A Trip Back In Time
I have skirted the Smokey Mountains my last two trips, once because of heat–107º and last year because I landed on a weekend. Smokey Mountain National Park is the most visited national park in the country. Needless to say, when I pulled into Sugarlands Visitor Center last year, I could see I wasn't going to enjoy the visit with hundreds of people milling around and I moved on. This year, I have a strategy. We leave Blue Ridge, Georgia and my intention is to stay in Copperhill, Tennessee at another boondockerswelcome site.
The spot is right in a cute old mining town on the border of Georgia and Tennessee. One side of the street is Georgia and the other Tennessee. The overnight spot is parking lot and on the river, but chain link fence blocking the river is not an ideal place to spend the day. We head to a picturesque, city park and research our options.
I decide abandon our stay in Copperhill and we make the drive to the Smokies and land at an RV park in Townsend. I suck it up and pay big bucks for our spot (the most we will pay for any camping spot the whole trip) It is worth it. It is directly on Laurel Creek and the roar of the rapids is great bed time music. It is still pretty hot during the day and Little Arrow Resort has a pool! There is a sweet coffee lounge to boot. Our spot has a log structure deck and roof, so we can stay outside during passing thunderstorms. And we spy mama and 400lb! papa bear in the campground. Most importantly, It is the closest campground with hookups to Cades Cove. I still need electricity to run the air conditioning especially if we have to close up for rain.
I leave at daybreak and we drive in complete solitude into the Smokies, not another car on the road! Cades Cove is an isolated valley located in the Tennessee section of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Wildlife is teaming around every bend in the road. We have a bear cross the road just as we arrive. A "cove" in Smokey Mountain vernacular is a relatively flat valley between mountains and ridges. The primary access is the 11 mile one way loop road. When Cades Cove was a farming community, an unpaved two-way road followed the same route as this present road. In 1900 about 125 families used the road. From 1830s and through the next 100 years travelers entered the cove by five narrow unpaved roads. A number of the historic homesteads are down trails that we can't access because, like most national parks, dogs aren't allowed. But we are afforded a glimpse back in time with a number of homesteads, graveyards and churches along the loop road.
Cherokee camped and hunted in the Cove, however, there is no evidence of Cherokee villages. The Jobe family, being one of the first to settle the Cove in 1821, came on to the land honestly. The settlers farmed and soon brought gristmills and blacksmiths for industry as well as distillers. The earliest settlers established Primitive Baptist and Methodist churches. The Civil War was the only interruption and forced the closings of the churches as the people were Union and Rebels were too strong in the area. Many folk hid in the mountains until the end of the war. Cades Cove suffered from the effects of the Civil War for most of the rest of the 19th century. Only around 1900 did its population return to pre-war levels. The average farm was much less productive, however, and the cove residents were suspicious of any form of change. It wasn't until the Progressive Era that the cove recovered economically
Large barns were common in the Cove. This barn with its large overhang is something new to me. Cantilever construction (counterweighted overhanging beams) originated in Europe. The provide shelter for animals as well as storage space for equipment.
Of all the places I stop to take a photo op, I choose the Dan Lawson Place, built by Peter Cable in the 1840s and acquired by Dan Lawson after he married Cable's daughter, Mary Jane. Lawson was the cove's wealthiest resident. And he is the great-grandfather of my friend Kenny Moles. At the time of the photo, I had no idea of the connection until Connie Moles saw my photo on facebook! The homestead includes a cabin (still called the Peter Cable cabin), a smokehouse, a chicken coop, and a hay barn.
The states of Tennessee and North Carolina bought up much of the land now in the park and gave it to the federal government to establish a national park in the early 1930s. Many of the farmers didn't resist. What does remain are the historic buildings and rich lore of a time long gone by. What also remains are plenty of deer, fox, bear, wild boar, turkey that you are bound to see as you make your drive through the park.
My expectation at the end of our stay is to drive to Lexington, Kentucky and visit my friend Leanne. While I stop at the visitor center in the Cove to get Sitka a new foxy all they have are bears. i decide to drive north by going east across the park to Pigeon Forge. On the way, I can stop at the Sugarland Visitor center and get Sitka his Foxy. We leave around 10am and I am not sure how this happens ,but the entire windy, twisty mountain road we have to ourselves. I do pull over two times to let two cars go by me... but that's it. The drive is breathtaking! I have often heard the drive is bumper to bumper. My lucky day!
"There are no words that can tell the hidden spirit of the wilderness, that can reveal its mystery, its melancholy, and its charm." - President Theodore Roosevelt
Onward
Catherine and Sitka