News

eastern hognose snake

This Useful Graphic Will Help You Identify Smoky Mountain Snakes

What you should know about snakes in the Smoky Mountains There is something primal about our fear of snakes. I suppose it’s the lack of legs or the possibility of a painful bite that reaches the core of our DNA. Once when I was young, my friends and I approached some overgrown grass. We were met by a hooded snake

daily parking tag in front of Great Smoky Mountains national park sign

A Simple Guide to Smoky Mountain Parking Passes, Park it Forward

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park launched its Park it Forward program on March 1, 2023. The new program is meant to help generate revenue to improve visitor services and address maintenance needs. While the Great Smoky Mountains National Park has been historically free to enter, visitation has put a strain on management and upkeep. For example, the park experienced its

sign for ghost town in the sky in maggie valley

Will Ghost Town in the Sky Reopen? The Latest Update

The future of this abandoned theme park looks bleak as the project continues to hit roadblocks Ghost Town in the Sky, aka Ghost Town Village, is a long-shuttered Wild West-themed amusement park that sat atop a mountain in Maggie Valley, NC. It opened in the early 60s. However, it began stumbling in the 90s as revenue couldn’t support maintenance needs

A black bear in the Smoky Mountains

Are Bear Attacks Common in the Smoky Mountains? Incidents in 2021

If we’re going to talk about the “rash” of bear attacks and bear encounters in and around the Great Smoky Mountain National Park, then we may as well start with this:  The remains of a friend of mine from high school were found down a ravine in Blount County earlier in the year. He’d been partially consumed by animals, presumably