Where to indulge your sweet tooth

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From baked-to-order cookies to sweet-smelling waffle cones, you can find plenty of worthwhile places to make a quick stop for dessert. (You should always save room for dessert!)

Here are a few ideas in Blowing Rock, Boone and Banner Elk to pick up something sweet, whether it’s after a hike, on the way home from dinner or just because:

Appalachia Cookie Company | Baked-to-order cookies in downtown Boone

Everything here is made from scratch and baked to order, which means you'll wait 15-20 minutes — but you'll leave with warm cookies. Or sit at one of the tables and devour them. There are around 20 flavors on any given day, ranging from a straightforward chocolate chip to combinations like peanut butter buckeye, cookies and cream and frosted animal cracker. The standout is the peanut butter buckeye. They also do coffee and lattes if you want something to drink while you wait. The pro move: order ahead online so your cookies are ready when you walk in.

Details: appcookieco.com

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BE Scooped I Premium ice cream in Banner Elk

BE Scooped has long been a favorite stop for ice cream in Banner Elk, and this year it moved into a new, larger location next to Banner Elk Pharmacy in the heart of downtown. The family-owned shop serves about 20 flavors of premium ice cream along with homemade waffle cones, milkshakes, root beer floats, espresso drinks and coffee. Best-selling flavor: strawberry cheesecake.

Details: bescooped.com

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Blue Deer | Cookie-and-ice-cream shop with 3 locations: Boone, Blowing Rock and in-between

Blue Deer has figured out a simple formula and stuck with it: freshly baked cookies, ice cream and the option to combine them into a sandwich. Critically, the ice cream is soft enough to bite into but not on the verge of melting. If you're a chocolate person, double chocolate with cookie dough is a reliable order. There are also full espresso drinks. Three locations total: the original pop-up on U.S. 321 (summer only), plus storefronts in downtown Boone and on Main Street in Blowing Rock. They’re all open until 10 p.m.

Details: bluedeercookies.com

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Local Lion | Donuts and coffee shop on Blowing Rock Road, Boone

Local Lion is primarily a coffee shop, but the donuts are the reason to make a trip. They're made fresh daily — with workers saying they get going at 3 a.m. — and the selection runs about 15 flavors on a given day, from classics like glazed and chocolate to more unusual options like lavender. They're not light, airy donuts; they're denser and more substantial, with subtle flavors. The coffee is taken seriously here too: small-batch, locally roasted. There's a drive-thru and outdoor seating. Legit donuts for breakfast or dessert.

Details: local-lion.com

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Kilwins | Chocolates, fudge and ice cream on Main Street, Blowing Rock

Kilwins is a franchise, but it's been a fixture on Main Street in Blowing Rock long enough that it feels like part of the landscape. The draw is the fudge — made in-store on a marble slab — along with hand-dipped chocolates, caramel apples and a wide selection of ice cream. It's a natural stop if you're walking Main Street. You can probably smell the waffle cones down the block, and the line on summer weekends can stretch out the door — which tells you most of what you need to know about how it is regarded. There’s also one in West Jefferson.

Details: kilwins.com

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Mast General Store | Old-time candy selection, Valle Crucis and Boone

Mast General Store is worth its own visit for the clothing and gear, but the candy section deserves a mention. The Valle Crucis original location has an annex devoted almost entirely to candy — barrels of bulk sweets, nostalgic classics, regional favorites and the kind of selection that requires some time to browse. Kids tend to lose their minds in a good way, then ride a sugar high the rest of the day. The Boone location on King Street has candy as well, though the Valle Crucis annex is the full experience. Neither is a destination purely for dessert, but if you're stopping by anyway … leave time for the candy section.

Details: mastgeneralstore.com

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Venture Chocolate and Wine I A sweet escape with wine and chocolate on King Street in Boone

Venture Chocolate and Wine is a distinctive spot. It combines a chocolate shop and coffee bar upstairs with a wine cellar below. Last year, it expanded to include books, gifts and additional seating, creating a space with a sophisticated vibe where visitors can linger well beyond dessert. And when it comes to dessert, the shop is best known for its handcrafted bonbons, rich sipping chocolate and other house-made sweets. The wine bar has charcuterie boards on the menu, sure, but also chocolate boards, a signature brownie, hot chocolate with marshmallows and chocolate and espresso martinis.

Details: venturechocolateandwine.com

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Tickets to the Land of Oz, the 1970s “Wizard of Oz” theme park at Beech Mountain, go on sale to the public on Friday at 12 p.m. for three September weekends.

Visitors can follow the Yellow Brick Road, meet characters from the classic story and explore restored sections of the original park. It’s open only a few times a year.

Tickets are $70 plus tax. The presale for those on the Land of Oz email list starts today (Thursday) at 12 p.m. before opening to the public on Friday.

Heavy snow on three consecutive weekends last winter dampened visitor traffic to the High Country during the first quarter of 2026, according to a new economic report from the Boone Area Chamber of Commerce.

Total visits to Boone and Blowing Rock were down 7.5% compared with the same period last year, according to cell phone location data — which the Chamber estimates translated to roughly 50,000 fewer visitors. The decline was concentrated on Fridays and Saturdays, the busiest days for local hospitality businesses. Visits to ski resorts fell between 3% and 12% year-over-year, with Saturday visits down 12%.

The storm timing also shifted where visitors came from. Traffic from nearby markets including Lenoir, Morganton, and Wilkes County dropped, while visits from the High Country itself ticked up slightly. Chamber President David Jackson attributed the shift in part to major snowfall hitting larger cities like Charlotte, Raleigh and Greensboro, keeping closer-in visitors home while more committed travelers still made the trip.

Despite the soft winter, occupancy tax collections for the quarter came in 6.3% above Q1 2025, the report said.

Jackson cautioned that many local businesses are still recovering financially from Hurricane Helene, making them more vulnerable to short-term dips in visitor traffic. "Every disruption is a magnified disruption for our local business community," he wrote in the report.

➡️ Read the report

Two houses near each other in the Mayview area near Blowing Rock went on the market in the $6 million to $7 million range last week. The neighborhood is just west of town off U.S. 221.

The houses are:

Key stats

Notable features

➡️ View the listing

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Key stats

Notable features

➡️ View the listing

➡️ On our website, we also have 20 independent reviews and recommendations of restaurants, hikes and activities — with more added each week! (Added in the past week: Over Yonder, The Pasta Joint)

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