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Cumberland County is about to receive some global exposure after it was announced to the Fayetteville community that a local business would be featured on the newest edition of the Visit North Carolina (Visit NC) Travel Guide, a 118- page guide packed with travel information from all 100 of the state’s counties.

The opportunity was made possible by a partnership between DistiNCtly Fayetteville and Visit NC. Visit NC’s Executive Director Wit Tuttell came to Fayetteville to deliver the news in person during the “DistiNCtly Cool Holiday Party” held on Tuesday, Dec. 17 and co-hosted by DistiNCtly Fayetteville & Cool Spring Downtown District.

“We've really stepped up our game this past year with how closely we work with them and partnering with them with the marketing efforts that we do, the sales efforts that we do and doing more collaboration with them than we've done in prior years, and a lot of good things have come out of it, including this Destination Guide,” shared President and CEO of DistiNCtly Fayetteville Devin Heath.

DistiNCtly Fayetteville helped arrange a media visit giving Visit NC representatives a tour of some of the county’s tourist attractions before the choice was made to feature one of the top attractions in the area, Fayetteville’s very own Zipquest Waterfall & Treetop Adventure on the cover.

Over 400,000 copies of the travel guide are printed annually, and the publication has a statewide and global audience which will be able to learn more about Zipquest, Fayetteville and Cumberland County.

“It will be huge because now, for those that already have Cumberland County and Fayetteville in mind, this continues to reinforce it. And for those who haven't necessarily thought of Fayetteville and Cumberland County, now being right there on the cover will really pique some interest and encourage travelers to explore more and look into Fayetteville, North Carolina,” shared Heath.

Moving forward, DistiNCtly Fayetteville plans to continue to collaborate with Visit NC on sales efforts and work on establishing partnerships with third party booking sites with an emphasis on international markets, which Heath shared is an underutilized resource for attracting new visitors. Numbers tracked by DistiNCtly Fayetteville show an increase in the number of hotel beds booked after a few months of focusing on those overseas tourists.

“We've already seen an incredible increase in production from them, and that's through our partnership that we've had with Visit NC. We're seeing a large growth in those different third party sites,” shared Heath. “There's several of them, like Hotelbeds[.com], that specifically target Europe, Latin America, as well as Canada. There's some great opportunity to put us on the map with those international markets that we haven't really had a presence in, certainly not in recent years.”

Visit North Carolina's 2025 Travel Guide is available to order and view online on their website here.

For years, the Mountains-to-Sea Trail effort has figured into its plans the Bushy Lake State Natural Area in Cumberland County and has invested money to make it happen.

Fayetteville Observer

I like to tell people Fayetteville is well-situated in that it is an easy 90-minute drive to the North Carolina beaches and four or so hours to the mountains.

That said, Cumberland County is not usually a place people think of when they consider either beaches or mountains. That is unless you are with the state’s parks people and the nonprofit Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail.

They are building a natural hiking trail that links up several communities on a 1,200-mile path from Clingmans Dome, which is part of the Great Smoky Mountains on the border of Tennessee, to the state’s Outer Banks.

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For years, the Mountains-to-Sea Trail effort has figured the Bushy Lake State Natural Area in Cumberland County in its plans. The heavily wooded area is 25 minutes southeast of Fayetteville just north of the Bladen County line.

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State officials and Mountains-to-Sea representatives approached the county in May about purchasing 71.5 acres of land in Bushy Lake, around Beaver Dam, to help them complete the trail, according to a county news release. The county Board of Commissioners approved the deal at its meeting last week.

Under the arrangement, the county buys the land for $253,000 and will be reimbursed by the Friends and the state Division of Parks and Recreation for $193,000, making the net cost to the county $60,000, according to a county news release.

Wildfire and later a grand opening near the Bladen and Cumberland line

The Bushy Lake Natural Area is not a place I can recall hearing of, or it’s just as likely that I have heard of it, and forgot it. (I have reached that age, friends.)

The place is not much in the news. Google lists the area as permanently closed.

“Not even a place!” groused one visitor to the site in the review section about three years ago. “Only a sign saying no trespassing and purple markers.”

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In the summer of 2011, a wildfire that stretched 5,600 acres blazed in part of Bushy Lake along Simmons and Turnbull roads and consumed at least three homes and several outbuildings. The heat index reached 124 degrees, as 220 firefighters and other personnel worked to control the fire with engines, helicopters and tractor-plow units, according to The Fayetteville Observer.

In March 2015, a grand opening in Roseboro, in Sampson County, was held for the 64-mile stretch of trail that will include Bushy Lake. Cumberland, Sampson and Bladen counties are considered part of what was then designated as an Agricultural Heartland Segment of the trail.

An NC path that is meant to connect in more ways than one

The Mountains-to-Sea Trail often follows roads but also has hundreds of miles of footpath over its (seemingly) meandering path from the Atlantic to the Smokies. It ties in rural areas in close proximity to cities, including Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro, Winston-Salem and Boone.

“Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail’s mission is to bring together communities and volunteers to build, maintain, and advocate for an enduring footpath connecting North Carolina’s natural, historic, and cultural treasures and to ensure that all people feel welcome on the trail,” the organization says on its website.

Hundreds of volunteers build and maintain the trail across the state, it says.

In these days of hyper-development of so many places in North Carolina, I am all for investment in natural spaces — our state’s physical beauty is one of its best assets. The idea of connectivity is also appealing at a time when people seem increasingly herded into cultural and geographic silos.

Connectivity sometimes has to be an intentional activity, as this public-private partnership illustrates.

Opinion Editor Myron B. Pitts can be reached atmpitts@fayobserver.com or 910-486-3559.