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We just spent 2 weeks in the
mountains of North Carolina
and Tennessee. (July, 2003) We have a 40 ft American Dream motorhome.
Most of the roads in the mountains are not made for any size
motorhome, in my opinion . It is best to stay on the major highways.
The above picture is of a "small" mountain.
Here are some of the other things we learned.
I cannot remember the exit
number off Interstate 40 but it is on Highway 66 which turns
into highway 44l. It is dual lanes and very busy. You can also
take Highway 4ll off I-40 but it is a little scary and only a 2 lane
winding road . It had been about 10 years
since we were in Pigeon Forge. Boy, had alot of changes been
made. It was in the mid 80's with not alot of humidity (mid July).
I understand that it is congested most of the year. October would be
the prettiest time to go cause that is prime time leaf changing time
but there would be huge crowds.
There are motels everywhere now. It looked like Myrtle Beach west to
me. Of course, the biggest attraction is Dollywood. It
is right smack dab in the middle of Pigeon Forge. The trolley
runs often. There are lots of outlets.
There are many, many
campgrounds. We stayed at Eagles Nest on Highway 321 (Wears
Valley Rd). It is a Passport America. I would
recommend this to anyone. We would stay there again. Also
River Plantation Campground on 44l looked very good although we did
not stay there.
Cades Cove, a part of the national park service,
looked good too. It is a little harder to get to if you have a big
rig. I don't think we will ever take our rig up that mountain
though. In fact, I only saw tents, pop-ups, and small RVs there.
I think they have 160 sites with a maximum 35 ft length. There is
running water and bathroom facilities only. No electric hookups or
shower facilities. There is an 11 mile round trip tour to take at 10
mph which takes about 2- 3 hours. We saw
several deer while we were there. Our daughter and son-in-law
were there at dusk and saw about 100 deer feeding. And it is high enough up
(1,807ft) ,
that it was cool and no humidity. It would be a good place to
check out.
You could end up spending a
fortune or just enjoying the mountains which is what we did. There
are waterfalls everywhere in the streams which are beside most
of the roads.
There are hiking trails every where.
Gatlinburg is a beautiful
place. It is a shoppers paradise. There are
motels, restaurants, gas station, etc. I do not remember
seeing any campgrounds. It is only about 5 miles from Pigeon
Forge. The trolley runs often between Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge.
I would recommend parking your car and taking the trolley as parking
is scarce. Oh, while
we were there - the chair lift up the side of the mountain broke.
It was full of people at the time and it took 4 hours to fix the
thing. They had to get everybody off individually. I bet
there are alot of people that will never ride a chair lift again
because of this experience.
From Interstate 40, take
exit 27. It is highway 74 and is double lanes. It will
take you to highway 441(double lanes) which will take you into
downtown Cherokee.
Harrah's Casino is on 441. Don't take Hwy 19 if you are
in a motorhome.
The two campgrounds we would recommend are:
Happy Holidays which is on 441 close to Harrah's.
KOA Cherokee
Another campground which is close to Cherokee on the way to
Gatlinburg is Smokemont in the national
park. We couldn't stay there either. It has 142
sites with a maximum length of 27 ft motorhomes. They have only
running water and bathroom facilities. It is 2,198 ft elevation.
You could also take highway 19 off Interstate 40 to get to Cherokee but be warned it
was laid out by a drunk snake. It is a beautiful ride through
Maggie Valley. .
Cherokee is only about 35 miles from Gatlinburg, but it takes
close to an hour to make the trip through the mountains because of
a speed limit of 35 or slower and many tourists. It is also not a
road for motorhomes as that same snake helped lay this road out
too. It is a beautiful ride with many pull offs to view the
mountains and streams. Most of the streams had people in big
rubber tubes enjoying the water. Water depth was knee deep. Beware of fallen rock such
as below picture.
The round trip in the motorhome was 976 miles.
This does not count the mileage we put on the car for our day trips.
Of course, Interstate 40 around Black Mountain is a 6% grade for 4
miles. And on the west side of the mountain it gets a little
scary with lots of winding and hilly lanes with some truck runoffs.
We did not have any trouble pulling the hills but did see some RV's
that were having trouble. As Jim said "I'm not worried about getting
up the mountain, it's getting down that bothers me." We did ok
there too. Thanks to the pack brake.
pictures made July 2003 in the
Smoky Mts
& Cades Cove, North Carolina & Tennessee
by Ann & Jim , Graphics by Ann
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