Asked which is the most visited National Park in the country, most people would think it must be Yellowstone or Yosemite or some of the other large parks in the west. Nope! Great Smoky Mountains National Park takes the top spot. Its location – within a day’s drive of half the US population – and its incredible beauty attracted 14 million people in 2021. (Zion with 5 million and Yellowstone with 4.9 rounded out the top 3.)
GSMNP is a wide area in the Appalachian Mountains that spans the North Carolina and Tennessee border with a seemingly endless series of forested mountain ridges. The natural vegetation in the area releases organic compounds with a bluish tint that mix with the natural morning fog to create a blue-tinged, smoky appearance – hence the name. The park is well known for its views and waterfalls, its elk herd, and its hiking. Hiking!
Due to a series of coincidental occurances that might be considered a perfect storm, our visit to GSMNP was nothing like we expected it would be. We had selected a few hikes featuring views and planned to spend most of our daylight hours in the park out on the trails. We left home aware that our generator (used to provide additional electricity, or charge the batteries) was not working, which would not be a problem since, with our typical usage, the batteries can ordinarily keep us going fine for a couple of days all by themselves. We also have solar panels that help keep the batteries charged, and they charge from the alternator whenever the truck engine is running.
We arrived at camp in the evening and our batteries started hinting that they might be nearing the end of their useful life span. By morning, we had essentially run out of battery power. It was unseasonably cold (28F/-2C) and we couldn’t run the furnace to heat the RV. (It runs on propane, but an electric fan blows the hot air around, so no electricity, no heat…) And the sun wasn’t up yet, so no solar, either. Ha! Let’s drive to our trailhead early and the batteries will recharge.
We arrived at the Newfound Gap trailhead and found dozens of people who had preceded us up the mountain, all lined up with their cameras to take sunrise photos. It was 17F/-8C at 6000 feet/1800 meters. So, we did the only thing we could do – joined the line and took photos! Then we sat in our RV and drank hot tea until we could feel our fingers again and realized the temperature wasn’t going to get high enough that day to suit our warmest hiking clothes. (We’re on our way to Florida, after all…) And at those temperatures, our batteries would be working extra hard to try to recharge from the solar panels. OK, let’s drive to the major sights in the park. Athough we missed not hiking, we did find spots with beautiful views of the Smokys!
Except for Clingman’s Dome. It’s the highest point in the park at 6643 feet/2000 meters. When we arrived, it was deep in the fog and frozen solid. We marveled at the heavy frost and rime ice on the trees, and frozen micro waterfalls everywhere. We took a few photos, warmed our fingers and headed off in the RV, again driving beautiful roads all the while charging the batteries.
To satisfy our urge for hiking, we found a few lower altitude places to explore in the mid-afternoons. The Three Waterfall Trail was quite pretty and allowed us to check out the Deep Creek area of the park. Our friend Shawna who lives just outside the park offered to take us to her favorite local spots, which included the Road to Nowhere with amazing views of Fontana Lake, just outside of Deep Creek.
We enjoyed the hiking in the Smokemont area. Although not as epic as the summit hikes we’d hoped to do, the Smokemont Loop and surrounding trails got us out to see this amazing natural landscape, awesome fall foliage (almost as good as Vermont!) with occasional glimpses between the trees of the high ridges above us in the distance.
Despite using the solar panels the whole time we were out hiking, the batteries were still grumbling. Let’s drive to Clingmans Dome to see the view later in the afternoon when it’s less likely to be foggy. Arriving there, we found hundreds of photographers lining up for sunset photos! Who knew this was a ‘thing’ in the National Park? (Everybody but us, apparently.) It was a blast, we had fun. We did some short hikes around the summit, including to an impressive tower with a stunning 360 view of the Smoky Mountains. And yes, wearing every item of clothing we had along, we hung around until well past sunset, taking photos and soaking up the jaw-dropping views.
All of this only means one thing… We’ll be back to Great Smoky Mountains National Park to hike! And next time we’re bringing more clothes and new batteries.
For anyone who’s interested, more Deep Creek, Smokemont, Sunrise (Newfound Gap and Clingmans Dome) and Sunset (Clingmans Dome) pix…
