Rose Eiklor

"When I was 18 in Vietnam, that's what it was about seven days a week," Longo said. "My body beat up, I know that, but we gotta keep walking it out one step, one moment at a time."

"This is my bed," Wynkoop said. He was living in a tent before coming here. Wynkoop said he came to the emergency shelter where he slept on a cot in the cafeteria but now has a room with a bed.

In the mountain community of Little Switzerland, an unincorporated area of McDowell and Mitchell counties, Alpine Inn has clung to the cliffs for over 95 years, providing the community with nearly a century worth of memories.

Benjamin Knight says he came here to Alpine Ski Center just days after Hurricane Helene blew through. He says the parking lot was full of debris and the fence was destroyed.

What You Need To Know A group of friends formed the group Lansing's Bridge to Recovery

"It was so much water coming out of there that this building right here, it went loose," he said. His property had damage from Hurricane Helene.

"My mom, my sister and my grandmother gave me plants," Ashley said. He lived in Rutherfordton and said since Hurricane Helene he had to stay with his sister, so having his own place is important.

In the small community of Creston, about 45 minutes outside Boone, a camper on the side of the road is now a place of hope.

"It's not my normal. I just think that everything's been turned upside down," Nan Hollifield said.

"This gave me a great opportunity to give back to the community that I love living in and has given me so much," Luc Henry said.