Road trip ideas around the Blue Ridge mountains?

I’m going to have some free time at the beginning of September. My family is going camping in western Maryland, but the trip is shorter than originally planned, and now I have five extra vacation days to use or lose.

Last week I drove to Cape Cod with a friend, and it was awesome! I left DC at 5 that morning, picked her up in New York, had lunch there, and after a bunch of stops and traffic we made it to Provincetown by 9 PM. That’s the farthest I’d ever driven all at once, and it was surprisingly easy and fun.

My folks have this rental in the western corner of Maryland. That’s already three or four hours west of my home, and I’d like to use it as a jumping off point for another road trip. If I can drive 500~ miles in a day, that gives a lot of options.

I’ve never really explored any further west of there, just flown over it. Like, I’ve never actually been to Tennessee or Kentucky. Asheville, NC seems like an appealing stop.

This time I’ll probably be traveling alone. We had a great experience using airbnb for the New England trip. It’s a site where you rent rooms by the day in someone’s house, with a few built-in safety measures. The host was a friendly and outgoing nurse who recommended fun stuff to do in the local area, and we cooked dinner with her one night.

I like hiking, painting outdoors, and going to art galleries. Where should I go and what should I do? :) Also is it worth heading northwest instead? Like in the Ohio/ Indiana/ Michigan direction? I’ve never driven through there either.