There's nothing like sleeping on the ground and not showering for four days to make you appreciate the comforts of home. Comforts like warm showers and clothes that don't smell like sweat, bug spray and campfire. A soft bed, solid walls and no chance of waking up to bears rooting around for food in the kitchen.
That introduction makes it sound like I had a horrible time camping in the Great Smoky Mountains over Memorial Day when I really enjoyed everything up until the last night. We had great weather the whole time, spent the better part of our days hiking surrounded by lush forest, and shared some tasty meals over the campfire.
Great Smoky Mountains National Park is the most visited National Park in the United States. We saw just a small portion of its eastern side. We arrived a little before dinner time on Friday and set up our home base in the Cosby campground. On Saturday, we set out from our campsite to hike part of the Appalachian Trail to the Mt. Cammerer lookout tower. The first part of the trail was very steep, but we were rewarded with an amazing panoramic view from the tower. We also saw a lot of wildlife: snails, birds, a rattlesnake and two black bears! The bears were in a grassy area on the right side of the trail when we approached, and the smaller of the two took off to the right as soon as he heard us. The larger (mama?) bear was much less concerned about our presence and ambled across the trail in front of us, ending up about 100 feet off the trail to our left. After a few moments of hoping both bears would end up on one side of the trail or the other, we got took out car keys, started clapping loudly and walked straight through the middle. In all of the excitement, no one remembered to take a photo.
Top to bottom, L to R: Our campsite; group shot; foliage; Clingman's Dome; view from Clingman's Dome; campfire; Mt. Cammerer lookout tower; view from close to the highest point in Tennessee.
On Sunday, we drove through Gatlinburg, TN to the park's main entrance and joined hoards of other people at the visitor's center. The main street of Gatlinburg is a boardwalk/Vegas Strip combination of shopping, motels and themed restaurants. We were very glad to have picked another place to stay, far from the crowds of people. After the visitor's center, we drove into the park towards Clingman's Dome, the highest point in Tennessee. About 3/4 of a mile from the parking lot at Clingman's Dome, we decided to join the other people parking on the side of the road and hiking the last bit. At the top is a space-age lookout tower, which we climbed in a heavy mist. We couldn't see much at all, but we did get to take one of my favorite photos from the trip: Keizo and I in front of a cloud (middle row). We did a short hike not too far from the base of the lookout tower which took us down below the clouds and through several different landscapes - rain forest, pine groves and grassy fields - before trekking back to the car and joining the line of traffic exiting the park in the late afternoon.
Our last evening proceeded like the two previous ones as we made dinner and s'mores over the campfire and turned in at very reasonable hour when watching the fire no longer held our interest. Around 3:00 AM there was a very loud, terrified scream not too far from our tent. I was instantly wide awake, but when I poked Keizo to ask if he had heard it, he hadn't heard a thing! We heard other people moving around in the campsites next to us, and after a quick trip to the bathroom where we met other campers who had seen two bears moving through the campsite, we tried to go back to sleep. Sleeping was challenging though, as further away people were banging on dumpsters and yelling.
Although tired from the lack of sleep, I was glad when morning came and we started to pack up our things for the trip home. We learned that the terrified scream was caused not by a run-in with a bear, but by a girl who had been spooked when she spotted a whole family sitting in their car and staring at her as she returned from the bathroom (the family had seen the bear and retreated to the comfort and safety of their vehicle). We thought this was it until we spotted the mess at a campsite about three away from ours. The food hadn't been locked up as instructed and the place was torn apart; we have no idea where the people went who were staying there, and can only guess that bears visited before 3 AM when we were woken up by the screaming. Surely we would have heard something otherwise? It was a rather sobering end to an otherwise great trip. I am looking forward to camping again, but hopefully in a place with fewer bears.
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