Location
The OVHT follows the route from Abingdon, Virginia, fording the Watauga River at Sycamore Shoals through present day Elizabethton, Tennessee, crossing the Doe River twice near both Hampton, Tennessee and Roan Mountain, Tennessee, and ascending over the steep Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina to the site of the Battle of Kings Mountain now within Kings Mountain National Military Park. The trail network consists of a 330-mile corridor, including a 70-mile branch from Elkin, North Carolina, that joins the main route at Morganton, North Carolina.
Fifty-seven miles of OVHT are officially developed for public use, and development continues on the remaining sections. The official sections of the trail were established through agreements with current landowners and often have overlapping designations. All officially certified segments are identified through the use of signs displaying the trail logo (an Overmountain man in profile on a brown and white triangle) or a white triangular blaze.
A parallel Commemorative Motor Route travels along state highways and, in some stretches, actually travels over the old historic roadway.
The Overmountain Victory National Historic Trail is a cooperative effort of the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Overmountain Victory Trail Association, local governments, local citizens' associations, local historical societies and the states of Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, and South Carolina.
Read more about this topic: Overmountain Victory National Historic Trail