Fall Creek Falls

We did a couple of nights near Chattanooga Tennessee in an RV Park. We caught up on laundry, went grocery shopping, tried to catch up on internet stuff (failed!), and we took a short hike along their trails.

Our next stop has been Fall Creek Falls in Tennessee.  Weird name, but this is where Fall Creek has a falls. Apparently this is the highest U.S. falls east of the Rockies (256 feet). It wasn’t wide or a large volume since the stream was fairly low, but it was tall. That's John down there in the rocks.

We did a lot of hiking here.  The trails aren’t really long (we hiked 5-6 miles) but they are difficult and steep.  There’s a lot of stepping up and down rocks and pulling yourself up by holding on trees and roots.  We saw quite a few trees that are dark in spots where hundreds of people have held on to climb up and down these paths.

We also enjoyed talking to many of the people we met along the trails including a couple of ladies who took this picture of us at the base of the falls.

There is a hike down to the base of the falls that many older adults skip because of the fear of the climb back up. The hike really up really wasn’t bad.  It’s over some slippery rocks and some other hikers saw snakes, but it took only 15 minutes to get back to the top. A different hike even required pulling yourself up by a cable.

This swinging bridge scared a lot of people (kids and adults) but was actually not too bad. 

If you go, come during the week.  On weekends the place was packed with kids swimming and screaming. During the week it was much quieter to enjoy a hike.