Thursday
Cades Cove
Cades Cove is an area in the northwest corner of the park which features some unique geology. During the formation of the Appalachian mountains, when the North American and African tectonic plates collided, the rocky crust which folded and ascended included newer rock up above, and older rock down below. During the millions of years of erosion which has taken place since then, most of the newer rock has washed off into various water bodies and older rock is exposed. However, a unique phenomenon occurred around the area of Cades Cove. Instead of the crust rising in unison, a segment of crust passed over another segment and subducted it. This higher crust has since eroded, revealing a patch of newer limestone crust underneath in a small flatland surrounded by high mountains (known as a "limestone window").
Cades Cove was settled by a number of families who built log cabins and farmed on the flatland. The community that lived in this area lived in relative isolation to much of the rest of eastern Tennessee. The community was quite opposed to incorporating Cades Cove into the national park, but as the settlers died out more and more land was annexed until in 1999, the last remaining resident passed on and the entire place was incorporated into the national park.
Rich Mountain Road
In the northwest corner of Cades Cove there exists a primitive gravel mountain road which rises over a couple nearby mountains, and ends up in the town of Tuckaleechee, TN. This road is maintained by the national park service. Not a whole lot of overlooks, but it rose to 4000+ ft elevations and therefore was pleasantly cool and had a number of pulloffs which would make nice picnic locations.
Laurel Falls
Laurel Falls is another waterfall in the park and seemed to attract quite a few visitors. It's relatively close to Cades Cove and we passed the trail head on the way to Cades Cove. It seems there is a lot of bear activity among the trail, and indeed we did find a family of 1 mother and 3 cubs who passed down the hillside on our way to the falls, and back up the hillside on our way back.
The falls itself-
And some bears!
(taken from afar with maximum analog + digital zoom)-
More footage available in video format (not sure the best way to present this, so I'll present links to the MJPEG AVI files)-
mvi_1784
mvi_1767
mvi_1787