Gatlinburg, Tennessee

The RV is parked at Sevierville, Tennessee, (the hometown of Dolly Parton, I’m told) just outside of Gatlinburg. I was looking forward to this stop.



It is the gateway to the Great Smokey Mountains National Park. This should be great fun with wonderful sights. I can’t wait to drive through the National Park.

So much for hopes and assumptions.

“Closed for the Season,” would be a better description of our time here. We tried driving the “Motor Nature Trail,” out of Gatlinburg, only to find it gated shut after a couple of really pretty miles.

The weather has turned on us and it is cold and snowy. Fortunately, the accumulation is only about an inch, but boy! Is it cold!! And the wind is blowing like crazy! We did find some things of interest here in spite of a few things that didn’t work out.

Driving down roads in the area, there were springs that had recently been running down the face of rock on the roadsides that now looked like some of Santa’s icicles. Well, it is Christmas time.

First off, we considered going to Dollywood, but then found out that our main interest, the craftsmen, which is a big part of Dollywood, had sense enough to call it quits during the winter weather.




Since we are not into wild roller coaster rides in 20 degree weather, we decided that we would pass on the whole theme park thing. Don, of course was hoping Dolly would be there…Sorry, Don, she is probably smart enough to be heading out to warm and sunny Southern California.

See ya' all later, Don!

We did find there was a craftsmen’s loop road, called “The Glades”, in an area of Gatlinburg where there were numerous shops and galleries selling locally made crafts and arts of all kinds.




That peaked our interest so we headed there. This is the kind of thing we really like and we picked up a couple of unique things.

One of the places that had several artists in residence, including a great potter, had some very interesting stonework on the fencing around the galleries.

Some very talented person put a lot of work into this rock wall.

Also on the road to "The Glades", we saw this church, which made one wonder if anyone had ever stepped out the door of the church a bit too fast and found themselves in the line of traffic. It was not more than four feet off a very busy roadway.

A drive through downtown Gatlinburg looked like it would have been a fun stop on a warm day. Lots of shops and tourist traps. Not fun in 20 degree windy weather. The Smokey Mountains (that I am not getting to drive through) is in the background.

There was also a “Knife Museum” near the RV park. It was a huge building with lots of cars in the parking lot, which made us wonder…What was the big attraction to a Knife Museum that resulted in such a big building and so many cars?

Finally we stopped. Yes, there was a Knife Museum, and they sold more knives than you could imagine, but in addition to that, we were surprised to find it was a huge store that sold all sorts of things, though mostly knives. I didn’t even get all the way through it. They had a huge kitchen area with every kitchen gadget imaginable. I spent a good bit of time in that area while Don cruised other areas.

Our RV park was next to a river, and the next morning snow was flying and the weather was generally gray. My picture taken out the window of the motorhome, looked like it had been taken in black and white. .

As we got ready to leave Gatlinburg, we were glad that the snow hadn’t piled up beyond about an inch, so off we went, heading further east and hoping for warmer weather. Oh, I am such a dreamer!

We will be seeing the grandkids soon. On Friday, actually!!! It is getting close and we can’t wait!!