Wicked Travels Holidays, 2013 | Page 12

America's busiest park attracts nearly DOUBLE the number of visitors in a year than any other National Park. Almost half the people in the United State live within a day’s drive of the Great Smokey Mountains Nationl Park. People who live in the eastern third of the United Staes could reach the park in a one day drive.

Stretching between Tennessee and North Carolina, the 816 square mile park pays homage to the lifestyle of the moutain people who settled here in the late 1700's. Early settlers remarked that the landscape reminded them of their far away homes in the Scottish Highlands. Today a Scottish lilt can still be heard in local dialecs and music.

According to the National Park Service, "The wispy, smoke-like fog that hangs over the Smoky Mountains comes from rain and evaporation from trees. On the high peaks of the Smokies, an average of 85 inches of rain falls each year, qualifying these upper elevation areas as temperate rain forests".