We decided to take a weekend trip to Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Both of us have been to Gatlinburg before, but not together, and definitely haven't spent any time in the park.
This park is actually the most visited national park in the country, mostly due to Highway 441 running through the park boundaries. This park is also free to visitors, however you must have a parking pass. Passes can be purchased on recreation.gov and are $5 per day or $15 for a week. You can also get parking passes at some of the visitor centers, but based on the lines I saw of people doing this, I would not recommend it. We stayed the weekend at the Sidney James Mountain Lodge, close to the entrance of the park, but close enough to plenty of food options for the weekend. This lodge had an indoor swimming pool, a restaurant, and laundry services. We didn't use any of these services while we were there though.
We came into the park from the west side, and I wanted to get the timing right, so we did things in a different order than everyone would choose. We started our activities hiking the Gatlinburg Trail. We started at the Sugarlands Visitor Center, hiking 3.8 miles roundtrip basically into the town of Gatlinburg and back along the West Prong Little Pigeon River. This trail has 177 ft of elevation. This was a very easy hike, passing remaining fireplaces from previous houses, crossing a beautiful bridge, and catching the sunlight through the trees. There is even a small side trail that leads to the park sign instead of fighting for parking on the main roadway. This trail is dog friendly, and with it being right beside the town, I feel like there was more of an atypical crowd on this trail compared to other trails/parks. There were other trails in this area (Cataract Falls, etc), but due to the elevation and time constraints for the weekend, we didn't do these hikes. We still had some daylight, so we decided to go ahead and hike the Metcalf Bottoms Trail. This trail is a fairly easy 1.4 miles with a large hill shortly after the start of the hike for 190 feet elevation on the trail. This is a peaceful hike in a wooded area, leading to a historic schoolhouse and cemetery. We passed the Laurel Falls Trail going out and back on this side of the park, but the trail is currently closed due to construction.
The next morning we woke up bright and early to beat the crowds to the popular Cades Cove. This is an 11 mile one-way loop. It usually takes 2-4 hours to complete the loop. This is a valley with the beautiful mountains in the background. This area is one of the best for wildlife viewing. It took us about an hour and a half to get from our motel to the valley, so make sure you plan accordingly. We timed it so we got there right at sunrise. There are many trails, historic churches, and historic cabins on the loop, showing the human history of this area. There is an audio tour on the National Park Service app, but I forgot to download the tour before we lost phone signal. We saw several deer and turkeys on the drive, and we even got to see a wild boar up close. At the end of the loop is the Cades Cove Camp Store with souvenirs, snacks, and drinks.
We spent the rest of the day driving down Highway 441, aka Newfound Gap Road. There are many pullouts, overlooks, and points of interest along this 33 mile drive, so do some planning ahead of time to see what activities will work for you. Because it was so cold, the water running down the rock walls along the road created many icicles along the drive. We stopped at the Newfound Gap Overlook. This area is right on the Tennessee/North Carolina border. There is a very large parking lot here, but parking was hard to find in the middle of the day. At the end of the parking lot is a section of the Appalachian Trail. We hiked a very small section of the trail, just so we can brag about hiking the Appalachian Trail. Shortly past this overlook is a side road to Kuwohi (formely known as Clingmans Dome), the highest peak in the park. We drove up to the top (again, fighting for parking) and walked to the visitors center. You can continue up the hill for one mile (350 ft elevation gain) for great views from the mountain. My feet and legs were not putting up with that elevation on this trip, so we just got some wonderful pictures from the edge of the parking lot. We continued to the Luftee Overlook, Charles Webb Overlook (my favorite), Mingus Mill (a grist mill from 1886), and the Oconaluftee Visitor Center. We couldn't find parking at the visitor center when we passed by it the first time, so we continued down to the town of Cherokee. If you have more time than we did, I recommend exploring this cute little town in the Cherokee Reservation. We turned around to head back toward Gatlinburg, passing the Blue Ridge Parkway. If you have time for the scenic drive with many other overlooks, you can make a loop with this road and Highway 19. We went back to the visitor center. The open field was hosting a beautiful heard of elk. Behind the building is a small farm area with free-roaming chickens. We continued hiking east to the Oconauluftee River Trail. This trail is an easy 3.1 miles with only 52 feet of elevation. If you hike the entire trail, it actually goes into the town of Cherokee.
We ate dinner at Bubba Gump's, which was thankfully a short walk from our motel. We thought we wanted to explore the downtown area and do some shopping, but it was so crowded we couldn't even get down the sidewalks. I don't know if this is normal for Gatlinburg or just because it was a holiday weekend, but no thank you! We decided to walk back to the motel. We did stop at an event called the Festival of Trees. I think they were auctioning Christmas trees for charity. I loved all of the different themed trees! As we walked back, we also passed a man with a pet beaver!
Sunday morning we drove to the Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail. This isn't too far from the main entrance of the park, but it is in its own section. This is a 6 mile one-way loop drive. There are hiking trails, historic buildings, and mountain scenery along the drive. Per the NPS website, this drive is closed December through March, however someone decided to close the drive a day early this year. We did have a nice drive back to the start of the loop, but since it was closed, we had to continue on. With an almost 7 hour drive home, we headed out through Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge toward home. With this being a nice weekend adventure with so much more to see, I'm sure we will make this trip again. Hopefully next time we can actually see a bear!
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