Tennessee Camping Trip - North Carolina

In October our family traveled to the colorful state of Tennessee. We spent an evening in Nashville to visit Uncle Eric's family, then went down to Smokey Mountain National Park to hike and camp for a week. One day we drove down to the North Carolina side of the park. Here's some of our adventures in North Carolina! Meigs Falls in the tallest waterfall in the park area, at almost 200 feet tall. It was so beautiful! But the way up to view it was a doozie! It was only a .2 mile hike, but it was a solid staircase. Doesn't sound hard, but it made the walk up to Red Rocks in Colorado seem easy! Daphne stayed in the truck with Grammy, but Jude rode on Ian's shoulders to see the waterfall with us.

And Jude loved it up there! Or maybe he liked the cookies we munched on from Subway.

Here's an interesting story that happened to us while we were up there. Technically, we were in the Cherokee Indian Reservation and no longer in the National Park. At the base, where all the cars were parked, there was a truck with several hound dogs. The dogs were going crazy. We didn't think much of it when at the base. But just as we got to the top of the stairs, we heard a gun shot...very close. About a minute later we could tell something was coming toward us through the trees. Shelley has been terrified of seeing a bear when on a trail, and so her fear was becoming very real. But then we all saw the bright orange of hunter clothing. But we could also tell the hunter was dragging something! Sure enough, the hunter had just killed a bear. He brought it just past us down the stairs. So we came within two feet of a bear, but it had just been killed.

Then a few minutes later, we heard another gunshot. We waited for that hunter to come down with a bear, but he came down empty handed. He said he had been chasing the bigger of the two bears, but had missed with his shot. Well, that was my cue to head back down to the car. Bears are in the area and they are mad for getting shot at!

But our drive to N. Carolina didn't end with only seeing bears. We got to see several elk as well! (Much to Gramps pleasure). We were passing the Cherokee High school and looking at the football field, when we suddenly noticed a young elk bull standing there! So we pulled over to look at him. Then Ian was shocked to see yet another elk bull standing about five feet from our truck on the other side of the road! The two elk joined together then ran to play on the football field. It was great to see the giant animals, but also interesting to look at the signage in the Cherokee language. Here's a photo that shows off both at the same time!

After all the excitement between the bear and elk, it was time to eat. So we found a small local diner for dinner. And then it was time to drive back to Tennessee. Just after we crossed back into the National Park, in a large clearing we were blessed to see a huge bull elk!

All in all, it was a great day. The waterfall was breathtaking and well worth the drive!