It had been quite a long time between national parks, unless you count Los Haitises in The Dominican Republic but we ended our drought with the most visited national park in the country! Last year they saw a record 12.5 million visitors. We're still not entirely sure how that number is calculated but it seems to have to do with cars entering the park. The park does not seem to be built for that many visitors. The parking lots are not large enough, and they don't have a bus system. We were glad we were visiting in the off season.
We came in on the North Carolina side so we started with the Oconaluftee Visitor Center. The weather had been questionable and they were thinking of closing the main road through the park if it made a turn for the worse so we decided to not spend too long on the southwestern side and instead headed straight through to Tennessee.
The drive through the park was gorgeous. The road was completely clear but there was snow building up on the sides and it was gorgeous. The views from the road seemed like they would have been spectacular if we had been able to see them, but unfortunately the visibility was low and we couldn't see much.
On the Tennessee side we went to the Sugarlands Visitor Center. From there there was a short hike out to Gatlinburg that Aiden was allowed on, so we started with that. Even though the path largely followed the road it was still lovely.
While at the visitor centers we asked rangers for hiking recommendations for the next couple of days. On Saturday we chose to do the Grotto Falls hike. In the summer this hike is very crowded, but very few people do it in the winter. This is partially because the road that leads to the trial head is closed in the winter, adding an extra five miles to an otherwise two mile hike. It turned out to the perfect hike for us for the day, and was a great recommendation. Although it did start snowing while we were hanging out at the falls.
Apparently there is also a lodge further up the trail that uses pack llamas. We were incredibly curious but unfortunately it wasn't llama string season, and was a little too far to hike up the lodge.
On Sunday we were planning to go to the Alum Cave Bluffs. The weather got better and the view is supposed to be stunning from up there. Unfortunately the road through the park was temporarily closed again so we had to pick a backup plan. A ranger told us that the Laurel Falls hike was the most popular hike in the park and that it is absolutely mayhem in the summer. So we decided to take advantage of the relatively empty park and check it out.
In the parking lot for the trailhead we ran into a super friendly group of five older adults who live in the area. They said the short walk to Laurel Falls is completely paved and a bit of a disappointment but if you go past the falls you can go another 3 miles up to Cove Mountain. We were hoping there would be a good view from the mountain, but it was still pretty heavily treed. There was an observation tower but you couldn't climb it. We're glad we took their recommendation and went up, it was a lovely hike.
There are a ton of hikes in the park that we didn't get a chance to do. We can also see how the park would be amazing in the spring and summer with wild flowers and new growth or in the fall with leaves changing colors. We hope to come back and do some of their view hikes in a shoulder season. However, it honestly didn't seem spectacular enough to for either of us to want to fight our way through millions of visitors in peak season. We seem to have come at the right time.
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