Guide to the Best Hiking in Nashville

Most travelers understandably associate Nashville, Tennessee with music: This is, after all, Music City, U.S.A., legendary epicenter of the country genre and one of the true global hotbeds of songwriting. But the appeal of Tennessee’s capital extends beyond honky tonks and the hallowed stages of the Grand Ole Opry and Ryman Auditorium: This is also a fantastic launchpad for outdoor recreation, not least hiking.

Fine footpaths and trails extend from Nashville’s lovely, rolling hinterland right into town, putting a lot of hiking opportunities at your boot tips on a Music City getaway. However, planning and searching can be a big process, so here’s an entry guide to the best hiking in Nashville and its surrounding areas.

Even in the heart of Music City, you’ll find ample dedicated mileage for hoofing it. After all, Nashville maintains close to 100 miles of formally designated Greenways, threading the metro area with hikeable (not to mention bikeable) routes.

In East Nashville, Shelby Bottoms Greenway and Natural Area encompasses close to 1,000 acres of lovely floodplain habitat the Cumberland River. More than five miles of paved and ADA-accessible multiuse paths and about the same mileage of unpaved and more primitive hiking trails lace the parkland, which includes bottomland hardwood forests, wetlands and fields. This alluvial realm is a wildlife hotspot, so keep your eyes peeled for everything from waterfowl, waders and songbirds to white-tailed deer, red foxes and mink while roaming the trail system.

Together, the 2,500-plus acres of Percy Warner and Edwin Warner parks on the southwest side of the Nashville metro area compose the beloved Warner Parks, only nine miles from downtown. An extensive trail system covers the hilltops and hollows, highlights including the 4.5-mile Mossy Ridge Trail loop, the 2.5-mile-long Harpeth Woods Trail loop and the easy Cane Connector Trail linking the Warners Parks and shadowing part of the historic Natchez Trace.

These are, mind you, just a few of the prime hiking spots in Nashville. The Greenway network offers plenty of other opportunities.

Outstanding public-land sites, nature centers and other destinations set within beautiful nearby hill country and blufflands provide stellar hiking daytrips for Music City visitors. Read on for profiles of some of the best hiking trails in Nashville's greater backyard.

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Harpeth River State Park offers access to one of the great geographic features of Nashville’s vicinity: the Narrows of the Harpeth, where the Harpeth River cuts a horseshoe bend through limestone uplands, almost forming a full cutoff loop. A number of short paths near the park entrance explore the scenic—and archaeologically and historically rich—Narrows area.

The short but steep Bluff Overlook Trail leads to a fantastic vantage from the skinny ridge at the Narrows’ chokepoint over the river lowlands. The views extend to the remarkable Mound Bottom, a Mississippian-period earthworks town that belongs to the Great Mound Group, the largest cluster of Native American mounds in the Volunteer State. You’ll also gain a sightline out to May’s Mace Bluff across the river, host to a well-known petroglyph linked to a widespread Mississippian ceremonial mace/“Birdman” motif.

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The roughly 1,370-acre Radnor Lake State Natural Area, also known as Radnor Lake State Park, is right on Nashville’s doorstep, serving as a perennially popular outdoor playground for residents and tourists alike. You’ll find nearly eight miles of hiking trails in this day-use park, anchored by the 85-acre reservoir impounded back in 1914 by the Louisville & Nashville Railroad.

The ADA-accessible Lake Trail is a no-sweat way to get to know this place, delivering multiple nice views out over Radnor Lake with good opportunities to see waterbirds and other wildlife. And if you extend your ramble onto Otter Creek Road—closed to motor vehicles within the park and the only route in this Class II Natural Area open to bicycles and dogs—you can nab a look at a beaver lodge from the causeway, not far from the Lake Trail/Otter Creek Road junction.

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Named for the 18th-century Southeastern frontier outdoorsmen—the “longhunters”—who took extended trapping and hunting forays into the wilds, Long Hunter State Park includes extensive frontage along Percy Priest Lake, a large reservoir of the Stones River.

The longest of numerous trails in the park, the Volunteer Trail hugs the southern shore of the lake, serving up plenty of long-range views over the water, backwoods ambience and hints of regional history via old stone walls. A pair of primitive backcountry campsites awaits at the end of the Volunteer Trail, in case you want to turn your hike into a little backpacking adventure.

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The lovely property known as Owl’s Hill Nature Sanctuary sprang from Owl’s Hill Farm, established on a former agricultural holding by Huldah (Cheek) Sharp—who grew up at the historic Cheekwood Estate and laid the groundwork for that site to become a botanical garden, now a defining Nashville landmark—and her husband. Huldah sold Owl’s Hill Farm to the University of Tennessee Nashville in the early 1970s to become a nature preserve and research area and now it’s a wonderful place to explore native ecosystems and get a full dose of “forest bathing” within easy reach of Downtown Nashville.

Weaving together the Sharp Creek and South Ridge trails gives you a nice taste of the Owl’s Hill magic. Trek from lower-elevation cedar groves and diverse mixed-hardwood forests up to a ridgetop above 1,000 feet and its recommended to take the 500-foot spur of the Old Oak Overlook off the Sharp Creek Trail to admire a 350-year-old white oak: one of the property’s biggest and most venerable trees.

The relatively rugged country of the Cumberland Plateau and Highland Rim encircling the Nashville Basin tumbles with many waterfalls, offering a plunging, misting flume as a hiking payoff.

The following are just a few of the must-do waterfall hikes within easy striking distance of Nashville.

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At Cummins Falls, the Blackburn Fork River drops 75 feet in a multi-tier, ledged, sheet-style plunge on the Eastern Highland Rim that ranks as one of the most voluminous waterfalls in Tennessee. The quarter-mile Falls Overlook Trail in Cummins Falls State Park gives you a fine top-down look at this fabulous waterfall, the plunge pool beneath which ranks as a top-draw swimming hole.

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The thousand-acre Cumberland Plateau wildland of Virgin Falls State Natural Area is a remarkable place and the demanding, all-day hike along its main trail casts you under its whitewatered, sylvan spell. Namesake of the preserve, the impressive 110-foot plunge of Virgin Falls within the long canyon called Scott’s Gulf is executed by a mostly underground stream that vanishes back into the depths at the base of the falls via a cave. Other waterfalls—including Big Laureal, Big Branch and Sheep Cave falls—lie within the natural area.

Besides waterfalls, the trail shows off a nice mix of forest communities: from drier mixed-deciduous woods early on to the lusher, more diverse gorge forest.

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Among the biggest and most popular state parks in Tennessee, Fall Creek Falls State Park is another jewel of the Cumberland Plateau, the centerpiece being one of the tallest waterfalls in the eastern U.S.: the 256-foot Fall Creek Falls. This is only one of numerous falls and cascades within this nearly 30,000-acre park, which notably includes some old-growth groves among its magnificently varied mosaic of forestland.

The short Gorge Overlook Trail gives you a great look at the namesake plunge: one of the most awe-inspiring natural spectacles within (longer) day-tripping reach of Nashville.

When thinking of the best time to visit Nashville it’s important to know that AAA members can access perks and take advances for vacation planning such as getting the best discounts on hotels, rental cars and entertainment tickets.