Cades Cove, Great Smoky Mountains

Driving

by Plot Along: Appalachia

A drive from Townsend into Cades Cove, on the Tennessee side of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It starts at the Great Smoky Mountains Heritage Center, runs in on Laurel Creek Road, and picks up the 11-mile one-way loop road around the cove, an isolated valley that is the most-visited destination in the most-visited national park in the United States, drawing over 2 million visitors a year. People come for its preserved cluster of 19th-century homesteads, churches, and grist mills, plus near-guaranteed wildlife sightings (whitetail deer, black bear, wild turkey).

The loop road circles a flat valley floor framed by 6,000-foot Smokies ridges. Driving speeds are slow by design (10-20 mph) with frequent pull-offs for the historic buildings and meadow views.

The loop road is open daily year-round, weather permitting, with vehicle-free mornings on Wednesdays from May through September.

Learn more: nps.gov

1
Great Smoky Mountains Heritage Center
Regional heritage museum in Townsend, just outside the park's Townsend entrance and the start of this drive. Exhibits on Southern Appalachian mountain life and the communities that were displaced when the park was created. From here, Laurel Creek Road leads into Cades Cove.
2
John Oliver Cabin
1820s log cabin built by John and Lurena Oliver, the first European settlers in Cades Cove. The oldest standing structure on the loop and the first major stop after the entrance.
3
Cable Mill
The Cable Mill Historic Area at the loop's midpoint, with the 1870s John P. Cable water-powered grist mill (restored and working seasonally, with staff demonstrating corn grinding) and the 1879 Becky Cable House, the only frame house in the cove. The visitor center and the loop's main services are here.
4
Tipton Place
1870s farmstead built by Hamp Tipton. The home is preserved along with a smokehouse, woodshed, and a working blacksmith shop.
5
Valley View
Open meadow pullout with one of the cove's classic Smokies-rim views. Near-guaranteed deer sightings at dusk.
6
Carter Shields Cabin
Small late-1880s log cabin in a dogwood grove, particularly photogenic when the dogwoods bloom in mid-April.

Great Smoky Mountains Heritage Center

John Oliver Cabin

Cable Mill

Tipton Place

Valley View

Carter Shields Cabin