Day 2 - Great Smokey Mountains National Park

Waking up in Cherokee, NC, the weather forecast continued to be poor.  With 100% chance of rain around 11 am; and then 100% chance of rain in the afternoon.  We decided to go for 3 shorter hikes instead of the one long hike to Mt. LeConte.  Someone the day before told us if it is raining, to go and see the waterfalls.  That is what we did. We looked in the park guide to find that there was a short 2.5 loop in the Deep Creek area with three falls.

Getting to the parking lot, there was not a lot of people - just a couple of cars.  This area of the park is much less visited.  Above is Juney Whank falls.

I think we saw five people - all near the parking lot.  The rest of the trail was empty.

Even if you didn't feel like a hike, the falls above (Tom Branch Falls) was not too far off the parking lot.  So, after the falls, we decided to head to the Clingmans Dome parking lot where we had little hopes of having any views.  When we got there, there were some clouds, but no rain.

The hike to Clingmans Dome isn't really a hike - but a walk up a 1/2 mile paved parkway.  In speaking with the ranger - it is also known as heart-attack hill.

The dome itself is strange.  Going up to the top, they do have four informational posts in each direction to identify the peaks - that was helpful.

After the dome, we headed back to the car to eat our sandwiches (it was a bit windy and cold at this point) and switch shoes for our hike to Andrews Bald.  A shorter 4 mile out-and-back hike.  It was a quiet trail - easy to follow.  We maybe saw six people total.

Apparently, they are set up for mud for the second half of the hike had log walks.  We really didn't need them though for it just wasn't muddy.  Nor at this point was the sky full of rain clouds - really forecasters?  In fact, it was partly sunny.

Upon getting to the bald, I saw the first snake of the trip - ick.

We decided since it was nice out, we would take a small detour up to the Appalachian Trail back to Clingman's Dome and back to the parking lot.

I suppose if we were to do it all again, the way to do it is to first go to Andrews Bald from the parking lot, on the way back take the cut back to the Appalachian Trial...and hike the Appalachian trail to Clingman's dome instead of the paved superhighway.  

The Appalacian Trail at this point had some nice views!

Then, for our last hike, we decided upon another 4 miler.  So when the severe storms rolled in, we wouldn't be all that far from the car...oh yeah, what storms?  It was beautiful out at this point.  The Chimney Rocks trailhead was fairly full with cars - we saw maybe 30/40 or so people on the trail.  We were lucky to be there when we were for it would be closed for repairs in a few weeks.

I knew it was a rock scramble at the top from reviews; there was adequate signage stating the dangers.

The hike up was quite beautiful; a portion of it followed a creek.

There were a lot of wildflowers.

Upon getting to the rock scramble, there was another Illinois couple there.  The man went up, and the woman did not.  I decided I would not either.  While I waited for Rob and spoke with the Polish-Illinois woman, a group of four boys that we passed on the way up arrived.  Three of them did it, one of them did not.  Well - it certainly wasn't for everyone.

Even if you were not interested in the rock climb at the end, the first mile of this trail was worth doing either way.  Very nice.  After this hike, we headed to the Tennessee side of the park for the night.  We stayed in Pigeon Forge - tourist trap of the Southeast; but the hotel we stayed at was terrific with a nice breakfast and great pool area...even cookies and popcorn in the evening.  That night, watching the news was interesting for it was just about tornadoes.  Just west of where we were staying, there were continuous tornado sightings.  We showered in the evening just in case the power was gone in the morning for it seemed like it was all headed our way.  We were again not happy about the forecast for the next day - 100% rain at points.