Front Royal, VA

Front Royal is a Shenandoah Valley town at the meeting of mountain scenery, river recreation, and regional history. The Shenandoah River is central to the landscape, and the town is close to the northern entrance of Shenandoah National Park's Skyline Drive. Front Royal is also home to Christendom College and the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute. It feels like a gateway town: part college community, part river town, part mountain access point, with a long history layered under the tourism traffic.