October 2022 Foliage, Charlies Bunion and Clingmans Dome of Great Smoky Mountain National Park

This was the first of a four-day road trip to the south, where I chased some great foliage colors in October 2022. Today, I hiked to Charlies Bunion, a popular trail in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, before catching sunset at Clingmans Dome.

Early October 2022, foliage times for the Blue Ridge Mountains. While I visited much of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia, building renovations at my workplace meant I had an opening to venture further south, so I planned this trip to Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the southern part of Blue Ridge Parkway.

The overall plan for this trip would span between October 8-11, I would spend the first two days in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and the last two days driving up Blue Ridge Parkway. Under this plan, I left home on the afternoon of October 7. While I thought I could beat the rush-hour traffic in northern Virginia, it's a Friday afternoon and traffic was certainly worse than what I anticipated. Including a few breaks hear and there, it took me 6.5 hours to make the trip to Wytheville, Virginia. I used this town as an outpost for my trip earlier this year for Mount Rogers. I liked it so that I spent the night there before continuing for another 3.5 hours to Great Smoky Mountains National Park the next morning.

In the end, I made it to Newfound Gap at 12:40pm. It sat at the boundary between Tennessee and North Carolina, where the main park road crossed Blue Ridge Mountains. It had a sizeable parking lot, but probably not large enough for peak autumn visitations. As some online comments suggested, most people only stopped for a short time at Newfound Gap admiring the views, only a small fraction would go on to hike Appalachian Trail, so parking spaces opened up regularly.

Before starting the hike, I snapped the above photos from Newfound Gap.

Charlies Bunion Trail

The hike to Charlies Bunion is 12.9km out-and-back with 575m elevation gain, most of which along the Appalachian Trail. The rock formation got this name for resembling the shape of a bunion (pdf link of Tennessee government website). It offered great views of various mountains to the north. I picked this trail for its relative short distance that fitted into my schedule (I drove from Wytheville), and the great views that it offered. Here's GPS tracking:

After some warmup, I started the hike at 1pm. Autumn colors were very visible along the trail.

Approaching Boulevard Trail Junction, approximately the highest elevation of the entire hike, there were sections of the trail where pine trees seemed to dominate the landscape, and undergrowth disappeared. It felt grave and immense, a departure from the otherwise cheerful colors of the day.

After that, the trail went on a gentle downhill towards Charlies Bunion.

Charlies Bunion Overlook

At about 2:40pm, I reached the overlook of Charlies Bunion.
As the park's name suggested, it's a misty day in the mountains up till this point, I could often see passing clouds above me as I made the hike towards Charlies Bunion (that had me worried about the views). When I first reached the overlook, I could tell it's facing a valley, where some of the leaves were starting to turn yellow. I knew they would look nice, but much of the view was concealed behind layers of mist.

Nonetheless, the passing clouds made the scenery dynamic, instead of presentation it became a discovery. I took some time enjoying it with my snacks.

About an hour after I first arrived at the overlook, I passed it again, and this time, the clouds cleared up and the views broadened. If not for the hard shadows on the mountains, it would be perfect.

I mentioned earlier that there was a separate "Charlies Bunion" on maps further down the Appalachian Trail. So out of curiosity, I decided to check that out.

Charlies Bunion on Maps

It turned out this "Charlies Bunion" was an additional 600m from the previous overlook, 100m from the Appalachian Trail. The 100m spur "trail" involved heavy bushwhacking (pushing overgrown plants aside), which wasn't pleasant.
And the views (below), albeit decent, couldn't justify the additional toll of reaching it.

In the end, I had about 15 minutes of solitude at this overlook, greeted by only one additional hiker who informed me about a series of additional overlooks up the hill if I was into bushwhacking. I kindly wished him good luck and headed back.

 

 

The Jumpoff

I arrived back at Boulevard Trail Junction at 4:30pm. There's still plenty of time left before sunset, so I decided to take a detour and visit "The Jumpoff". This would add about 1.4km of distance to my hike.

The Jumpoff wasn't as popular as Charlies Bunion, so the trail leading to it was steeper and more primitive.

12 minutes later, I arrived at "The Jumpoff" which was a steep cliff leading down to the valley below. The trail passed right along the cliff's edge, giving it such a name.
When I first arrived, the mountains were partially in mist, just like my experience with Charlies Bunion. Much to my surprise, I found my own shadows in the clouds below, a most marvelous sight beyond what words could describe and photos could capture.

Just like Charlies Bunion, I waited a few minutes and the clouds slowly cleared, so I could enjoy the full glory of the mountains in autumn colors. It's getting late in the afternoon so the hillsides closer to me were in shadows, otherwise I thought the views here could rival that from "Charlies Bunion". It must be the exposure and a scary name that prevented people from visiting this place.

After spending about 20 minutes at the Jumpoff, I started to head back, picking up more autumn colors along the trail.

Finally, I got back to Newfound Gap at 6:20pm. After that, I drove up to Clingmans Dome, hoping to catch the sunset.

Clingmans Dome

Sitting on the boundary between Tennessee and North Carolina, Clingmans Dome is the highest mountain in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and the highest in the state of Tennessee. The peak featured an observation tower with a spiral ramp, affording visitors with panoramical views.

Parking was hard to find at Clingmans Dome during peak visitation seasons, as I drove past lines of cars parked (illegally) along the access road. But I seemed to have good luck with parking for the day, as I pulled into a spot just as another car was leaving.

From the parking lot, it was an additional 900m one-way uphill trail to the observation tower. The trail was paved, but at an incline. I anticipated the tower to be next to the parking lot, and this hike towards the end of the day was unpleasantly unexpected.

Finally, I arrived at the observation tower just in time, and join the crowds lining the spiral pathway for sunset.

Usually, I prefer the soft and vivid colors of twilight after sunset, but when I went through the photos I took at Clingmans Dome, I found the setting sun was lighting up the tips of fir trees surrouding the tower, and their interplay with shadows was making the perfect photos.

With that, I was most fond of the mountains to the north, like Mount Le Conte which I was to summit the next day. In comparison, the sunset just didn't seem as spectacular. (Another reason being it's rather crowded on the side facing the sunset.)

And finally, the tranquil colors of the mountains after sunset.

After sunset, it got both dark and cold rather quickly. So not long after that, I retreated back to the car. (The bitterness and the steep incline combined didn't work well with my knees.) Then I drove to the town of Pigeon Forge where I would spend the next two nights.

END