Cades Cove (Part 2)

The next morning we headed a different direction in the Park to a place called "Cades Cove".  This one of the lowest points in the park in a beautiful valley.  It used to be an old farming community.  There is an 11 mile loop that we drove with different stopping points along the way.  They had some original structures that you could go into and read some history about.  It was really neat!

Left to Right: 1-John Oliver cabin, built in the early 1820's this is the oldest log home in the cove.

2- The Methodist Church was built in 1902 in 115 days for $115 dollars!!

3- A sourghum mill was used to squeeze sugary juice from stalks of cane.  In the background is the Gregg-Cable house.  This house is believed to be the first all-frame house in the Cove

4- A part of the loop surrounded by beautiful, tall, green trees

The structure of things were a little different in the oldtime South than they are in the oldtime West.  This picture is mostly for my dad to see.  Interesting way to build a fence huh?!

The views in the valley were incredible-- I think it was my favorite views in the park.

There was a visitors center halfway through the loop that we stopped at and ate our picnic lunch.

There was also a walking tour of some more buildings from the old community.  Here are a couple of old barns, again very interesting structure compared to the West

This is an old water-powered saw mill.  It was cool to go inside and see how water provided power to the buildings.  

Cades Cove is also where they say you will have the most chance of seeing wildlife.  As you can see from the pictures in the previous post the views are very full of lush trees and plant growth, therefore it doesn't leave much room to spot animals.  So because there are more clear areas here we did see all of our wildlife here.  We saw deer and wild turkeys:

And our favorite of course was the Smoky Mountain Black Bear!!  We were driving the loop and came across a little creek where about 3 people were out of their cars looking at something.  We didn't spot the little guy at first so Justin pulled over and I hopped out of the car to walk down and see if it was anything worth pulling over for.  Once I saw this adorable baby bear I ran back and got the boys.

He was super little and just so adorable... he didn't seem to mind at all about the people who were close by.  Seeing that he was so little, I asked the Ranger who was there if the mama was near by, but he said that he was big enough that he was independent.  That really surprised me cause he looked super young.  Jackson had been wanting to see a bear so the kids were pretty excited about it!

On the way back to our cabin we pulled over to get some more beautiful scenery pictures: