Dana & Sharon Hike to Spruce Flats Falls and Honey Cove

Forest at Tremont --shows a tiny bit of Fall color 

Mo and Wa-Wo Hike to Spruce Flats Falls and Honey Cove

Dana Koogler & Sharon McGee 

Thursday Oct. 15, 2015

    I have had the wonderful fortune of two of my best friends moving to Tennessee!

Instead of being a twelve hour drive from me in Florida they are now a mere two hour drive from me.

John and Sharon moved to Jamestown six weeks ago to begin a new chapter of their lives!

They are semi-retired and retired in that order.  They are also in the process of building a house.

I feel like one of the luckiest persons alive because I get to see them more now and do things with them.    I was a weird kid growing up. I did not care about people's color, gender or any of that stuff.

I just liked outside, exploring, creativity and fun. I hated the politics and drama that so many 

would get caught up in.  I am finding out as a grown woman that there were others out there like me.

I just had to find them.  Sharon is one!   She grew up in Vienna, Virginia. I grew up in Barren Ridge.

         She came over to spend the night at Kügler Haus for the first time on Thursday.

We went out hiking in the Smokies. She has visited the Smoky mountains before, but had not done

any hiking there to speak of.   We hiked to Spruce Flats Falls, Honey Cove Falls and Spruce Flats.

I had done this hike before, but I wanted to spend time hiking not driving. This is close to the house

and always a sure bet.

Spruce Flats Falls was just right.  Autumn colors creeping in. Leaves falling.  Just enough water to make the falls pretty, but we could still ford the creek easily.

Honey Cove Falls is on back in there.  We climbed the old rail grade and manway and made it back there.  Right at the falls is a huge mess of blown down trees. New stuff.    Making the use of the manway no easy trick.  



    We visited both falls and went back out toward Spruce Flats.  It was very pretty.
We checked out pioneer junk.  Dishes. Old train parts. Mason jars.   We also found a newly put up cable where there is no camp site. It intrigues me and I hope I can figure out why it is there.
No stealth camper would do this.  It is a professional job. I know the Tremont Institute has a separate
trail system and perhaps they constructed this for some purpose.

 Bear cables are used to hang your food when you camp in the back country. I don't know if that is what this represents? 

Another view of the system. **Edited to add-- a couple weeks after this hike I heard from Dana Soehn of the NPS that the hog hunter for the park installed this set up of wires as a hog trap to catch a bunch of them varmints at one time!


         We hiked back out.  We went to Little River BBQ for a late lunch.  It was a great day.
Sharon's first hike in the Smoky Mountains and already going off trail!  
It was a very relaxing day filled with laughter and great company.