Chilling in the Smokies

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The drive from Kodak Tennessee to our spot near Waynesville North Carolina was just under 80 miles. It was a pretty drive along I-40 as it goes thru the mountains. I did feel sorry for the westbound traffic. A semi had been in an accident and was on the side of the road needing to be pulled out of a ditch. I wasn’t able to tell if all lanes of traffic were blocked, but nevertheless, the traffic jam was impressively long - about 6 miles or so based on my estimate!

Our next stop would be a bit unusual for us. We typically stop at campgrounds, be it private commercial ones or public ones like state parks. We’ve also stayed many nights at Elks Lodges or boondocking in places like Quartzsite Arizona. This spot is a half acre lot in a rural but residential area north of Waynesville. The lot owner lives in a home just a couple hundred feet up a gravel side road. She had some work done to get a gravel pad and water, electric and sewer installed and now rents it out to travelers and named it “Chill Hill”. We have looked at similar arrangements over the past few years, mostly in the Arizona area for the winter months, but have never given one a try. Our 4 months in Show Low Arizona last summer was on a site owned by a person that was willing to rent by the month had us dealing with an individual but it was in a large resort with hundreds of other residents.

We were a little concerned with the entrance to the lot. The side roads off of US-276 looked to be rather curvy and narrow. The owner had told us to “come up the hill steady and don’t brake” and a 45 footer had been there just before us and made it okay. We decided to unhitch the Jeep before we made the turn from 276 and drive in separately. The couple of side roads were narrow and curvy just like “Street View” in Google Maps had shown, but we managed to get there without incident. After talking with the neighbor about the hookups, we got the rig situated for the next 2 months. There are four other homes that share the same driveway access but the main side road we are on dead ends into the mountains with several dozen homes further up the hill, so the overall traffic is quite limited. Save for some of the neighborhood dogs occasionally going into barking outbursts, it’s a peaceful setting. It might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it is ideal for us. The best feature is, this area doesn’t have cicadas!

Sitting Atop Chill Hill

Nice Setting for 2 Months

We had all sorts of ideas for lots of hiking and sightseeing in this part of western North Carolina. Our camp is just a few “crow miles” from Great Smoky Mountain National Park although the drive to an official park entrance is closer to 30 miles. Plus there are endless trail options in the vicinity not within the national park. Unfortunately when we arrived, I was nursing a bit of a leg problem. Walking the 25 feet from the front of the rig to the bedroom was a challenge so I knew a real hike was out of the question! Over the next couple weeks, I would limit my activity and when it started to feel better, we would head out to explore some easier options in the area.

Lake Junaluska is a small community just to the north of Waynesville. It’s less than a 10 mile drive from our spot at Chill Hill. The 200 acre man made lake is a picturesque spot with the Smoky Mountains as a backdrop. The grounds are home to the United Methodist Church. There is a beautiful chapel and a large conference and retreat center. A paved path goes around the perimeter of the lake. The full path comes in at 3.8 miles but taking the footbridge over the lake near its midpoint will reduce the walk to 2.5 miles.

Lake Junaluska with Mountains

Chapel at Lake Junaluska

Chapel Breezeway

Chapel Reflections

Lambuth Inn Overlooks Lake

Swan Watches My Approach

Swan Relaxing on Lake

Besides the several lodges and inn on the grounds, there are some beautiful homes surrounding the lake although some of them are on very hilly sites. The entrances look like they may have been gated and manned in the past,  but now the lake is open to the public. There is plenty of parking around the lake and the couple times we visited the place, it was a very popular destination. There is a large in ground pool that the public can use for a small fee. They also have kayak and canoe rentals. Since gas motor boats are not permitted, it looks like a pretty nice paddle. When doing the full walking path, a section of it goes beside a very busy road so the 2.5 mile loop around the eastern half of the lake is the more peaceful route. There are also a couple gardens within the grounds that seem to be very well taken care off. There is even a golf course and campground across the road from the lake. It is a nice place for a relaxing walk and was almost within my capabilities during our early visits there.

Home on Hill with Lift System on Left

Pedestrian Bridge Over Lake Junaluska

Bushy the Dog Topiary

Swan Family

For the past 14 months or so, our sightseeing activities have been greatly curtailed but with things getting back to normal and restrictions being lifted, we ventured off to do a popular tourist destination in our area. The Wheels Through Time motorcycle museum is very well known in this corner of North Carolina. It’s not like we are motorcycle enthusiasts by any stretch of the imagination but this isn’t our first visit to a motorcycle museum. We checked out the Sturgis Motorcycle Museum a couple years ago when we were in that part of South Dakota. We just assumed it was going to be a very similar place and would kill an hour of time to check it out. The place was rather busy with most of the visitors, not surprisingly, arriving on motorcycles. But this museum is probably about 8 times larger than the one in Sturgis so even with the big crowd, it didn’t seem crowded. The entrance fee is $15 per adult - unfortunately we didn’t meet their senior citizen discount. In the entrance/gift shop area was a motorcycle being raffled off in their annual drawing. It is a very nice looking 1948 Panhead HD with the drawing around Thanksgiving this year. We don’t need to be present to win but also don’t know what we would do with it so we pass.

Wheels Through Time Museum

Lawn Mowing Made Fun!

"Win This Bike"

Entering the museum, we are amazed by its size. With a footprint of roughly 25,000 square feet and a partial second floor, it’s hard to know where to start. There are several hundred motorcycles with many of them from the early 1900’s.  Many of them are completely restored while others are in their original paint and hardware. Like any type of collection, it’s a balancing act to determine what should be restored and what should be left alone. Lots of the early motorcycles have pedals showing their heritage to early bicycles.

Reading Standard

1912 Sears

1904 Marsh

1913 Henderson

1915 Indian Twin

Of course the restored motorcycles are the more visually appealing since I have no real knowledge for some of the old, unrestored relics.

Bright Yellow Indian

Indian 4 Police Cycle

1933 Harley-Davidson Flathead 45

Wonderful Paint Job

Winner of "Most Blinged Out" Cycle

There are numerous groupings of motorcycles from their use in wars over the years, to hill climbs and track bikes. There are even some nicely done displays with an old style motorcycle service facility. One thing rather unique about this museum is its an operational museum. What’s that mean? Well, we were there for a couple hours and heard three different motorcycles started up and driven around the inside of the place. We all know how loud motorcycles can be, especially Harleys, well start one up inside this big metal building and it’s hard to hear yourself think. The one that drove past us early in our visit was driving in a calm, well behaved manner giving visitors a chance to get out of the way. But while we were upstairs, one was started and actual left a patch of rubber on the concrete floor! We couldn’t actually see the motorcycle in question but there was no mistaking what was happening.

H-D Hill Climber

Service Facility

H-D Track Racer

View from 2nd Floor

While the museum is predominantly centered around motorcycles, there are a fair number of old cars on display. I didn’t detect any particular theme to the cars so I’ll assume they were ones the museum’s creator had some connection with.

Cadillac Convertible

Supercharged Austin Seven

1932 Ford Model-B

There are some other displays that didn’t always seem to have a motorcycle theme but were quirky nonetheless. The random prosthetic leg and “peep show” display were two that caught my eye.

Missing a Leg?

10 Cents a Peek

Old Neon Sign

Wooden Indian

Fill Her Up

There were also a handful of bicycles scattered about the museum. One of our favorites was the side by side tandem. We have bicycled across the USA on a tandem - but the more conventional style. We were tempted to ask if we could give this one a spin but the “Please do not touch” sign told us not to ask. But the winner of the whole museum (in my mind) was the display of the Schwinn Apple Krate. I don’t specifically remember Captain Kangaroo being a pitch man for them but back in the early 1970’s I wanted one of these bikes so very badly. The kid that lived across the street from me had one and I was jealous. Of course the $102 price tag ($678 equivalent today) kept the 10 year old me from getting one. I wonder whatever happened to Greg’s Lemon Peeler?

1896 Punnett Double Bike - Side by Side Tandem

Apple Krate

Cicadas in Kodak

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Back in late February and early March while making our travel plans for the year, we had found two spots in the Asheville North Carolina area for two months each. This would cover us for all of June, July, August and September including 4th of July and Labor Day, but Memorial Day was still unplanned. One thing we have come to realize in our travels is, its best to have the major summer holidays planned and booked in advance. With this holiday occurring just before our stop in North Carolina, we wanted a campground that was near our intended route and a reasonable drive to Asheville.

There were lots of possible choices but one town in Tennessee caught our eye. Kodak Tennessee is about 20 miles east of Knoxville and just off I-40. Since we had both worked at Eastman Kodak and met each other there during our co-op years, Kodak holds a special place in our hearts. While maybe an unusual way to select a place to stop, we found a couple of county parks in Kodak next to the Douglas Dam that had decent reviews and availability. We picked a site at Douglas Dam Tailwater campground and booked it for the 4 nights we needed.

It’s only 125 mile drive from London to Kodak and reasonably easy being interstate most of the way. The traffic around Knoxville wasn’t too bad. Even though we were arriving on the Friday of a long holiday weekend, there wasn’t a long line entering the campground either. It was a warm sunny afternoon when we arrived and Chris went in to register. When I came out of the rig to unhitch the Jeep, I heard a strange noise. Since the motorhome was still running, I initially thought it was making the noise and I went back to investigate the engine. But it sounded normal, then I realized the sound I was hearing was from the Brood X cicadas. The nearby trees were full of them and they were causing a racket. We had actually seen a couple cicadas back at Deer Creek State Park in Ohio the morning we were pulling out and had assumed we would find them at our stop in London Kentucky, but had lucked out since they hadn’t emerged there yet. Well I guess our luck had run out.

Cicada Looking for Love

On the Hood of Jeep

Douglas Dam Tailwater campground has 60 sites and is situated on the downstream side of the dam. Many of the sites are waterfront but ours was next to a heavily treed hill. This meant our site wasn’t as level as we would like, but using all of our leveling blocks we managed to get setup. The story of the town of Kodak is interesting. Back in 1892 when this town was being created, the local postmaster heard about the new Kodak camera. He liked the name Kodak and got permission from George Eastman to use Kodak for the town’s name. While not the original post office building, we did stop by to get our souvenir picture. (We went on a Sunday to avoid looks from locals!)

Chris & Jack Come Back to Kodak

There aren’t any trails on the tailwater side of the dam, but we can walk the park roads to get in some dam sightseeing. From the campground level, you can get a good look at the dam. There are a fair number of day use visitors in the park fishing along the outlet. Signs warn about rapidly rising waters when there is a release through the hydroelectric power plant. We would occasionally hear warning sirens but never went over to check out the change in water flow. This would have been much easier if we had a waterfront site.

Douglas Dam from Tailwater

The road out of the campground is a pretty good climb going up 350 feet in the mile it takes to get up the the overlook picnic area. Maybe we should have been like everybody else and drove, but we wanted a bit of exercise. There are lots of information signs that describes the construction and operation of the dam. Douglas Dam is 201 feet high and 1705 feet across. Possibly the more impressive fact about this dam is it was built in just 384 days back in 1942-43. The dam creates Douglas Lake with a shoreline of over 500 miles.

Looking Up at Overlook

Clouds Rolling in at Douglas Dam

Tree Full of Blooms

Down from the overlook is a pedestrian walkway that gets closer views of the dam and the power plant. Unfortunately you’re not permitted to walk across the dam itself to get to the Headwater campground.

Closer View of Douglas Dam

Power Plant at Dam

We spent the next day checking out another of the 29 dams in the Tennessee Valley Authority system. Cherokee Dam is near Jefferson City to the north of us. The drive had a couple goals besides seeing another dam. There is a hiking trail at the dam and by heading this way, would could find geocaches in two additional Tennessee counties. While it wasn’t the nicest of days, there were still plenty of visitors. Probably to be expected for Memorial Day weekend. On one side of the levee is Cherokee Lake. The other side has some of the parkland being used for agriculture with dozens of round bales of hay waiting to be collected. It was a nice walk with some pockets of woods and a few geocaches along the way. The red, white and blue mesh used to create the hay bales was a patriotic touch.

View of Cherokee Lake from Levee

View of Opposite Side

Holston River Flows from Dam

Patriotic Bales

By no means were we “getting used” to the cicadas. Fortunately we had some cool and even wet weather early in the stay so they were less active. They tend to hang out in trees that are in full sun and our site just happened to fit that category. When it was warm and sunny, the noise was obnoxious and they were everywhere around the rig. They seemed to like one of my bright yellow shirts and would swarm me when I was wearing it. Even though they are harmless, when one lands on you and tries to climb up your leg or neck, it is a bit startling. At one point, a cicada landed on my shoulder and started to make its noise. When they are only inches from your ear, the noise is unnerving. We had to be careful to avoid letting them in the motorhome. We would check our persons and the area by the door before coming back in. Let’s just say, I’m glad we weren’t staying here for a couple weeks.

For our last day, we drove over to the other side of the French Broad River to the Headwater Campground. This campground is just a bit larger than ours but much more crowded. Being the holiday weekend, besides campers, there were dozens of trucks with boat trailers parked on just about any grass surface. We had wanted to do a hike in the woods to immerse ourselves in the sound of cicadas. The Trotter Bluff Trail starts near that campground. It’s only a 1 mile loop but for what we intended, it should work fine. At the trailhead near the parking lot was a dead ash tree. Hundreds of cicadas were on its bare branches and more easily spotted than in a live tree with leaves. We watched for a bit and noticed that they tended to all fly from their spot at almost the same time, fly around for a couple seconds and land again. They constantly repeated this activity almost like they were playing some form of musical chairs.

Once on the trail in rather thick woods, the sound of the cicadas was nearly deafening. Maybe not quite as bad as spring peepers when you’re right next to their pond, but still very loud. The interesting thing was once we were on the trail, we saw no cicadas - not even on some of the understory trees. They were all in the upper canopy where the sun was shining at least 50 feet overhead. So we were actually able to enjoy the walk and not needing to constantly swat them away. At one point we sat down on a fallen tree and just listened. There seemed to be two distinct sounds. That of those cicadas in the surrounding canopy just over our heads and the thousands more further away from us. The large body of water near us obviously reduced the numbers. Maybe we should have picked a larger woods for our listening experiment. I put together a short video so you may experience the sights and sounds of the cicadas if they didn’t make it to your part of the world.

Lake and Headwater Campground

Looking Down French Broad River at Tailwater Campground