Our winter project is to organize (deleting many) our thousands of pictures from the past year when we stay on the road as much as possible. We traveled east twice in April and June in 2016 which is our normal routine in the Georgia to New York mountain corridor. Our first trip was to hike the Appalachian trail and explore north and south of Great Smokey Mountains NP in Tennessee and North Carolina. Our second trip was hiking the AT and exploring Virginia between Roanoke and Shenandoah NP. Clouds, haze, and rain combined with a small sensor camera make for poor pictures when traveling east but here are a few highlights (while hiking in the east we always say to come back, while looking at the pictures we always wonder why we went):
April picture taken on top of Smokey Mountains NP in the early morning at 25 deg with a 35 mph wind, both of which reduced eastern haze. This is Clingmans Dome tower top view which is a half mile hike from the parking and can be strenuous because of the altitude.
Early April view from the southern end of the Blue Ridge Parkway in the North Carolina highlands southeast of Great Smokey Mountains NP.
Audie Murphy memorial on a mountain ridge top near the Appalachian Trail and near where his plane crashed west of Roanoke, VA. A road comes up on the east side of the mountain to within a half mile of the memorial while we hiked up from the west side on the AT. We arrived at the memorial on Memorial Day 2016 by chance as this was the next day hiking segment.
View of the country around the memorial from a viewpoint near the memorial:
Two Blue Ridge Parkway views near the northern end in Virginia:
Roadside view along Skyline Drive in Shenandoah NP in Virginia (the flowering shrub is Mountain Laurel):
And the highlight picture for an iowahiker trip from Cataloochee campground on the east side of Great Smokey Mountains NP:
And we are looking forward to our return in 2017 (despite the pictures).
April picture taken on top of Smokey Mountains NP in the early morning at 25 deg with a 35 mph wind, both of which reduced eastern haze. This is Clingmans Dome tower top view which is a half mile hike from the parking and can be strenuous because of the altitude.
Early April view from the southern end of the Blue Ridge Parkway in the North Carolina highlands southeast of Great Smokey Mountains NP.
Audie Murphy memorial on a mountain ridge top near the Appalachian Trail and near where his plane crashed west of Roanoke, VA. A road comes up on the east side of the mountain to within a half mile of the memorial while we hiked up from the west side on the AT. We arrived at the memorial on Memorial Day 2016 by chance as this was the next day hiking segment.
View of the country around the memorial from a viewpoint near the memorial:
Two Blue Ridge Parkway views near the northern end in Virginia:
Roadside view along Skyline Drive in Shenandoah NP in Virginia (the flowering shrub is Mountain Laurel):
And the highlight picture for an iowahiker trip from Cataloochee campground on the east side of Great Smokey Mountains NP:
And we are looking forward to our return in 2017 (despite the pictures).