Our Fun Trip to the Great Smoky Mountains

We boarded the flight to Knoxville to visit Gatlinburg, TN. It was my idea to go so I had no one to blame for the unfolding events. We both had separate reasons why we thought this trip was a good idea, in addition to two plane tickets expiring at the end of August. I wanted to see the Great Smoky Mountains and my husband wanted to see at least one bear in its wild habitat. I for one am fine if I never see a bear in his/her wild habitat. Hubby told me enough times that, if a bear should appear, all he must do is run faster than I can.

The flight was terrible, the pilot went around the airport a couple of times, overshooting it by 50 miles each time. I kept hearing the landing gear actuating motor coming on underneath our feet and it felt that it had dropped for landing. As soon as I got excited, the airplane gained altitude again. My ears were hurting from all this dropping and climbing steeply, and I started to pray very hard. The pilots made no announcements at all and we finally landed with a hard thud.

I felt like clapping when we landed but I restrained myself on account of not wanting to embarrass my husband.  Everybody else was either sleeping or petrified like me. I might have felt better had I not overheard the previous pilot upon deplaning telling the new pilot that he had problems with some light. But I could not overhear which light, nor would I have understood the technical names for it. So, my fear was prepared to explode at the slightest provocation. The danger drama queen was on full alert.

Instead of my husband’s intended Corolla, which would have huffed and puffed every inch of the way up the steep mountains, the agent did us a huge favor and we rented a RAV4 to help us climb the mountain roads and off we went as the sun light was turning golden.

Unbeknownst to us, my GPS downloaded onto the car’s computer the shortest and quickest way to Gatlinburg from Knoxville. The problem was that it was through the most serpentine road through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and it was getting dark fast.

We are not the best drivers at night anymore and the road had no shoulders and no line markings part of the way. The roadsides just dropped into the deep and rocky ravines and the furious Little Pigeon River below. To make matters worse, the woods were dense, adding a level of difficult darkness even in daytime as we learned the next day. Just to add more challenges to my already terrified eyes and mind, we crossed a one-car only wooden bridge over the river, and it seemed bouncy. Perhaps it was my rich imagination.

After numerous ‘oh my God,’ ‘slow down,’ and ‘watch for the ravines and boulders,’ along the serpentine road, we made it to the three-star Bearskin Lodge and were elated that our second-floor balcony was overlooking the Little Pigeon River. There was dust everywhere on the rugged, cabin-like furniture and wood floors, but the view was priceless. I am not sure there are any four-star hotels in the area. I pulled out my Clorox wipes and started cleaning all surfaces. The room came with a very large jacuzzi tub, free breakfast, and Grandma’s cookies every day from 2-6 p.m. What a deal!

Unbeknownst to us, the town of Pigeon Forge was overtaken by the annual Great Smoky Mountains Jeep invasion and the roads were packed in every direction with Jeep owners so proud of their artistically bedazzled with lights and whimsically decorated Jeeps that they paraded on the 6-mile stretch and blocked all three lanes in both directions. The Jeeps and their owners were very patriotic, flying American flags, darkened American Flags, a few Confederate flags, and many Gadsden flags.

I asked a cop what would happen if someone needed an ambulance and he said, call 911. How would the ambulance reach anybody in distress? He shrugged his shoulders. He was stuck in a three-hour traffic jam just like the rest of us.

The first adventure was on Harrison Mountain where we rode the ski gondola called the tram and then the ski lift chair to the peak at 3590 feet. The view from the top was breathtaking – the city of Gatlinburg below was at 1289 ft elevation, Chimney Tops at 4800 feet, Newfound Gap at 5046 feet, Mount LeConte at 6593 feet, and Clingmans Dome at 6643 feet. A blue grass band, Mountain Grass, entertained those who reached the top and took a well-deserved rest and a photograph in the lift chair for posterity.

The lower stop of the gondola (the tram) took us to the wildlife habitat of several grown and fat bears, two foxes, three otters, a golden eagle, some hawks, a flying squirrel, two skunks, two fat racoons, two mountain cats, and a few box turtles.

The visit to the Tuckaleechee Caverns in Townsend, TN was entirely my idea and it convinced me to never want to go spelunking again. As I got cold waiting for the group to return from the largest cavern where the guide decided to turn the lights off and I would have none of that, I decided to return above ground on my own. Sadly, I missed their number one attraction, the waterfall. Hubby clued me to its beauty with his video. I love mountains but deep down I am a beach lover, watching the ocean waves crash onto the shore.

The Titanic Museum visit in Pidgeon Forge was also my idea. The well-conceptualized museum left me with a deep feeling of sorrow for those who lost their lives and for those who survived and had to return to normal living.

Objects in a museum, a history for future generations, are a good idea. Deep down I felt that it was wrong to profit from the sale of objects that floated to the top or were dredged from the bottom by salvage operations. It should have been left at the ocean grave site. One of the band player’s violin was sold at auction for $1.3 million to a private collector. A deck chair was estimated to be worth $100,000 and Madeleine Astor’s life vest also on display was worth $250,000. I do not understand private collectors want to own a piece of this sad history instead of letting it stay in a museum like this. Life and death should be treated with the highest respect possible.

On the other hand, the ocean bacteria have already claimed all the metal remains of the ship and all that is left now is just huge orange spots in the sand where Titanic’s pieces fell – broken lives’ final resting place. The owner of the museum described the two-and-a-half-hour descent into the abyss in 1987, as “a drop like a brick to the bottom of the deep ocean.”

Cades Cove, an 11-mile one way and single lane paved road through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, was hubby’s idea – he wanted to see bears in the thick and dark forest, in their natural habitat. He got his wish as we saw a momma bear with her two cubs from the comfort of our car. We followed a slow line of Jeeps (from the Annual Great Smoky Mountains Jeep Invasion from all fifty states) through beautiful hills, pastures, and meadows with grazing turkeys totally oblivious to the human traffic.

In one spot, well-trafficked by bears and deer, signs posted everywhere warned humans to stay 50 feet away from the woods but then there is always the one daring elderly couple who decides to gamble with their lives and pull off into the pasture, get out their folding chairs and have a picnic, surrounded by pastoral beauty, right in the vicinity of a momma bear with her cubs. It is the American way.

The 11-mile stretch of natural beauty had a few cabins and a rest stop for the weary. The most remarkable was the John Oliver Place, a well-preserved log cabin dating back to 1818.  The mile hike there and back was doable either through a well-traveled trail in the woods or by a paved and winding lane through the beautiful meadow with native flowers in full bloom and tall grasses.

John Oliver was the first European to settle in Cades Cove in 1818 with his wife Lucretia. It is estimated that they completed the 1 ½-story cabin, the oldest structure in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, by the 1820s. According to the rangers, the Oliver family members lived in this cabin for more than a century. John made by hand the 3,000-wood shingles. The doors and rolled glass windows were small to preserve heat and coolness inside. The logs were constantly chinked to add more protection from escaping heat. Corners with half-dovetailed notches had outward sloping angles to drain water away from the notch, helping to prevent rot.

One early morning, as I’m sitting on the balcony of our hotel, enjoying the birds and the gurgling river, I spot a young fellow in waders, unsteady on his feet, who tripped and almost fell into the shallows. I could not see any sign of life in the river, but he caught a big rainbow trout in about 30 minutes. An older gentleman joined him. He looked more professional with his fishing technique.

The trip was not complete until we drove 23 miles to Savierville, TN, to visit the largest Buc-ees in the U.S. where we ate the famous and delicious brisket sandwich and tasted at least four different types of fudge. The country roads were delightful, and we saw so many Baptist and Methodist churches, reminding us that we were in God’s country.

NOTE: Photos taken by Ileana Johnson