We got up even earlier
to get to Cades Cove by 7 a.m. to beat all the other national park early birds
to my bear sighting and a possible hike. Again though, of course, it was
raining Dings and dogs…more dogs than Dings. We saw the same dumb, lame, wet
deer on the way in and more of her friends grazing in the marshy meadows. As
the great Yogi, not the bear, once said, “It was déjà vu all over again.”
Having seen no bears
since the flash of lightning black bear a day earlier, we decided that if they
weren’t going to come to us, we would go to them. Thus began our
five-mile hike to Abrams Falls. Described as “moderate,” this hike was pretty
strenuous for the mostly out of shape folks. At some point on the road trip, I
recalled that my long lost brother, Andy, and my cousin, Phil, have hiking
poles and camel packs that I've used in the past, which remove a lot of the thirst, pain, and wear and tear from our hike. So we stopped at the Wal-Mart for said items and, thus, my knee ligaments
were spared of further damage and we didn’t stop to cry too much along
the trail. Well, I didn’t stop to cry too much along the trail.
From the first
step onto the mushy trail, I began calling for a bear as one would a puppy, kitten or one of those newborn human
creatures. Not one showed himself/herself. Undaunted by the poor listening
skills of the native bears, I continued to call out to them to come forth and be seen.
Still nothing. Somewhere about half way along the trail, Julia decided that she
had enough of my attempts to coax bears out of hiding and dropped the quote of
the day, “Will you shut up about the bear?” She said that we were out there by
ourselves and that she was tired and wouldn’t be able to run away from Smokey
and Boo Boo. I had to once again remind her that one does not, in fact, run
from the bear lest ye desire death by bear paw – quite the opposite – stand one’s
ground, look as large as possible, and, should Mr. Berenstain still try to get
all up in your grill, hurl non-food items at him. Needless to say, I was quite
amused.
After 2 ½ miles and
four foot bridges suspended over rushing water, we reached Abrams Falls. It made the trek of pain that
reminded me of my advancing age and thinning hair with each step, worth it,
except for the return portion. It was there that we saw the only bear we were
destined to see, albeit, in warning signage form. By the way, that sign says
that four people have died, while the one at the trail head said five. Let’s be consistent Ranger Rick and be snappy with the sign updating.
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| I'll do my best, but I promise nothing. |
 |
| That's the only bear we saw that day. Damn hiders. |
The
rain continued, but it was pretty awe-inspiring to be out there in the
bear-free woodiness hiking along hearing only the rain falling on the trees and
the rush of the water in the creek beside us (or below us depending on the
elevation of the trail at any given time). It was awe-inspiring, that is, until
all of the late arrival hikers started coming towards us asking, “Are we almost
there?” Who am I? Magellan? Do I have “Garmin” tattooed on my forehead? Am I
your GSMNP Sherpa? I think not. You’ll figure it out in due time and you’ll rue the moment you decided that a hike in the rain was a good idea. Lament,
late arrivals, lament!
We finished our hike,
God willing, and completed the drive on the Cades Cove loop and headed for
Gatlinburg in search of pottery goods. Julia’s family did a GSMNP trip back in
the day where they picked up some ceramic mugs and such with local wildlife emblazoned
upon it. Various pieces had broken over the years, probably from Momma Simpson
chucking them at nearby felines, and Julia wanted to attempt to replace them.
While we did not find anything like them, we did drive an eight-mile loop of
artists’ shops. Many were out of business, while many others were simply
closed, but we still found enough cool stuff to pile into the Avenger.
After a few hours in
Gatlinburg, we headed back to Pigeon Forge. Remember Monday night when we met
Singing Santa at the Smokies game? Santa had asked us to visit him at The
Incredible Christmas Place and we told him we’d stop by on Thursday. So we did.
You can’t lie to Santa. He sees you when you’re sleeping or awake, after all, and I'm looking for a mighty haul of presents this year.
We
arrived at TICP and entered the building. It was basically a warehouse where
Christmas vomited a thousand times and, instead of cleaning it up, they constructed a
store around it. It was like dry drowning on Christmas cheer and decorations of all
types: ornaments, both secular and sacred; at least 50 different varieties of
artificial trees in all colors of the bow, and even black bear nativity
scenes...
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| Fo' real. And not cheap at all. |
Here
at TICP, Singing Santa has a throne, of course, and belts out Christmas tunes
several times a day. I was amused by the miniature humans as they laid eyes on
Santa and proceeded lose their wee, little minds in Christmas anticipation euphoria. When they talked to
Santa, he’d of course ask them if they had been naughty or nice so far this
year, and, as expected, every one of those little liars in the making promised that they had been good. Santa then gave them a business card that had checkboxes
next to the words “naughty” and “nice.” Santa placed a check mark beside “nice” on every
single one of them. Way to take their word for it and turn TICP into a house of
lies, Santa.
At one point, Santa
looked up and took notice of us hovering in the background and bellowed, “Hey,
it’s you guys from the ball game! I remember you!” That he did. Singing Santa
was the nicest guy and a perfect Santa. Since he IS Santa, that really shouldn’t be difficult for him though. I bought one of his CDs and had him autograph it for my niece and then it was Singing Santa tune time. He chose one of the
tracks from my new CD, which I shall share with you now. Merry Christmas.
Seriously, Merry Christmas, because this is the only gift I’m giving this year.
After Santafest 2012,
we stopped at a great used bookstore, which was colossal in its holdings. As
always, I headed to the sports section in search of new additions to my
baseball book collection. It was there that I made a new friend. I’ll call him
Bobby Ricky. Bobby Ricky was a jort-wearing, buck/gap-toothed, coke-bottle
sporting, Army hat-donning, hillbilly from Fort Bragg, North Carolina, as I
would soon learn.
So there I am, minding my own business, checking my My Stuff
app to see if I already own a particular volume when Bobby Ricky interrupts:
“Hey, man…what’s that
word on that book?”
I look down to see a
book with words far too advanced for Bobby Ricky to sound out Electric Company style.
“Heraldry,” I said.
Bobby Ricky: “Is that about
military medals and stuff?”
Dave: “I assume so
since that’s in the subtitle.”
Bobby Ricky: (Insert
confused look here.) “This joker’s gotta go,” said Bobby Ricky pointing to a new
book with Barack Obama on the cover. “He needs to be taken out back and
horsewhipped and tarred and feathered. I’m not saying kill him. That’s too
harsh, but somebody’s gotta do something. This country is going to hell.”
Dave: “Ummmm…”
I didn’t know whether
to back away slowly and contact the FBI or to get out of the way of this crazy
train about to derail. After a few more minutes of feigning listening, I was able
to escape without incident. It was a bizarre end to another long day, our
last in the Smokies, but it was, indeed, memorable. I’ll never forget that
goofy hillbilly…even if I try.
So it was back to the
cabin for some packing and sleep before we left for the next stop on the tour:
Chattanooga, Tennessee, home of the Chattanooga Lookouts.
See photos from Day 13
HERE.
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