October.
Finally, just north of the nearby town of Newberry, check out the Tahquamenon Logging Museum, which celebrates the area’s logging history, dating back the 1880s. All this touring might make you hungry for a hearty, lumberjack-worthy breakfast at a local diner.
Once you’ve had your fill, take a swig of warm coffee, pop your collar or tighten your scarf against the brisk breeze, and listen to the wind whisper through the red, gold and brown leaves.
Ah, just like fall in New England.
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