Majestic mountains. Historic waters.

The French Broad is the longest river in Western North Carolina and one of the oldest in the world, and it’s one of the few rivers that has the unique distinction of running north. Its banks were first settled by the Cherokee Indians, who developed a footpath across this mountain land through what is now French Broad Crossing.

More than 200 years later – after visits from explorers including Hernando de Soto – the nation’s first government granted the surrounding land to veterans of the Revolutionary War. Immigrants from Scotland and Ireland settled here, and the Cherokees’ path eventually became the famed Buncombe Turnpike, a major west-to-east route for livestock drovers and other traders that came through the mountain land of French Broad Crossing and Asheville, NC.

All of these individuals cherished this WNC land for its rugged elegance and rich diversity of flora and fauna, features that French Broad Crossing is committed to preserving today and forever.