The Smoky Mountains (Part 1)

There are so many cool places here in the South that we live fairly close too that we wished we could take more advantage of while living in Tennessee.  However, most of the times we have a break we go see family.  During Justin's August break we finally decided to head to one of our many destinations we want to visit.  We made the trek across the state of Tennessee and spent some time in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park and Gatlinburg.

The first day we checked into our awesome cabin, went grocery shopping, and walked around the Gatlinburg streets.  The next day was our day in the park.

We found a 1.5 mile paved hike to Laural Falls.  We tried to find hikes that were doable with the little boys and that allowed us to see cool parts of the park.

Laural Falls:

After the morning hike we headed back to the cabin and ate lunch.  After lunch we traveled about 45 minutes to our next hiking destination: Clingman's Dome.

There was some really pretty pull offs along the way that we stopped to snap pictures at.  This pointy part of the mountain was called Chimney's rock.  I loved how lush and green everything was!!

Jackson wanted to practice his rock climbing at one of the pull offs

Clingman's Dome is the highest point in the Great Smoky Mountains and one of the highest peaks in the Eastern United States.  The trail was a paved 1 mile hike to the top, and although it was paved it was VERY STEEP!  Poor Justin had to push Jonah in the stroller the whole way.

This is the observation tower at the top of the peak that takes you above the trees to see a 360 degree panoramic view of the Smokies.  On a perfectly clear day they say you can see about 100 miles off in the distance!

This is what the views looked like... pretty incredible.  I love how each "layer" of mountain can be seen rolling around.  The further distance they were away the more faint they look.  (look closely for layer 4)

The day we were there was very clear so we got to see one of the furthest peaks away.  Mt Mitchell is 73 miles away in North Carolina's Black Mountains and is the highest peak in the Eastern United States.  (Look closely... its there, I promise!)

After hiking in the park all afternoon, we headed back to the cabin for dinner and then went to Ober Gatlinburg.  It is a ski resort with some water slides and an alpine slide.  It was my first time doing an alpine slide.  We decided the water slides didn't look like they were worth the money so we did the alpine slide a couple of times.  The boys loved it!

They also had a little play area these huge steep nets.  We were really impressed with how Jonah could climb it all on his own.  

They also loved the slide.  Here is a video of them having fun:

When we booked the vacation, we knew we wanted to get an affordable room with a kitchen in it so that we didn't have to spend any money on going out to eat.  After searching for awhile we found a great little cabin.  It was actually what they called a "Honeymoon Lodge" but it worked perfectly for us.  And because we went during the "off" season, it was a 40% off!

Check out the video if you want to go on a little tour of the place with me.