Turn left at the number 8 streetlight (yes, they are numbered) on Parkway in downtown Gatlinburg. This puts you onto Airport Road. Follow the signs to the park's entrance. Gatlinburg is so close to the park boundary, this 6-mile loop tour actually begins in the city limits. There is no entrance fee but an informative guidebook is $.75. We loved this tiny piece of the Smokies experience, cruising slowly through drooping trees enveloped in a white mist. Our tunnel of trees wrapped itself around the climbing twisting road at the base of Mt. LeConte and lured us deeper and higher.
Small car parks popped out of the turns to invite us to investigate the restored cabins of the region’s first settlers or hike to view the tumbling 25 foot high Grotto Falls. Two room, original log cabins with one window and stone fireplaces told us how hard and sparse life with nine children could be. We took a small hike through the claustrophobic cabins and into the woods beyond and felt the isolation. In the Ephraim Bales cabin, Mr. Bales and his wife Minerva clothed, sheltered and fed nine children on a 70-acre mountainside.
Several other historic structures including the Alfred Reagan Place with a gristmill litter the roadside and are convenient for exploring. We found the colors of the Reagan homestead a little startling: lime green and yellow with a dash of lime sherbet.
Further, hovering hemlocks guarded our path as trailheads for Trillium Gap Trail and Bullhead Trail split off for the summit of Mt. LeConte.
Here we topped out and slowly dove into the Roaring Fork watershed as the air cooled and a bubbling stream rose to us follow down the trail. Ahead cars lined the narrow one-way trail and we investigated to discover “The Place of a Thousand Drips”, the birthplace of a new waterfall. A rising canyon wall hung heavy with moss and ferns while a dozen spiraling trickles of water wore away at the stone. As our path twirled down the mountainside a thunderous mountain stream kept us company. The lower we came down the mountain the faster and harder the stream ran. Slick boulders gave it a pathway and it splashed hurriedly to the next turn. The area was cooling, moist and quiet with only the sounds of tumbling water offering company.
Suddenly the exit was there and we were in Gatlinburg again but this time on highway 321 north of Gatlinburg headed for East Parkway.