We took an extended weekend trip to celebrate our wedding anniversary the weekend of February 13 16th. Our destination was east Tennessee to see and experience portions of the Appalachian Mountains that we had not seen. It is beautiful! We have a daughter in elementary school; so much of our getaway schedule during the fall, winter, and spring months revolves around the school calendar. Therefore, our weekend adventures during this time dont begin until Friday afternoon after school is out. So it went with this adventure (aka trip).
First stop on our way was Levi Jackson State Park, KY. It is open all year and it is not too far off of interstate 75, so it made a great overnight stop on our way to east TN. It was us and a couple of other campers (nice and peaceful).
Saturday morning, it was on to Tellico Plains, TN to make a stop at the Tellico Grains Bakery to pick up delicious homemade bread and brick oven pizzas. The brick oven pizzas were for our anniversary dinner in the mountains!
Our itinerary for the day was to see the western half of the Cherohala Skyway (TN section), make a visit to Bald River Falls, and stay overnight at Indian Boundary Recreation Area (hint: group/overflow campground is open year round). Temps were very chilly overnight (14 degrees), but we stayed warm and cozy with our propane furnace.
On Sunday, we woke up to a nice bright sunny morning! That morning we drove a little more of the Cherohala Skyway and then took North River Road (FR 217) at Stratton Meadows. It was beautiful and followed North River most of the time. We stopped at waterfalls and hiked back to Donley Cabin to take a look. Our weather for mid-February was pretty and nice - blue skies, sunshine and 32 degrees. A big winter storm was headed our way, so we decided to camp down off of the mountain Sunday night at Cherohala Mountain Trails Campground. We were their only customers and I think they were surprised to see us. It is a nice place and the owners turned on the water so we could have hot showers.
On Monday, we had to head back home to Kentucky. We knew we were in for quite a trip with the snowstorm on its way. We fortunately did not hit bad weather until the TN/KY state line and did not have the major accumulating snow until around London. The Sportsmobile did great in the snow and we made it home safely.