Spring Break - Great Smoky Mountains National Park: 2 of 2

We spent much of our time during our spring break trip to Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  We wanted to explore and hike to see as much as we could in the park that is supposedly the most visited national park in the country.

Our first hike was to Alum Caves - 4.6 miles round trip, with a 1200 foot elevation gain.  It started out along a pretty creek - there were huge rhododendron plants all along this hike, but we were probably a week or two too early for them to be blooming which was too bad.

The kids had fun hiking with Grandma and Grandpa.

Many of our hikes had log bridges crossing streams which made for cool picture locations.  This bridge led to Archway Rock along the trail where you had to climb steps through an arch.

Here are the kids with Grandma and Grandpa in Archway Rock.

Grandma and Grandpa got Derek a fun metal detector and he was diligently using it on the hike to find treasures.  He was able to find lots of coins along the trail that fortunately were not buried too deep and somehow seemed to usually be close to Tanja or Grandma.  He also was a huge help to me when I accidentally dropped my keys and couldn't find them; he was able to find them under a bush right along the trail next to me where I pointed out that I think I dropped them somewhere in that vicinity.  He found nails that were holding logs together forming steps along the trail.  But his most exciting discovery happened when we actually got to the cave at the end of the trail and he swept back and forth to find buried treasure!  We dug it out, and he had stumbled upon a rusted can that had been buried by hikers long ago, or perhaps an ancient civilization!  The metal detector at least helped keep interest in continuing along the long hike (though it did mean he was moving slower than he would have if he were just walking).  Here are Lydia and Derek inside the cave searching for more buried treasure.

Here we are in the mouth of the cave overlooking the mountains - it's a very pretty spot.

And going down under Archway Rock on the return trip.

Our next hike was to Clingmans Dome and then hiking along a short portion of the Appalachian Trail.  Clingmans Dome is the tallest point in Tennessee at 6643 feet in elevation.  The early morning hike we took to make sure we could get a parking space combined with the elevation meant it was our chilliest hike, but we bundled up in sweaters (including Grandma and Derek borrowing our spare Ecuadorian wool sweaters we keep in the car for extra warmth), jackets, or hoodies for this short hike of one mile round trip to get to the observation tower.

The kids had fun climbing on the rocks of course.

The hike takes you to a tall observation tower right along the North Carolina border.  Looking out at the fog rolling over the mountains, you can see why this area is known as the Smoky Mountains.

The tower we climbed to is in the background.

On the way back to the car, we hiked along the Appalachian Trail (a famous hiking trail in the Eastern U.S. that stretches from Georgia all the way to Maine).  This section of the trail zig zags back and forth between North Carolina and Tennessee since it is right along the border, so we had fun with our phone and the GPS monitoring our progress as we bounced back and forth between states on the hike back to the car.

Being silly at a signpost for the Appalachian Trail pointing all kinds of different directions for where we should go.

I had promised my parents the chance to warm up from their long cold Idaho winter.  And even our cold day at Clingmans Dome when there were actual snowflakes falling as we left was warmer than they had been for months back home.  Our next day was truly warm and we went with shorts in the 80-degree weather for a nice drive in Cade's Cove Loop.  This section of the park has several old buildings like cabins, churches with graveyards, and this main section with an old gristmill.  The mill has a man-made channel of water from the creek flowing into it through a wooden canal and there were lots of coins that people had tossed into the canal for luck or whatever else.  Our kids couldn't resist the urge to collect a few fistfuls of coins as they leaned over.  Oh well.

Here we are in front of the mill.

Lydia and Derek found an old style horse-drawn wagon they could climb on.

These cabins and other structures were originally from the 1800s for the first European settlers in what was then Cherokee country.

At the start of the loop was a herd of horses people could pay to ride through the park.  We got out to pet them until one of the horses off in the distance got jealous or felt we were threatening or something and galloped over.  We thought the other horse just wanted some attention too, but no.  He was very bossy and chased the other horses away from the fence where they could be petted, then ran off himself.  It was actually comical and a little bit frightening given how big the bossy horse was.

On the way out of the loop, we hit very heavy traffic.  We had experienced bad traffic other days leaving the park due to construction that was going on, but weren't sure whether we had the same issue in this new section of the park or not.  Finally, we saw the reason for the traffic was a black bear along the road that everyone was gawking at.  This section of the park is good for finding wildlife; in addition to the bear (which we were thrilled to see), we also saw wild turkeys and a herd of deer.

The next day, Tanja and I hiked to Rainbow Falls alone since this 5.4 mile round trip hike was probably more strenuous than we wanted to do with our kids.  I think we had worn Grandma and Grandpa out with our daily hikes as they were very eager to let us have some alone time and stay with the kids.  We noticed that there were several children on this hike at the start, but very few at the end.  We offered encouragement to some groups with smaller kids that had almost made it to the falls at the end as well as a reality check to one group with small kids that hadn't even made it halfway to the falls yet and kids were dragging.

We were also excited to see at least one more bear and possibly two at a distance on this hike as we were starting our climb.  On the way down, we were warned by other hikers that they had just barely passed a rattlesnake that was rattling right along the trail - this would have been very exciting, so we carefully and slowly kept walking and looking for the rattlesnake, but we never found it.

These pretty falls are a prelude to the much bigger Rainbow Falls that were just a little more down the trail, but they made for a good spot to take a few pictures.

Here are the actual Rainbow Falls - supposedly when the afternoon sun hits the water at the proper angle, there is a rainbow that forms in the mist.  We didn't get that phenomenon, but I still had fun hiking behind the waterfall.  It was very refreshing and rewarding after the hike and climb to get to that point.

Our next hike was to Laurel Falls.  Along the trail, a fellow hiker who had stepped into the forest saw me walking with my camera, asked if I were a fellow birdwatcher, and pointed out she had found a yellow hooded warbler.  That meant nothing to me, but she pointed out the pretty yellow bird and even though I didn't have a zoom lens, I think the picture turned out ok, albeit sadly more focused on the leaves in front of the warbler rather than the warbler itself.  Oh well.

Laurel Falls was a very nice 2.5 mile round trip hike that is right in the sweet spot for our kids I think.  The falls themselves are beautiful, and the kids enjoyed climbing down the rocks to get to the base of the falls (though it was wet and potentially slippery to get down there).

Derek likes mimicking me when I show my belly to try to get smiles from the kids.  Silly boy.

For our last hike, we took the kids on a 2.8 mile round trip hike to Grotto Falls.  The road to the trailhead for this hike had just opened that day, so we were one of the first people to hike it this year (it is in the same area of the park as Rainbow Falls but off a spur road).  We had been nervous that the weather that day would be too rainy, but we found a few hours when the forecast was clear and decided to go for it.  Other than the trail being muddy in sections, it worked out great!

This hike is known for the grotto feature that allows hikers to go behind the waterfall.  We took full advantage and got some cool pictures from behind the waterfall.

We were extra excited to see a bear high up in a tree as we were driving back to the cabin from this hike.  I think this bear must have been over 100 feet up and the branch it was on didn't look particularly big, though I suppose looks can be deceiving.  I knew bears were excellent climbers, but seeing this in person was very impressive and exciting, particularly since there didn't seem to be a lot of branches lower down that the bear could have used to climb so high.  The bear is the dark spot in this picture to get a sense how high up it was.

Here it is zoomed in a little.

Overall, I think Tanja and I walked/hiked a little over 18 miles over the course of the week in the park.  The kids were probably just under 13 miles since they didn't do the Rainbow Falls trail.  It was great exercise in a beautiful location.

My take after this vacation is this section of Tennessee is a naturally beautiful part of the country and I am glad we got to see it as a family with Grandma and Grandpa too.  But it was just too crowded with tourists and tourist attractions for my taste - and I have no idea when the slow tourist season would be that I would want to try and go back.