I refer to Pigeon Forge as "Reno" and Gatlinburg as "Vegas". Pigeon Forge is tons better than it was in the 80s, but Gatlinburg is still better.Date: 6/26/2009 9:22:33 PM
Author: Tuckins1
Thanks all! It is gorgeous down there... We stayed in Pigeon Forge first- I wouldn''t recommend it unless you just want a cheap place to stay while exploring the smokies. Gatlinberg is a much nicer place to stay, it has lots of cool shops and things to do- like Hillbilly Golf!
Date: 6/27/2009 7:44:14 PM
Author: April20
Your pictures are beautiful! It looks like you had a great time. What tour did you do at Mammoth? I grew up near there and did a ton of field trips there growing up and did the ''Wild Cave'' tour about nine years ago. It''s a fantastic cave site- I never get tired of going there.
I''m going to tell something on myself here that I have tried to bury deeeeeep into the recesses of my mind, but your pics of the chimney tops in the Smoky Mntn''s brought it forward and it won''t go back. I am going to apologize now for the thread jack.
My mom and step-dad used to be big hikers. They would take these long hiking trips with friends. Once my younger brother and sister came along, that got scaled back, but we''d still do these occasional family trips. My siblings were in backpacks (too little to hike) and I was about 10, trugging up the mountain toward the chimney tops and I DID NOT want to be there. I wanted to be doing ANYTHING else. So what did my parent decide to do with a whining 10 year old? Well, LIE to me, of course. What else could they do? They told me there was a BOWLING ALLEY at the top of the mountain. AND I BELIEVED THEM. You can only imagine what happened when we got to the top and there I was looking for the bowling alley and asking other hikers where it was. They looked at me like I was nuts and my parents like they wondered what kind of child I was. I have pretty much never lived that down.
Okay, thread jack over.
I don''t think I could do the Wild Cave tour now if I wanted to. I was about 23 when I did it and much more apt to go, "Yeah, let me crawl thru miles and miles of dirt on my hands and knees! Sounds fab!". Seriously, we were walking down a path and the guide stopped and says, okay, here''s our turn. It was a hole near the floor. We spent hours crawling- sometimes army crawling. My neck was sore for days and my knees were really swollen from all the time I spent on them. It was a lot of fun though- I have great memories from it.Date: 6/27/2009 10:18:26 PM
Author: Tuckins1
We did the Grand avenue tour... It''s the longest and most strenuous hike you can do besides the Wild Cave tour. I was definitely not ready to crawl for miles through tiny passageways, in the dirt and dark!! That''s way too hard core for me.
Chimney tops was a challenging hike. In 1 mile you go up about 1000 feet, so it''s a push!
Date: 6/28/2009 8:39:54 AM
Author: April20
I don''t think I could do the Wild Cave tour now if I wanted to. I was about 23 when I did it and much more apt to go, ''Yeah, let me crawl thru miles and miles of dirt on my hands and knees! Sounds fab!''. Seriously, we were walking down a path and the guide stopped and says, okay, here''s our turn. It was a hole near the floor. We spent hours crawling- sometimes army crawling. My neck was sore for days and my knees were really swollen from all the time I spent on them. It was a lot of fun though- I have great memories from it.Date: 6/27/2009 10:18:26 PM
Author: Tuckins1
We did the Grand avenue tour... It''s the longest and most strenuous hike you can do besides the Wild Cave tour. I was definitely not ready to crawl for miles through tiny passageways, in the dirt and dark!! That''s way too hard core for me.
Chimney tops was a challenging hike. In 1 mile you go up about 1000 feet, so it''s a push!
I don''t think DH has ever been. He couldn''t do the Wild Cave tour if he wanted- his shoulder measurement is too big to fit thru the tight spots. I''m going to stick the Grand Avenue on our list though and take that one.