America’s Road of the Year 2025 is…

Road Trips

May 20

The Cherohala Skyway that runs between Tennessee and North Carolina has been named the 2025 Hagerty Road of the Year.

The U.S. classic car insurance giant is a champion of driving for the sheer joy of it and the Cherohala Skyway has been designed for that very purpose says Hagerty’s Senior Vice President of Media and Editorial Larry Webster.

“After carving 43 miles of smooth asphalt that rises through meadows and dense forest on its way to a mile-high peak, a driver might conclude that the Cherohala Skyway was made purely for the fun of it,” he writes. “This ribbon of uninterrupted bliss, which traverses the spine of the Unicoi Mountains, unwinds over thousands of uninhabited acres and few connecting roads.”

The Skyway is practically brand new, having only been opened in 1996, despite its route through the Cherokee National Forest and Nantahala National Forest being approved over 30 years earlier, after a campaign by Tellico Plains Mayor Charles Hall to create the scenic road.

“We salute Mayor Hall and his vision to create a road that is the stuff of driver fantasies,” adds Webster.

The Cherohala Skyway is the second Hagerty Road of the Year, after California Route 33 took the honours in 2024.

For a full description of the route visit the Hagerty website.

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