A day at Cades Cove, TN

Pigeon Forge and Cades Cove, TN.

Welcome to Karen, the latest follower of our Blog.

This weekend was a sad one.  We stayed close to "home" most of the weekend.   My thoughts often were of Margie and Bruce and their children and grandchildren who are in the midst of their grieving over this unthinkable event.   But, today I needed to get out and about so we decided to pack a picnic lunch and head over to Cades Cove, about an hour and a half drive from the campground.

I had printed out directions on Mapquest but decided, instead, to listen to Lucy our GPS. (my first goof in directions of the day)  We should have followed Mapquest.  Lucy took us through Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge.  Not where we wanted to be!

Since we were there, we made one stop in Pigeon Forge at the Christmas store.  We detoured through there  and stopped several years ago on our drive to Louisiana.  This area has really built up since we drove through about 12 years ago.

We've been looking for an electric candle like many houses have in their windows and we had back in NJ.    We have a ceramic pumpkin sitting outside our Fiver for Halloween.  The original light in it broke.    We have been to several stores looking for a window candle but no luck.  Not even WalMart of all places!   We found a small window type candle at this Christmas store but I refuse to pay almost $10 for a smaller candle than what I had paid a few dollars for previously.    We will wait until WalMart sets up their Christmas displays.

This store had all sorts of stuff, everything overpriced.   Hey, Terri which of these do you want?

We finally got to the 11 mile Cades Cove loop drive.  But first we were hungry for that picnic lunch.  We pulled into the picnic area and saw many empty tables but no place to park.  We drove further down the loop until we saw a side road.   After we drove through a small stream we found the perfect spot to tailgate.

Out next stop was to walk to the oldest cabin at Cades Cove built in the early 1820's.  This was the John Oliver home.   His family were the first white settlers in the area.   The house sits more than 1/2 mile off the loop road, a pleasant walk.

Up the road a bit was the Primitive Baptist Church built in 1887.

I tired out the pews.   All I can say is I would hope the services were short!

Further along and we came to the Methodist Church built in 1902.

Their pews were a little better.   Maybe the Baptists were a hardier breed or the Methodists learned some improvements after once having sat in the Baptist pews.

Because it was a beautiful fall day and the leaves were changing, many people had the same idea as we did.  There were times when we drove bumper to bumper cruising along at 2 mph.

Two views of the valley.

The only wildlife we saw was one black bear.  He was rambling through the forest.   A truck load of folks a few vehicles ahead of us stopped in the middle of the road to take pictures staying there until the bear walked out of sight.   Therefore, all of us behind them did not have a chance to take a picture.  

Gregg-Cable House - 1879

John P Cable Grist Mill

Carter Shields Cabin - 1910

Tipton House - 1870's

After almost completing the loop road, I looked at the Cades Cove Tour brochure and saw a side road that looked to head toward the direction we wanted to go. We (I) decided this would be a good idea.  (My 2nd goof in driving directions today)  This meant taking one of the valley roads back onto the loop road and retacing where we had already drove for about 2 miles.  Easy enough. 

We then took the "different" road.  Once we got on it we found it was a cinder road 12 miles long and ONE WAY!  No turning around.   This road took us up over the mountains with steep drops offs, winding and curving and very narrow.  Len said it was fun.  I hung on to the door handle.

This is looking down at the Methodist Church on our way up my SHORT CUT :)

We had planned on making Tacos for dinner but after coming down from the mountain road we were hungry for dinner and had a 65 mile drive back to the campground so Ruby Tuesday it was!