All of the buildings are being restored by the National Park Service. The national park was going to tear down these buildings until the Elmont town was listed on the National Register for Historic Places. When the property was given to the government, some people didn’t want to leave their homes, so they made an agreement that they could stay until they passed away. People used to live in the park before it was a park. Want to see unique places to visit in the Smoky Mountains? You should go to the Elkmont ghost town.
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The path to the falls is paved, making it easy for anyone to hike! There are some steep drop offs, so be careful, especially when going with children. It stands at 80 feet tall, and a footbridge separates the waterfall into an upper section and a lower section. If a waterfall is something you want to see while you’re here, then you should hike to Laurel Falls. There are many hiking trails in Cades Cove, as well as a picnic area where you can eat lunch! 2.
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You will definitely see historic buildings and homesteads, letting you look back to the pioneer days. You will probably see bears, deer, turkey, and many other creatures. The most popular way to travel in Cades Cove is by car, but from May to September on Wednesday and Saturday until 10 am, the loop is only accessible by foot or bike. You can’t visit the Great Smoky Mountains without driving around the 11-mile loop! If you want to see wildlife in its natural habitat, the best time to go is early in the morning or late in the evening. The top place to visit in the Smoky Mountains is Cades Cove. Check out the top 5 places to visit in the Smoky Mountains National Park: 1. While there’s too much to do to pack into a single trip, you’ll definitely want to do the top things when you stay with us. For more like it subscribe today or log in to the digital edition with your active digital subscription.If you’ve never been to the Smokies, there are so many things you probably will want to do. The story above appears in our March/April 2020 issue. “The park service required that the people who had the lease agreement all move out in 1992. These century-old cabins, mostly made of wood, “had been abandoned” or their owners were “forced to evacuate,” McMahan says. “In its heyday, Elkmont was a very nice place.” “The plan is to restore them so they are structurally sound enough so visitors can walk inside of them to see what they look like,” McMahan says. Later, when about 70 structures stood at Elkmont, a decision was made to save just 17 of the cabins-not for habitation but for historical interpretation, says McMahan. “Technically, you could have called it a ghost town, but it has a whole other story to it,” says McMahan, the author of “Elkmont’s Uncle Lem Ownby: Sage of the Smokies,” published in 2013.įor years, McMahan says, “There had been talk of tearing down the ‘summer houses,’ as they’re called.”Ībout a decade ago, McMahan says, the national park received some stimulus money to restore structures like The Appalachian Club and The Spence House, both used for rentals in Sevier County, about seven miles from Gatlinburg.
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Now, a new Elkmont era has dawned in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park-with renovations of some structures and the removal of others, says historian Carroll McMahan, the special project facility coordinator for the Sevierville Chamber of Commerce. Elkmont dates to the early 1900s, when it was established as a cluster of summer cottages in what is now part of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.Įlkmont has stood like a ghost town in the Great Smoky Mountains for decades-a cluster of cottages and getaways that once welcomed the affluent and residents of nearby Knoxville, Tennessee.