- Let's head to the mountains where the Western North Carolina Nature Center suffered major damage due to Hurricane Helene, but they are back up and running and welcoming visitors.

- The WNC Nature Center is an accredited facility that displays animals, plants and artifacts that are native to the Southern Appalachian Mountains.

The history of the Nature Center started back in 1925 as the Asheville Zoo.

We did have things like lions throughout our history and we also up until the early 1980s had elephants here at the Nature Center.

The collection that we have in our mission shifted from one of a kind of a mishmash collection, a menagerie if you will, to focusing on animals and plants that live in the Southern Appalachian Mountains.

- So the animals here at the Western North Carolina Nature Center are mostly native to Western North Carolina.

We strive really hard to have a collection of animals that people can come here to see that they might also have in their backyard.

So it's really important for us to educate our guests about animals that they might live around like black bears.

Some animals like coyotes or foxes are a little more elusive and they don't get to see them as well.

- It's my first time here and I loved it.

It tells you about all of the mother nature.

It tells you about all of the animals.

I highly recommend if you want to know about nature and you really want to be educated on the wildlife, come here.

It is a beautiful, beautiful walk.

- It is very peaceful.

It's usually one of the first places that I take somebody who's visiting or new to town that I've met.

Like, hey, let's go to the nature center.

And it's really great with a membership, too, because you can get different levels and sometimes you can get like extra family members in and stuff like that.

You do feel like you get to connect with nature in a safe environment.

- Here we are coming up on a year since Helene in the mountains, and a lot of us are thinking about how far we've come as a community and also how far the nature center has come since that time.

The day after Helene was the first time that our staff was able to actually access the center.

We had some pretty significant tree damage.

We had some fences down.

We had some boardwalks that needed some serious repair.

Despite all the stuff that we had gone through, we were, we were safe.

Our animals were safe.

Our staff and our people were safe.

Within hours, we had zoos offering to send teams of people, supplies, come to us and help us with our repairs.

So that was, I think, the time when we realized when we got that outpouring that we were going to be OK.

- Hurricane Helene was a really difficult time.

And so when we were finally able to open, it was so wonderful to see the guests be able to come back because they had missed us.

We had missed them.

And it was really great to talk to all the guests and just ask how they were.

And we all just shared stories of getting through and dealing with it.

- The local community came around us after the devastating impact of Helene on this area.

One of the things I think that was most heartening for us was that literally by day two, our social media channels were flooded with people saying, are the animals OK?

Are you OK?

How did you fare?

And to know that we were top of mind really gave us it bolstered us to have the energy to continue going when things when things were difficult.

- We've renovated all our farm area so that our domestic animals have a much bigger space to roam.

And we've also added significant pollinator gardens to attract our local pollinators.

It was about six months later in March that we officially opened again to the public.

And so far this year, with the for the months we've been open, we've seen well over 100,000 people.

So people do love us and they're very quick to come and support us.

- It's just so amazing to see the support of the community and how much they really appreciate our facility and support us.

It's always positive.

They're always thanking us for taking care of the animals.

So it's just a really wonderful relationship that I think the Nature Center has with our guests.

- Well, our mindset moving forward is one of hope.

You know, in the future coming up, we have some great modifications that are going to be made here in the next five to 10 years.

So as people continue to return to this area every single time they come, they'll probably see something new.

So it's amazing how much and how this little gem that everybody calls that was known by the city of Asheville has spread its wings and become a favorite place for people that come from all over the country to stop when they visit the Asheville area.

- The Western North Carolina Nature Center is at 75 Gashes Creek Road in Asheville, and they're open daily from 10:30 a.m.

to 3:30 p.m.

They do not accept cash.

The best way to purchase tickets is online at wildwnc.org, or give them a call at 828-259-8080.