{"id":4042,"date":"2013-11-17T08:47:21","date_gmt":"2013-11-17T08:47:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/janetgover.com\/?p=4042"},"modified":"2013-11-17T08:47:21","modified_gmt":"2013-11-17T08:47:21","slug":"steamed-up-over-great-smoky","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/history\/steamed-up-over-great-smoky\/","title":{"rendered":"Steamed up over Great Smoky"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The<\/a>
The leaves in the park were just starting to show some colour (or as the locals would have it – color).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

There\u2019s bears in them there hills.\u00a0Seriously.<\/p>\n

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park \u2013 which straddles the Tennessee \/ North Carolina border \u00a0\u2013 claims to have bears. About 1700 of them.<\/p>\n

That was all I needed to hear and we were off, cameras poised, on a bear hunt.<\/p>\n

Entering the park, we stopped at the ranger station, to be assured that there were indeed bears to be seen. In fact, we were given advice on how to behave if we were to come across a bear doing what bears do in the woods.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A few minutes later \u00a0\u2013 a mile or more further into the park, we saw a crowd of excited photographers\u2026<\/p>\n

\"Where's<\/a>
Where’s the bear?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

This had to be it \u2013 bear photo op\u2026\u00a0 We grabbed our cameras and stomped through the grass.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The deer were cute and very happy to be photographed.. but they were not bears.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Undeterred and keeping my bear hopes high, we then started an exploration of Cades Cove \u2013 a beautifully preserved historic settlement.<\/p>\n

There was so much to discover\u2026 fascinating stuff about barn design.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The settlers in Appalachia seemed to have some issue with building walls that came all the way to the ground.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

About whittlin\u2019<\/p>\n

\"I<\/a>
I do hope he plans to sweep up all those wood shavings on the floor.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

About how to build the foundations of your shotgun shack\u2026<\/p>\n

\"No<\/a>
No building regs back then – I’m not sure that is a good thing.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

And \u2013 sadly \u2013 a few not so nice things to learn about people.<\/p>\n

These buildings are not old shacks \u2013 they are a piece of history. These buildings have been a national monument since 1940 \u2013 but for some reason people seem to think they have the right to carve their names into the walls. It\u2019s unpleasant when people do it on public toilets \u2013 it\u2019s criminal when they do it on a national treasure.<\/p>\n

\"Why<\/a>
Why would anyone do this to a piece of their own heritage?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

And this was the final straw for me\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n

\"Mom<\/a>
Teach your children to respect their heritage – not deface it.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mom \u2013 if you really loved your kids, you would preserve their heritage, not destroy it!<\/p>\n

We spent a lovely day in the park. We didn\u2019t ever meet a bear, but that\u2019s not what made us sad.<\/p>\n

However, I\u00a0was soon cheery again \u2013 back in a favourite place – listening for voices\u00a0from beyond the grave. More on that next week.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  There\u2019s bears in them there hills.\u00a0Seriously. The Great Smoky Mountains National Park \u2013 which straddles the Tennessee \/ North Carolina border \u00a0\u2013 claims to have bears. About 1700 of them. That…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4042","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","category-my-travels"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4042","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4042"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4042\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}