The mountain brewery trail: great beer beyond Asheville

Beyond Beer City

Asheville's own breweries deserve their own day. This trail is about the mountain towns around it — where a brewery is often the best seat in town and the drive between them is half the fun. Always have a sober driver; these are country roads.

The trail, town by town

• Mills River — Sierra Nevada. The East Coast home of Sierra Nevada is a destination in itself: riverfront patios, brewery tours, and a full kitchen. sierranevada.com
• Brevard — Oskar Blues. The brewery that helped put craft beer in cans, with a taproom and music near the Pisgah trailheads.
• Hendersonville — Sanctuary Brewing and neighbors. A walkable downtown beer scene a few blocks off Main Street.
• Waynesville — Frog Level and Boojum. Frog Level's deck hangs over the creek; Boojum is the big mountain-town taproom with a full kitchen.
• Sylva — Innovation and Balsam Falls. Part of Sylva's famous four-breweries-on-one-street run.
• Boone & the High Country — Booneshine and Lost Province. Punchy IPAs and wood-fired pizza up near App State.
• Worth the detour — Fonta Flora (Nebo) and Lazy Hiker (Franklin). A farm-driven rural brewery near Lake James, and an Appalachian-Trail-town favorite to the southwest.

Make it a loop

The Brevard–Hendersonville–Mills River triangle is an easy southern loop; Waynesville–Sylva pairs naturally with a Smokies day to the west. A good regional starting point is VisitNC.com.