Winter Wonderland- Pigeon Forge

This Christmas, my family decided to take the brand new camper to Pigeon Forge for its maiden voyage. Now, my parent live in Pennsylvania, so they get snow in the winter. However, living in Tennessee we do not tend to get snow around Christmas time. But to add to the abnormal year of 2020, Tennessee actually had a white Christmas! Tennessee had gotten some snow in the days before Christmas, but as we drove down Christmas Day the snow kept coming down. Driving over the mountains of Virginia the snow just kept coming down, and I got super excited to play in the snow! (Yes I am 24, and no I will never stop getting excited and playing in the snow like a kid).

By the time we arrived at the campsite, it was dark with ice and snow everywhere. The car we towed behind the camper was coated in ice from the drive and was quite funny to try to get in and out for parking. Sadly I couldn't play in the snow right then, so I eagerly went to sleep, dreaming of waking up to go walk in the snow. The next morning, I woke up to see sparkling snow as far as my eye could see (which honestly wasn't very far since we were in a campground surrounded by trees). Before breakfast my brother, dad, and I went for a walk along the creek that was less than ten feet from our camper. The sun was just starting to rise over the mountain, sun shining on the crisp snow and ice, and the steam rising from the babbling creek. I definitely broke the peaceful atmosphere a couple times to throw snowballs at my brother and dad.

Once some time has passed, we ended up driving on a mountain road to visit family in another town. And honestly I think that was the most beautiful part of the trip. Mom wasn't so sure of the drive since the roads were coated in snow and ice, and there were many downed trees. But the heavy snow was resting so beautifully on the trees, I felt like we were driving through Narnia. We drove slowly to take in the view since no one was on the road with us, and I rolled down my window so I could see everything clearly. I was in constant awe looking at the mountains, trees, and creeks as we went through our hour drive. We had a couple laughs a few times as we drove under and around trees that people before us had cut a small path through. I just wanted to jump out of the car and play in the snow, but sadly we had no where to pull off of the road to safely stop. I have been constantly yearning for another snow like that since Christmas and am holding out for more fun in the snow. Especially since for this trip, I didn't bring my camera with me. Thats right- me, always taking photos, in a beautiful landscape, and no DSLR camera. I ended up taking all of these photos and videos on my phone.

But hey, I know I'm not the only kid at heart who loves to play in the snow. The next day we drove up to Cades Cove to drive the loop. A lot of people had the same idea so it was very crowded, and ended up taking three hours to dive without stopping to get out. However, there was a lot of stopping and waiting to move, in this we started to notice a pattern and had some fun with it. People everywhere were getting out of their cars to throw snowballs at each other or build snowmen. So, as we drove we started to count how many snowmen we could see from the car (over 200 were spotted) as we drove. Even though we didn't get out of the car, it was nice to see people having fun and playing in the snow like they were little kids again. This year has been so hard for everyone, and it doesn't look to be letting up anytime soon; so it was so nice to forget about the world and find joy in the little things.

Until next time- Stay safe, Much love!

Laura Mantooth