We had breakfast at the hotel and set out pretty early on our way toward Smoky Mountains National Park. We got there in a few hours and then began to navigate the narrow, winding dirt roads down to the trail.
We filled up our water bottles at a campground and found the Boogerman trail head along the road. It began with a narrow log bridge crossing the water and then a densely wooded trail.
It turned out that the log bridges were quite common along this trail. They were fun to walk across and afforded a nice view up and down the streams.
Much of the hike was relatively flat or gradually graded except for one part that was a bit of a struggle. Not too bad at any point though. We had a few small stream crossings that were fun rock hopping. I also got inside this tree.
This stream crossing was really unavoidable unless we wanted to backtrack the entire trail. The bridge was out and the water was knee-high and moving quickly. I took off my boots and tossed them across to commit myself to the crossing, then I slowly waded across the rocky stream bed as the frigid water curled my toes. I made it with relative ease and then went back to help Kate across.
After another bridge or two and the lead-up section of the trail we were all done. It was a nice hike that ended up being more exciting than expected.
We stopped at a lookout on our way back out of the park. There was no shortage of great views. It was very windy up there.
We went back to Kate's cousin's house, where they graciously invited us in for dinner and offered us their spare bedroom. The meal was quite the proper southern meal also. There was chicken and plenty of sides. It was all delicious.
We spent the evening looking up places to go the next day. We made our list and then retired to bed to read for a while.
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