Natchez Trace Parkway

Started in 1930, the modern Natchez Trace parallels the old trace. It is packed with hiking trails, history exhibits, nature exhibits, picnic areas, public campgrounds and birding opportunities. The National Park Service displays a milepost on the east side of the parkway. Mileposts start at 1 on the southern end of the Trace near Natchez and end at 444 just South of Nashville at the northern point.
Commercial traffic is prohibited. Campers or RVs are limited to official camping areas. No ATVs allowed. No stop signs or stop lights. The parkway is clean and smooth. Scenery is awesome. Instead of utility poles and buildings, the Trace is lined with forests, farmland and creeks. Restrooms are available about every twenty miles. Numerous side roads take you past antebellum and victorian homes, sunken roads, civil war battlefields and southern towns. It is a shutterbug’s heaven. The Trace is a designated bike route.
Hunting is prohibited but you must remain alert for animals on the parkway, especially deer.
Traffic is generally very light except around Tupelo and Jackson. Often there are more motorcycles on the road than cars. Not only for the incredible sights but because of highly enforced speed limits of 50 mph and access on and off the Trace is via on/​off ramps which means no need to worry about cross traffic.
There are gas stations, markets, bed and breakfasts and restaurants near the Trace. None are right «on» the Trace.
Native Americans, following the «traces» of bison and other game, further improved this «walking trail» for foot-​borne commerce between major villages located in middle Mississippi and central Tennessee.
I’ve worked on a dairy farm and you can see the «traces» left by the cows leading to a pond or to the barn. It was like an ant trail, the way one cow went, they all went, everyday.
The route is not necessarily shorter, however, by constantly traveling this route the bison, and later humans, avoided the endless, exhausting climbing and descending of the many hills along the way. Also avoided was the danger to a herd or groups of humans of being caught en-​masse at the bottom of a valley if attacked by predators. The nature of the route, to this day, offers good all-​around visibility.
I’ve been on this trail throughout Northeast MS and AL. I want to go South with it one day soon. I’ve not been even as far as Jackson, yet.