Every (Flying) Cloud Has A Silver Lining: 2019

Friends Ella & Tom go to the Elkmont Campground every Fall in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. This year they made a rally out of it and invited all. It was beautiful. I believe it was me and Carie's first time actually camping in a National park. We've been to Nat'l parks before and camp near them but never in them. It was boondocking only, as are most Nat'l parks. We were there from Wednesday to Sunday. Other showed up at different days but most were there for that long weekend. There were 10 couples scheduled although four had to cancel for various personal reasons, so six couple in attendance. We did all kinds of fun stuff like hike to the old Elkmont "ghost town" https://roadtrippers.com/magazine/abandoned-ghost-town-smoky-mountains/ and drive the Roaring Fork loop which is similar to the Cades Cove loop but smaller, we hiked one of the trails along the Roaring Fork loop, we did some shopping at the 8 mile Arts & Crafts loop https://www.gatlinburgcrafts.com/ and of course we did touristy Gatlinburg and more. We avoided some of the other great sites due mainly to crowds and time constraints, like Kingman's Dome, Cades Cove, etc...

This sign photo compliments of the internet because the crowds waiting to take pictures with the sign were crazy...

Our setup at camp

John preparing his morning coffee on his little BioLite

Tom & Ella

Turkey's were everywhere!

We did a 3 mile hike on one of the trails, well, they did, I did about a third of it. Mainly because the ground was wet with leaves and my inappropriate shoes were slipping all over the place.

(l to r) Judy, Tom, Georgia, Carie, Alan, Suzie, Rick and not shown is Tom taking the picture.

Georgia & Carie on the trail

Carie -

Alan & John

Chris & Lauren

John cooking his famous pizzas for the group! They are delicous!

The fixin's

Lauren and Rick

Carie, looking cute in the Airstream!

The Roaring Fork loop drive -

More turkeys!

The Arts & Crafts Loop road

Sparky the glass blower...this guy was a hoot! Great story teller, honored veteran, and extremely talented and skilled in glass blowing, and self-taught!