Great Smokey Mountains Railroad

Lubliner

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Joined
Nov 27, 2018
Location
Chattanooga, Tennessee
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smoky_Mountains_Railroad

I was lucky one year to be hiking through the area associated with this railroad one summer. I had gotten into the Nantahala Outdoor Center from the Appalachian Trail and applied for a job. Fortunately, no openings existed, so I decided to follow the railroad from there into Bryson City on foot. It was a pretty neat operation back in the 90's, and the link above gives some history and a chart of the different locomotives and rail gauge used through the years.
Lubliner.
 
I collect Thimbles. Have ones from Smokey Mts. sites. It just like collecting mugs or spoons. Just another material thing representing a site or place you visit. I have lots of mugs and cups. I usually try to buy these at the gift shops at the place I visit, like one of the Visitor Centers. I think for many of us it kind of an obsession. I really don't know as I get old, who the heck is going to want my collections. Even though I wonder this at times, still buy them. I guess I am silly or something.
 
Thank you @limestone1863 for the compliment. I will continue to attempt keeping the conversation on a level field of play.
@donna and @Copperhead-mi I believe someone is lightening their collection and priced it at 85 grain silver. I wonder what the box of 7 runs?
@rebracer the hike along the tracks took me a few days. They run beside a part of the Fontana Dam finger lakes, and when coming into Almond N. C. I stood along the side of the tracks as the train rumbled by, looking at the travelers enjoying their ride in the open carriage cars. There at Almond, the brick house that sits very close to the track was a way station way back when, and very few cottages even then when I passed were present. A man was cutting the lawn at the house and I asked him if it was okay to pick some apples from their tree (winesap). He was nice enough to tell me about the house, then owned by a doctor, and him the landscaper. That night I found a nice secluded area to set up camp and fried some almonds and apples from the trees that surrounded me, drawing water from the lake.
Lubliner.
 
I love this part of the country so much. Did you notice all the old cars that were used to build the edges of the lake?
No, I didn't. I only had one night camped along a curve on the outside elbow, me facing the lake with the railroad behind me, and then the mountain. If I remember it was a two-day walk into Almond from the NOC, this not being a trail but just the tracks and what was beside it. It was a couple more days into Bryson City, and I got to see the railhead where the locomotives park for the night. I never went down to the water except in Almond overnight, and that was just a small backwash from the main system.
Lubliner.
 
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