9 Most Welcoming Towns In The Southern United States' Countryside

Nine countryside towns across the American South make a real effort to welcome strangers. Highlands and Blowing Rock keep their porch lights on in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Hendersonville and Blue Ridge run their orchards and vineyards open year-round. Eureka Springs has been receiving guests in Victorian boarding houses since the 1880s. Jonesborough hosts the National Storytelling Festival every October and treats it as a town-wide reunion. The nine towns ahead each carry their own kind of Southern welcome.

Highlands, North Carolina

Highlands sits on a 4,118-foot plateau in the Blue Ridge Mountains, one of the highest incorporated towns east of the Mississippi River. The elevation keeps summers cooler than just about anywhere else in the South, and the waterfalls draw visitors year-round. Dry Falls, just outside town on the Cullasaja River, is the easy crowd-pleaser. A short paved path leads behind the 75-foot waterfall so you can stand under the rock overhang and look out through the curtain of water.

Glen Falls is the more rewarding hike, a two-mile round trip with three viewing platforms looking out at the triple-tiered waterfall. The Jackson Hole Gem Mine lets visitors sift through buckets of mineral-rich dirt for garnet, ruby, sapphire, and amethyst, with staff on hand to help identify finds. For a slower afternoon, The Bascom: A Center for the Visual Arts occupies a six-acre campus with rotating exhibitions of regional artists, ongoing art classes, and a gift shop stocked with locally made work.

Abingdon, Virginia

Abingdon sits in the Blue Ridge Highlands of southwest Virginia, where tree-lined streets and friendly locals set the tone. The town is the trailhead for the Virginia Creeper Trail, a 34-mile rail-to-trail path winding south through the mountains to Damascus. Abingdon sits at the elevated end of the trail, which means a downhill ride most of the way for cyclists. Hikers, horseback riders, and runners use the trail too.

Downtown, the Southwest Virginia Cultural Center & Marketplace showcases regional music, arts, and crafts in a restored building on East Main Street. The William King Museum of Art occupies a former school building up the hill and runs rotating contemporary exhibitions alongside its permanent collection. On Saturday mornings from April through October, the Abingdon Farmers Market pulls regional growers and food producers downtown with vegetables, baked goods, meats, cheeses, and flowers from farms across the highlands.

Blowing Rock, North Carolina

Blowing Rock sits along the Blue Ridge Parkway with a walkable downtown of historic stone and brick storefronts. The Town Tavern on Main Street is a local favorite, with a tree-shaded patio, comfort food, cocktails, and live music several nights a week. A few steps away, the Blowing Rock Art & History Museum runs rotating exhibitions of regional artists and permanent collections covering the area's mountain heritage.

The Blowing Rock itself, just south of town, is the natural landmark that gave the town its name. The cliff sits 4,000 feet above sea level and overhangs the Johns River Gorge 3,000 feet below. The shape of the gorge funnels wind upward over the rock so light objects thrown over the edge come right back. North Carolina's oldest tourist attraction has been welcoming visitors since 1933. The Glen Burney Trail is a tougher option, a 1.6-mile out-and-back hike through rocky terrain to a series of waterfalls along the New Years Creek.

Madison, Georgia

Madison sits in Georgia's Piedmont region with a downtown of antebellum and Victorian buildings, much of it spared during Sherman's March to the Sea in 1864. The streets are walkable and shaded, with shops, restaurants, and historic homes filling the National Register district. Town 220 Restaurant is the spot for an unhurried meal, serving French-Southern fare in an elegant downtown space with attentive service. The Madison Flea Market is the regional draw for antique and vintage shoppers, with collectibles, home goods, and oddities filling the booths.

The Georgia Safari Conservation Park is the unexpected highlight. The 530-acre safari park west of town houses bison, antelope, zebra, emu, kudu, and other species from around the world. Guests ride open-sided safari trucks through the property and can book an overnight stay in a tented camp with savanna views. For history, the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center occupies an 1895 Romanesque Revival school building on South Main Street with a regional history museum, rotating art exhibitions, an arts and crafts gallery, and a restored 1895 schoolroom.

Hendersonville, North Carolina

Hendersonville is the apple capital of North Carolina, with orchards, vineyards, and farms filling the rolling foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Grandad's Apples opens for the season in late September with apple and pumpkin picking, cider donuts hot out of the fryer, apple pies, and the kind of barn-side activities that make a long Saturday with kids easy. J&M's Farm runs year-round and adds weekly live music, a rotating food truck, baked goods, local beer and wine, and handmade goods alongside its seasonal apple picking.

Burntshirt Vineyards is the award-winning local winery, where mountain and vineyard views frame the tasting room and farm-to-table dining room. Tastings, vineyard tours, and live music run on a regular calendar. Back downtown, the historic Main Street has been brick-paved and lined with locally owned shops, galleries, and restaurants. Brooks Tavern is a reliable downtown stop for comfort food and craft cocktails in a relaxed setting.

Blue Ridge, Georgia

Blue Ridge sits in the southernmost reaches of the Appalachian Mountains with a population of around 1,250. The Blue Ridge Scenic Railway is the marquee attraction, running 26-mile round trips through the surrounding mountains alongside the Toccoa River. Each season changes the view (spring wildflowers, summer green, autumn color, winter bare branches), and the open-air cars give the best look.

Mercier Orchards has been a family-run apple farm since 1943 and now spans 300 acres with apple picking, cider tasting, baked goods, candies, and seasonal fresh fruit and vegetables. Bear Claw Vineyards & Winery rounds out the unwinding options with regional wines, weekend live music, lawn games, and views over the vineyards. For water, Lake Blue Ridge Marina sits just outside town and rents pontoons, kayaks, and canoes on one of Georgia's clearer lakes.

Eureka Springs, Arkansas

Eureka Springs has been welcoming visitors since the 1880s, when word of the spring waters' healing reputation brought boarding houses, hotels, and Victorian storefronts up the steep hillsides of the Ozarks. The whole downtown is on the National Register of Historic Places, and Spring Street still winds past the original 19th-century buildings. The Palace Hotel & Bath House dates to 1901 and is one of the few remaining Victorian-era bathhouses in the area, still open for spa treatments and overnight stays.

Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge is one of the largest big cat sanctuaries in the United States, home to more than 400 rescued tigers, lions, leopards, and bears across more than 450 acres outside town. Lake Leatherwood City Park covers 1,600 acres of trails (more than 25 miles total) around the 85-acre spring-fed lake, with boating, fishing, and swimming. The Thorncrown Chapel, a glass-walled wooden chapel built into the woods on a hillside outside town, has won architectural awards since it opened in 1980.

Jonesborough, Tennessee

Jonesborough is Tennessee's oldest town, founded in 1779, seventeen years before Tennessee became a state. Something is almost always happening on Main Street. Music on the Square is the free Friday night summer concert series running May through September, with bluegrass, rock, jazz, and other genres on a rotating bill. Every October, the National Storytelling Festival fills downtown for the first full weekend of the month. The event is hosted by the International Storytelling Center and brings storytellers from around the world to share oral traditions with thousands of listeners.

The Chester Inn on West Main Street is the oldest commercial building in town, built in 1797 by Dr. William P. Chester. Presidents Andrew Jackson, James K. Polk, and Andrew Johnson all stayed there during their travels. It now operates as a state historic site and museum chronicling Jonesborough's history from its founding to the present. Fender's Farm just outside town runs pumpkin picking, hayrides, zip lines, and a corn maze during fall harvest season.

Harrodsburg, Kentucky

Harrodsburg sits in Kentucky's Bluegrass region surrounded by rolling hills and horse farms. The town was founded in 1774 by James Harrod, making it the oldest permanent settlement west of the Allegheny Mountains. Old Fort Harrod State Park preserves a 1927 full-scale replica of the original fort. The grounds include log cabins with reconstructed pioneer-era furnishings, the George Rogers Clark Federal Monument, the Lincoln Marriage Temple (which holds the cabin where Abraham Lincoln's parents were married), and the oldest cemetery west of the Alleghenies. A gift shop sells souvenirs, and the grounds work well for picnicking and birdwatching.

Anderson Dean Community Park covers more than 100 acres with sports fields, a 1.2-mile walking trail, a fishing pond, and a community pool. Rags to Riches Antique Center & Flea Mall has a wide-ranging selection of collectibles and vintage finds in a large downtown space. For a working-farm experience, Big Red Stables offers gentle horseback rides through fields of grazing cattle and Bluegrass scenery.

Southern Towns That Mean It

The Southern welcome is real in these nine towns, and not in a tourist-brochure sense. Eureka Springs has been putting up visitors since the 1880s. Jonesborough turns its biggest event of the year into a town-wide reunion every October. Highlands keeps a porch light on at every guesthouse in town. Blue Ridge and Hendersonville run their orchards and vineyards open year-round. These are working towns where people still know their neighbors and treat newcomers like one of them. Pick any one of these and you'll come back with stories.