MountainLaurel
Appalachian Trail
Ty on App Trail
Dennis Ouellette
We said good-bye to the gecko’s, the palms, the nasty iguana, crocs and all the beautiful shore birds. We are now enjoying all the deciduous trees, pine and fir trees, and North Carolina is full on bloom! Instead of geckos we are seeing all sorts of salamanders (did you know that the Great Smokies have the highest number of salems?) and lots of turtles!. Waterfalls abound, deer, birds and other small animals are plentiful. We’ve been staying in some secluded campgrounds which are quiet, dark at night and forested – its wonderful.It has rained everyday and most nights since we left Atlanta Georgia and have made our way to the Great Smokey Mountains
We have gotten in some great hikes along the way too. We’ve mostly been sticking to 4 miles because of my hip however, Ty picked out a 5 mile hike which turned out to be 6.5 and 2 of that was straight up!), then another hike up to the Appalachia Trail, 2.5 one way straight up 2,000+ elevation gain plus another 1/2 mile on the trail. I am pooped. With all the rains we’ve had for the last 2 days the streams are running fast and high which makes for some spectacular waterfalls.
The Great Smokey Mountains are a sight to see – so majestic, vast, green (should be it has rained for 5 days!) and back country. To give you an idea of the blooms, attached is Mountain Laurel and me along the trail.
We encountered our first detour in plans pulling the rig because of roads and low bridges. We are staying south of the Great Smokies and we intended to take the main road thru up to Gatlinburg TN. But as we traveled sans Wanda we encountered 3 tunnels with height clearance of 13’6″ IF you drive down the center. Wanda is 13′ – too close for comfort. No worries, we will just drive up this back road on the east side of GSM and head to Knoxville. So as we traveled without Wanda we took that road and there is huge sign NO TRAILERS TO EXCEED 30 FEET. Well, Wanda is a “big girl” then you add the truck; this will not work. And we saw why, twisty, tourney, up and down and around – it was a wild ride; thank goodness we decided to check it out! So change of plans and we headed east as there are plenty of options, just added a few extra miles.
I end this post on a sad note, my youngest brother Dennis, passed away on May 5 after a long illness. My bro with always a smile on his face, love of a good scotch whiskey, loved kids, especially the littler the better and was the only one whom Beth would let tease her. Dennis, you will be missed dearly.
Rest In Peace
