These days, you won’t encounter stray chickens in downtown Asheville — just one 10-foot-tall rooster with a proportionately large attitude.
The star of local artist Molly Must’s Chicken Alley mural casts a cool stare on passersby, coaxing them to pause at this side street off Lexington Avenue and wander in. Which is exactly the point: to draw modern city-goers back into the agricultural past of the neighborhood, where a family-run poultry processing plant once ruled the block in the early 1900s. As visible proof of that time disappeared, Must’s chickens pace the alley — strutting, as if boasting what we only partially knew then: They were about to be history.
Find it: Between North Lexington Avenue and Broadway Street in Asheville.
Why does this Haywood County town have some of the cleanest water in the state? It’s the result of the community’s efforts to keep the forests in its watershed pristine.
The spectacular views in North Carolina’s High Country aren’t just inspiration for writers, painters, and sculptors. Those landscapes — the rugged gray face of Grandfather Mountain, the vibrant fall leaves, the deep green meadows — are brushstrokes on Earth’s own canvas.
The sprawling vineyards and wide-open skies that stretch for miles across seven North Carolina counties offer relaxing getaways — not to mention some of the state’s finest wines — for Sunday drivers aching to escape the rush of city life.
Nothing lasts forever — and that’s what makes many of our cherished moments so special.
