Great Smoky Mountains National Park

On Monday morning Jansen woke us up really early with a high fever. This kid cannot catch a break, but he is such a trooper just going with the flow. He hasn’t complained once that we are driving cross country while he’s feeling poorly. The early rise did give us a good jump on the long day though. First stop…Great Smoky Mountain National Park!

A little taste of how we pass the drive time…

We did change our park plan & rather than going into the middle of the park for the very popular highest point at Clingman’s Dome, we skirted around to the peaceful side of the park (NOT Gatlinburg, oh my goodness, what a tourist trap! We did not fall into it.). So instead we did the very short walk at Foot Rock for some phenomenal views from the top of a lookout tower.

From the top you could see the road we were supposed to be able to take up and down the mountain, but there was construction, so we had to take the ridiculously scary switchback locals road.

In the shot below you can see a forest fire burning in the distance.

And Jansen was pretty low on energy, so Doug carried him up and down the path. These two have my heart! My trooper & my man.

Then it was back to the van and on to Chattanooga for the night. And on the way when we crossed into Tennessee it was our 11th state!

A bit of a snaffoo at the hotel…their pool was closed! But the world’s sweetest manager had pity on us and got us into a pool at a hotel down the street. Saving grace because these boys needed to get out all that pent up energy!

Finished the night with a frustratingly late pizza order (I don’t recommend Uber Eats in Chattanooga). But we passed the time with reading up on the history of the parks we’ve visited thus far and some family viewing of Antiques Roadshow. Yep, that’s right, we’re fans.

That's "it" for Monday.  Tomorrow it's on to the cousins!!