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Early in the morning on Wednesday, April 25th, Fred departed for the return trip to his home near Atlanta. It was very nice making his acquaintance.
My route from Helen north to the Great Smoky Mountain National Park, through Cherokee to return to Helen
Since the weather was again beautiful and promised to be another great day for riding, including north into Tennessee, I decided to go for a longer ride through the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. The adjacent map shows my route for the day, through Hiawassee and Robbinsville to Deal’s Gap, along the Tail of the Dragon and the Foothills Parkway through Townsend, along the Little River Road to US-441 in the Park, across the Park and through Cherokee to Franklin, along US-64/Hwy-28 towards Highlands, through Clayton and back to Helen. The entire 286 mile trip took just over nine hours, from 9:30 AM to 6:30 PM.
During the day’s outing, I stopped on several occasions to take photos of the scenery, as well as to get gas and lunch. The first photo stop was along Chatuge Lake near Hiawassee. Other photo stops were along Santeetlah Lake near Robbinsville and Cheoah Lake near Deal’s Gap. When I reached Deal’s Gap, I stopped for about 15 minutes to see who else was there whom I might know and to take a couple photos of the numerous motorcycles in a line.
Although the ride was rather long, it was pleasant and without incident. Traffic was not very heavy, certainly less than it would have been on a sunny weekend.
Please continue reading Day #8 on this page.