Day 146. Standing Bear Farm

Mile 1937 – Max Patch To Mile 1952 – Davenport Gap

Our last stop before the Great Smoky National Park is Standing Bear Farm. Our plan was to hike a few miles past there to Davenport Gap and then have Brenda drive us back to to stay for the night. It was snowing all day, but we hiked fast and arrived at our destination early in the afternoon.

After dinner in the nearby town we went to the hostel. We had sent our supplies ahead and they were waiting for us when we arrived. As we were getting ready for the next day we found out that the road to Gatlinburg from Newfound Gap is closed due to snow which is a problem because it is the only route out of the park before the south end. We would need to use that road to get to Gatlinburg for Christmas.

This left us with the choice of entering the park in the hopes that the road will be open before we get there or waiting for it to open before proceeding. If we arrived at Newfound Gap while the road is closed we would be faced with a 15 mile road walk to town. The situation was complicated by the fact that the government shut down tonight and therefore no information is available from the park.

We deliberated for quite a while before ultimately deciding that we didn’t want to risk our Christmas plans, so we would not be going into the park tomorrow. This was a really tough decision because we’ve been making great progress and we have been looking forward to this part of the hike for a long time. We don’t want to waste the few days before Christmas, however, so we are planning to continue hiking on a section of the trail south of the park.

Our new plan is to jump down to Fontana Dam tomorrow to continue south for the next few days and then go back up to Gatlinburg on Christmas eve. Then we’ll tackle the Smokies after Christmas.

Winter in the Smokies