The Great Smoky Mountains (Part 3/4)
An anniversary on the trail…
Perhaps because we felt we were being lazy — when will this need in me to be “productive” fade a bit? — or perhaps it was guilt from too much fried food from dinner on the previous night (pecan fried chicken and fried catfish), we decided to do some hiking on Thursday.
Big Creek Trail (out-and-back, 10.4 miles) is actually located on the North Carolina side of the Great Smokies. The last bit of the road to reach the trailhead — gravel horrors! — was so narrow that we could not imagine how we could have navigated it if another car had been coming the other way.
The trail was beautiful, a gentle but steady incline in a wide trail that went lockstep with the creek itself. The path was also used by horses — we ended up seeing 6 riders in some massive-looking noble steeds — so from time to time, we had to avoid big piles of still fresh manure.
It didn’t hit me until later in the hike that it was our wedding anniversary. N. kept having us take selfies with him pointing 3 fingers and me with 2, for our 32nd. One of his best photo composition ideas has been to take pictures directly upwards, leading to gorgeous photos of an eye view look at the tree canopies, some that include all shades of fall, from bright and mustard yellows to deep oranges and reds.
Today’s adventures — or misadventures — took us exactly in the opposite direction: crowded rather than solitary, urban rather than natural, gaudy rather than gorgeous: downtown Gatlinburg.
I know, I know, but our intentions were pure! I wanted to visit the Craftsmen’s Fair at the convention center ($10 per person). The big hall was mostly empty except for the vendors themselves. A couple of talented woodworkers were selling massive cutting boards (how to fit them in the van?) and metalworkers had spoons and planter hangers (also impractical in our 20-footer). In the end, N. got a little bag of roasted pecans for $8.50 and tipped the change, so truly, those pecan were, for all practical purposes, $30 for the bag!
Walking along the busy strip in downtown Gatlinburg induced a different mindset wherein we became fascinated by the souvenir shops that sold t-shirts with the picture of what looks to be a Heinz ketchup bottle with the writing, “Catch Up with Jesus!”; by candy shops that sold caramel apples and slabs of fudge the size of one’s face; by the ice cream shops which touted Mason jars filled with sugary frozen concoctions to double their height; by the moonshine joints that advertised “free tastings!” Helpfully, there was even a Walgreens tucked shyly on the main drag wherein I imagine they make sure to stock on antacid.
The only interesting thing today was a whole slew of “skies”: the SkyLift, SkyTrail, SkyBridge, SkyDeck, SkyCenter. We went up on ski lifts to the top of a tall hill. The views were great if one avoided looking at the cityscape below. I could even see the speck of that concrete observatory on Clingman’s Dome.
