We enjoyed these trips, yet as far as I can see, the most spectacular views in the Park are available right from the cross-park highway, or from the trails out of Gatlinburg.
A horse trail follows the backbone of the high mountain ridge from one end of the park to the other. This is a part of the Appalachian Trail which runs from Maine to Georgia. Each summer large groups come and ride the whole 71 miles of this trail, camping out at night, taking a week or more for the journey.
There is one place on this trail, called Charlie’s Bunion, which I have not yet seen. It is a place where you ride or walk (or crawl if you’re like me) across a narrow, wind-swept ledge where it drops straight off for 1500 feet. There aren’t many such places in the Smokies, but this one is a lulu.
Charlie’s Bunion is only a four-mile hike from the main paved highway that crosses the Park. Some day, if my game knee ever gets fully recovered, I’ll have to hike up there and peek over the edge. I hope my knee never gets better.
MANY MOVED
When the Smokies became Government land, a great many people were moved out. But also a great many were left in. Today there are around 400 native mountain people still living in the Tennessee half of the park, probably an equal number on the Carolina side.
But it is hard for them. They are no longer masters of their own souls. His independence is a mountain man’s staff of life, and the reason he was here in the first place.
Today a mountain man in the park dare not go hunting. He can’t even have a gun, unless he’s a trusted old-timer allowed to keep it for sentimental reasons.
He cannot trap. He cannot cut down a tree. He dare not cut balsam boughs for an outdoor bed. When a mountain schoolteacher wants to give some of the boys a whuppin’, he has to get a Park Warden to cut the switches for him.
The mountain people live within the shell of their traditional existence, but it is an empty shell. The spirit has gone out of the old log house; an unseen guard stands watch at the door over their liberties. They are gradually leaving.