North Carolina: Deep Creek

For the first few days, Rob's parents joined us at the "Tree House" and we all squeezed into the minivan to do some exploring. 

The kids got in some game time with Grandpa.  This picture was posed, but they have some pretty intense Uno matches!

Florida kids are amazed at Daddy Long Legs.  We do not have them down here.

Our first trail day was at Deep Creek.  Last year we stuck to the main road that goes through the park - from Cherokee, NC to Gatlinburg, TN.  This year we branched out a bit.  Deep Creek is on the southern border of Great Smoky Mountain National Park and in the western half.  It has a few trails that lead to waterfalls and the one we took was wide and mostly smooth.  That is, I'd class it in the easy and well maintained list for the trails we've taken in GSMNP.

It was kind of cool, but we saw a few people tubing on the river, maybe an option for another trip. 

Tom Branch Falls

Lots of flowers!

Indian Creek Falls, I think.

We picnicked beside a calm section the lake and the kids played in the water after lunch.  A lot of people make these rock towers in the river.  The is one Annalise made:

You can see that at this point the forest was still pretty green.  It changed a lot while we were there.