Smoky Mountain Living, February 2015

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING

TROUT DERBIES | CHATTANOOGA CHOO CHOO | FOLKMOOT USA FEBRUARY/MARCH 2015

Celebrating Southern Appalachians THE

KNOXVILLE'S BIG EARS MUSIC FEST • ANGLERS COUNT THEIR CATCH • CELEBRATING APPALACHIAN TRAIL HIKERS • TAKE A FESTIVAL TRIP

Taking the

Plunge Mountain festivals make a splash

What Big Ears? smliv.com

FEBRUARY/MARCH 2015 • VOL. 15 • NO. 1

Knoxville makes global sound waves

Q&A with author Ron Rash Appalachian Trail Days

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Contents

FEATU RE STO RIES

A WALK IN THE WOODS Appalachian Trail hikers celebrate their journey at annual festivals held in trailside communities.

BY HOLLY KAYS

PAGE

38

SOUND OF MUSIC Get out and get down with Knoxville, Tenn.’s, high-concept Big Ears music and arts festival.

BY KATIE KNOROVSKY

PAGE

46

UP TO THE GILLS Trout derbies provide fishermen of all ages a chance to prove their worth with a hook.

BY ANNA OAKES

PAGE

52

FESTIVAL FINDER Make plans to explore the Southern Appalachian region this year with a roundup of festivals not to be missed.

BY SARAH E. KUCHARSKI

PAGE

2

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

58

Contents MOUNTAIN VOICES

DEPA RTME N TS

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The festival atmosphere prompts a bit of waxing rhapsodic

MOUNTAIN MUSIC

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Camp chairs, portable toilets and wrist bands aren’t needed at these listening rooms

OUT & ABOUT

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Explore Chattanooga, Tenn.’s, vibrant downtown scene

OUTDOORS

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

12 18

22 24

Gear up for the season and learn a few tips on caring for what you already own

MOUNTAIN LETTERS

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Celebrating the South with a new collection

ON THE COVER

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Nu Wray Inn, a Burnsville, N.C., landmark, unmolds a tradition

A brave soul makes a splash in the Polar Plunge at Blowing Rock, N.C.’s, Winterfest.

ARTS

PHOTO BY TODD BUSH BUSHPHOTO.COM

MOUNTAIN VIEWS

Good Living 4

CUISINE

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Ron Rash sits a spell to answer our questions about his upcoming films

Life, unlike pet hair, is fleeting

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

28 30 36 64

Southern Appalachian Mountains Gallery Guide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 Crossword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Select Lodging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

Annual Events Garden Jubilee

Memorial Day weekend NC Apple Festival Labor Day weekend Flat Rock Playhouse mid-April thru late-December Rhythm & Brews Third Thursdays, May - Sept North Carolina Mountain State Fair early September Music On Main Street June thru late-August, every Friday Street Dances July thru mid-August, every Monday Art On Main first Saturday & Sunday in October Farm City Day first Saturday in October

Check out

Ask for your

Hike

ay!

Travel Guide tod

Camp Explore Relax

800.828.4244 historichendersonville.org WWW.SMLIV.COM

5

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

p e rs p e ct i ve s :

FROM THE MANAGING EDITOR

Let’s get something out in the open: I’m not from around here. My love for the Southern Appalachians runs deep, but I can’t regale you with tales of my Smokies ancestors or show you faded photos of my family’s cabin in the woods.

“Y’all” doesn’t cross my lips naturally, at least not yet. I play the violin, not the fiddle, and have never done so on a porch— though I have hopped on a bicycle with my instrument strapped to my back.

Perhaps worst of all, as the new editor of a magazine devoted to life in the mountains, I come from flat land. Growing up in a Mississippi River town, I was raised to treat slight inclines as hills and to only steer my sled down smooth descents. As a Katie Knorovsky precocious young bookworm, I once spent my Christmas money on a complete set of Little House on the Prairie books, a series of stories that rang true on visits to my grandparents’ farm on the wind-whipped plains of northern Iowa.

And yet mountains have shaped my identity.

At 18, equipped with an overweight backpack and poor lung support, I found faith in my own two feet in the backcountry of the Colorado Rockies. Years later as a newlywed living in Washington, D.C., I taught my husband how to pitch a tent and cook tinfoil dinners at Shenandoah National Park; I learned patience as he caught up from a childhood that had no use for kindling. We fell into step as partners on repeat trips to those waterfalls and overlooks.

One long weekend we followed the Blue Ridge south to North Carolina. Though we didn’t know it at the time, that road trip reset our life’s course.

A couple of years later, after seven years living and working in the heart of D.C., life in the nation’s nerve center began to feel more stifling than exciting. We knew just where to go. We packed a steel pod full of our belongings and said our goodbyes. Upon arrival to our new home in Asheville last June, we possessed a spirit of adventure and a love of the

mountains. We had a mortgage; we didn’t have friends. The first night, we unpacked and ordered pizza. The second night, we craved community.

Where to find a friendly face in a city full of strangers? We headed to a downtown music club to see an old friend. That is, we watched a favorite singer take the stage. Over the years, we had seen her perform enough times that she qualified as our closest kin that night. Shoulder to shoulder in a crowd of fellow fans and new neighbors, we set our newcomer status aside. We belonged. A couple of hours later, the show ended, sending us back to our menagerie of half-empty cardboard boxes. But that spark of connection had filled us up.

Such is the beauty of a shared experience, its power to wrap up everyone as equals in its fold. Of course, fellowship happens outside the all-encompassing presence of music. It brightens grocery store aisles and mountaintops and is passed in church pews and crosswalks.

Community is rarely more conspicuous, or more contagious, than at a public festival. Annual celebrations welcome one and all to honor heritage, share tradition and

“My husband and I fell into step as

partners on repeat trips to Shenandoah. One long weekend we followed the Blue Ridge south to North Carolina. Though we didn’t know it at the time, that road trip reset our life’s course.” breathe new life into both. Attendees can choose to wander lost in the crowd, or to join the party. To be lonely at a festival here is a decision.

And so it feels fitting that I begin my post at Smoky Mountain Living with an issue centered on the unique festivals that fill the calendar and enliven these mountains. At nearly every festival I have attended since moving here, from craft fairs to harvest happenings, I have walked around in an air of presumed anonymity, still an outsider in my mind’s eye.

And then, inevitably, a neighbor or friend stops to say hello, reminding me that I’m not such a stranger anymore.

WWW.SMLIV.COM

— Katie Knorovsky, managing editor

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p e rs p e ct ive s :

FROM OUR READERS COURTESY OF GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS ASSOCIATION/GEORGE MASA COLLECTION

Broad River in the valley below. Charlie’s Bunion is on the Appalachian Trail along the N.C./Tenn. line. Quite a booboo, guys. But you’re forgiven.

— Les Smith Editor’s note: Les is correct, as the formation in question is called The Devil’s Head. According to Chimney Rock State Park, “A long time ago a huge sheet of rock slid down the mountainside and broke into many pieces, one of which came to rest on this ledge.

The facial features of the boulder are due to differential weathering of Henderson Gneiss rock. More resistant parts of the rock form the eyebrow, nose, chin and ear, while softer layers have eroded out, shaping the eye and the mouth.”

As I have discovered, Smoky

My wife just presented me with my very first copy of Smoky Mountain Living.

Love it. I’m considering a subscription.

However I was very surprised at the photo on page 56 (August/September 2014, Man of the Mountains) referred to as Charlie’s Bunion. That precariously balanced rock resembling a devil’s head is at Chimney Rock State Park in (of course) Chimney Rock, N.C. You can even see the Rocky

Mountain Living is a terrific read, taking me back 40 years to my first visit, filled with memories of Cades Cove, the scenery along the Newfound Gap Road, and hiking up the Alum Creek Trail (huff, huff).

As one of America’s most visited national parks, this wonderland has so much to offer, whether on foot or through the windshield—but we should make every effort to lure folks to walk away from the road noise a bit. What a treat for young parents introducing the kids to butterflies, the joys of rushing whitewater, and the vista from the tower on Clingsmans Dome.

— Doug Scott

VOL. 15 • NUMBER 1 Publisher/Editor . . . . . . . . . . . Scott McLeod scott@smliv.com General Manager . . . . . . . . . Greg Boothroyd ads@smliv.com Sales Manager . . . . . . . . . . . Hylah Birenbaum hylah@smliv.com Managing Editor . . . . . . . . . Katie Knorovsky editor@smliv.com Editor-at-Large . . . . . . . . Sarah E. Kucharski sarah@smliv.com Art Director . . . . . . . . . . . Travis Bumgardner travis@smliv.com Graphics . . . . . . . Micah McClure, Emily Moss Finance & Admin. . . . . . . Amanda Singletary Sales . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Greg Boothroyd, Whitney Burton, Amanda Bradley Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Scott Collier Contributing Writers. . . Lindy Keane Carter, Joe Hooten, Holly Kays, Sarah E. Kucharski, Anna Oakes, Jeff Minick, Garret K. Woodward Contributing Photographers . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Brandon Buckner, Scott Chris, Max Cooper, Bill Foster, Heidi Hatcher, Margaret Hester, E.J. Horrocks, Holly Kays, Elizabeth Majcher, Rosemary H. Williams, Garret K. Woodward, Scott Woody Contributing Illustrator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Mandy Newham-Cobb Smoky Mountain Living is published bi-monthly

by SM Living LLC. Smoky Mountain Living has made every effort to insure listings and information are accurate and assumes no liability for errors or omissions.

For advertising information, contact Hylah Smalley at 866.452.2251 or hylah@smliv.com.

For editorial inquiries, contact Sarah E. Kucharski at sarah@smliv.com.

Smoky Mountain Living assumes no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts or photographs. Queries should be sent to Sarah E. Kucharski at sarah@smliv.com. ©2015. All rights reserved. No portion of this magazine may be reprinted without the express, written consent of the publisher.

Crossword answers Puzzle is on page 61.

8

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

Smoky Mountain Living is published bi-monthly (Dec/Jan, Feb/Mar, Apr/May, Jun/Jul, Aug/Sep, Oct/Nov) by SM Living, LLC, 144 Montgomery Street, Waynesville, NC 28786. Periodical Postage paid at Waynesville, N.C., and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: please send address changes to Smoky Mountain Living, PO Box 629, Waynesville, NC 28786.

p e rs p e ct i ve s :

ABOUT OUR WRITERS Lindy Keane Carter is

a writer who lives in Charleston, South Carolina. Her recently released novel, Annaliese From Off, is the story of two women uprooted from their lives of comfort in Louisville, Kentucky and forced to live in a north Georgia lumber camp in 1900.

Mandy NewhamCobb is a lefty vegetarian artist

and illustrator living right outside of Philly. Newham is the illustrator of three children’s books: “Razzmatazz!,” “‘Bullet’ Joe: A Kansas City Monarch,” and “The Little Brown Hen.” She earned her bachelor of fine arts at Florida State University and her master of fine arts in drawing at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Katie Knorovsky lives

in West Asheville, N.C., and is the new managing editor of Smoky Mountain Living. Previously an editor at National Geographic Traveler in Washington, D.C., she loves a good adventure and is thrilled to have come home to Southern Appalachia, where there’s always more to explore.

Sarah E. Kucharski

is a writer, speaker, reader, traveler and doer of things. As Smoky Mountain Living’s managing editor for the past several years, she enjoyed discovering so much more about the people and places of the Southern Appalachians in which she was raised. Now her focus is on creative writing and working on that book about which everyone has been asking.

Joe Hooten

was born in Macon, Ga., but spent his formative years surfing the beaches near his home in Mt. Pleasant, S.C. He eventually found his way to Western North Carolina. Hooten taught public middle and high school history in Hendersonville, Cary and then Raleigh for 10 years before moving back to Asheville with his wife and three young kids in 2008. Hooten writes about his all-time favorite hobby— music—for The Smoky Mountain News and Smoky Mountain Living. A second-rate guitarist, he can be found most evenings pickin’ some tunes on the back porch while enjoying the beauty of the Appalachian Mountains.

Holly Kays

is a forester's daughter who came to the Appalachian South by way of the West via the mid-Atlantic. She’s produced award-winning work at newspapers in Idaho and Wyoming and now writes for The Smoky Mountain News in Waynesville, N.C. Happy to have returned to the land of many trees, she’s even happier to write about them. When, of course, she’s not hiking.

Jeff Minick

lives in Asheville, N.C., where he tutors home-educated students and writes for various publications. He is the author of two books, both self-published: “Amanda Bell,” a novel, and “Learning As I Go,” a collection of essays and reviews.

Garret K. Woodward

grew up in the tiny Canadian border town of Rouses Point, N.Y., spending his childhood on the shores of Lake Champlain and in the mystical woods of the Adirondack Mountains. When not wandering and writing, he spends his time seeing live music, running, hiking, and starting conversations with strangers over a cup of coffee at a diner.

WWW.SMLIV.COM

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perspectives:

MOUNTAIN MUSINGS

Answers always start as questions

10

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

Shortly after I became Smoky Mountain Living’s managing editor, I also took a teaching job at the local community college. I struggle to find the words to express how much it meant to me. My students all were at the lowest end of the spectrum—some graduated high school, some simply earned GEDs, some were 40 or older and laid off so had returned to school for lack of other options.

It had been a foregone conclusion I would go to college since conception. I was in a program for academically gifted students and took advanced placement classes in high school.

I’d graduated from Chapel Hill and was working on my master’s in addition to being managing editor and teaching. On paper, my students were my antithesis.

Sarah E. Kucharski In reality, they became my personal projects, my challenges, my loves.

It was my sole (and soul) purpose not to teach them to love English, but to see its relevance in their lives and futures. I didn’t need them to recite Shakespeare. I needed them to be able to fill out a job application.

So I did what needed to be done—I made the subject matter applicable. The school is known for its wildlife and forestry programs, so I brought in the N.C. Wildlife Commission’s division chief, a program graduate, in full uniform to speak with me about how English and communication skills played a part in his day-to-day duties; about how accurate and clear descriptions could make or break a case; about how written and verbal testimony could lead to conviction; about how orders to his officers needed to be understood. I read them John Muir. I read them Bill Bryson.

I also read them David Sedaris—with all the curse words— because they didn’t know “English” could be like that.

I made my tests hard and expected the world of them, and when they did not do well, I did not yell. They were used to yelling. What they were not used to was someone being disappointed in them and telling them that they were indeed capable of doing better. But I told them that in the end, it did not matter to me what grade they made. I would get paid regardless, and that if they did not want to work hard enough to pass the class, I simply would see them again next semester and perhaps the semester after that. Without passing my class, they would not be allowed to move on to core level courses and thus would not be able to take the classes they actually wanted to take. All in all, it was up to them. They could do it—if they wanted to do it. And I would help them as much as I could.

I’m certain I broke rules.

But I didn’t care because my methods worked.

For all my expectations and journal assignments with twopoint deductions for spelling and grammar and tests with more than 50 questions administered in a 50-minute class, my students passed the departmental exam and I earned their

respect and admiration. The guys who would rather spend any and every day out in the woods than in an English class decided I was their favorite teacher. When a giant snake visited campus as part of a wildlife program course, my students who were in the class wanted to bring the snake to me to show off—a flattering if not terrifying prospect. Whenever I’d run into a previous semester’s students in the community, they always would tell me they missed me. No, every day in the classroom wasn’t filled with hugs and sunshine. Some days were nothing but subject-verb agreement, pronouns and individual bookwork. But each day I felt like I was doing something that mattered.

One student dropped out after I left teaching. Granted there are always a million reasons why such things happen and some of them are valid. From my students I gained the perspective that my life’s complications were relatively simple. I had deadlines to meet for Smoky Mountain Living.

She had custody battles for her siblings. I had a basement with a retained moisture problem. He had discovered his father was racist and was grappling with his feelings that his father was wrong.

So whenever I’d see my former student working at the gas station up the road, I didn’t push the school issue. Instead I simply was kind and always made a point to acknowledge her and spend an extra minute or two talking with her. She’d always ask about my work and my travels.

Over the summer, I’d stopped in for a soda and some chips.

She rang up my items and we chatted until she got busy with other customers. When I got to my car, it occurred to me that I really ought give her a copy of the latest magazine. I snagged a copy from the backseat, went back in, simply handed the magazine over the register and said, “Here! This is for you.”

Her smile was genuine.

She was working at the gas station again one night this fall when I stopped by on my way home from work. It had been a long day. I was feeling somewhat low. She asked how things were going and I told her that I was leaving Smoky Mountain Living for other opportunities. She glanced sideways out the door and smiled before looking back at me. “You should go back to school! I did,” she said.

I only was able to get out a single word of praise— ”Good!”—before my throat closed up, and I scurried out to my car where, safely enclosed in the steel and the dark and the rain, I burst into tears. I cried as I drove. I cried in the garage. I cried in the kitchen.

I cried not because I was sad but because I was so overwhelmed to receive such a meaningful gift—exactly when I needed it—and to think that maybe, just maybe, I nurtured it a tiny bit.

The absolute best things in life are those on which we take a risk and invest ourselves even though we do not know how they will play out. Certainty is safe and rather useless for bringing richness to life’s experiences. Answers do not simply present themselves without giving them a chance to first exist as questions. As I leave Smoky Mountain Living, I am asking for and ready to receive whatever comes next.

Dear readers, thank you for all that you too have meant.

WWW.SMLIV.COM

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p e rs p e ct ive s :

MOUNTAIN VOICES

The more the merrier

BY GARRET K. WOODWARD

I had just driven 1,016 miles and yet I didn’t know where I was.

In July 2012, I wandered into The Smoky Mountain News office in downtown Waynesville, North Carolina—tired, hungry, a little delirious and full of inertia and caffeine after a nonstop haul from upstate New York. Publisher Scott McLeod extended a friendly handshake and conducted our fourth interview in two weeks (the last three over the phone). He needed to fill a slot for an arts and entertainment writer. I was in dire need of work.

“Let’s see what you can do on the spot,” he said. “The town is in the midst of Folkmoot. Find and write me two stories by the end of this weekend about the event.”

What in the heck is Folkmoot? Before I could get a firm grasp on a definition, I was handed a camera, notepad, pen and quickly pushed out the door. Around the corner, on Main Street, I could hear the sounds of music and people cheering.

Bringing together the essences of world culture with the traditions of Southern Appalachia, Folkmoot USA is a true “meeting of the people”—as I later found out that the Old English term means. The art of live performance found at this the two-week international dance and music festival transcends barriers by creating an ambience that’s as embracing as it is unique. Alongside the hundreds of performers stand business leaders, politicians and musicians who represent this region with class, style and their own brand of southern hospitality. Since its debut in 1984, Folkmoot has emerged as a beacon of hope, change and beauty in Haywood County.

As the sun fell behind the Blue Ridge Mountains on my first day in town, the Serbian dance troupe Talija overtook Main Street. Draped in traditional attire, the teenage ensemble stepped onto the cornmeal-laced pavement representing a foreign nation, an abstract dot thousands of miles away. For all who bared witness to their movements and musical accompaniment, it seemed to move a little bit closer.

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

“I’d only been in Waynesville a few hours, but I had already experienced the most important trait of this region—its abiding sense of community.”

Balsam Range (above), the 2014 International Bluegrass Music Association Entertainer of the Year, performs at the Fines Creek Bluegrass Jam. Waynesville’s Folkmoot draws folk dancers from around the world (facing page). GARRET K. WOODWARD PHOTOS

Talija Director Dragan Pantelic felt it, too, and shared his love for western North Carolina. “The people and the nature is just like in Serbia,” he said. “People here are always friendly and always make you feel at home.”

After Talija exited the street, the local Green Valley Cloggers performed traditional Southern Appalachian rhythms and techniques along with a fast-picking band from eastern Tennessee. Rotating and shuffling around the street with meticulous style and grace, the dancers never once lost their step.

I’ll never forget watching those performance ensembles, from completely different backgrounds, happily share their cultures as ambassadors of peace and understanding. I’d only been in Waynesville a few hours, but I had already experienced the most important trait of this region—its abiding sense of community.

Festivals in Southern Appalachia stand apart. Here, the word “nostalgia” does not exist. The traditional dances, sounds, food, attire and attitude are not simply for show, emerging once a year and then pushed aside. These faces and the heritage they represent are an everyday lifestyle for those of us lucky enough to call this region home.

In other words, the skills presented on stage during a festival actually represent who its performers are as people. See those folks up there clogging or playing a string instrument? They’re doing that all year, in community dance halls on a raucous Saturday night or around a potbelly stove while winter frosts their windows. See those blacksmiths and weavers demonstrating on the street? Those are professionals who lead workshops at local colleges or take to the road to share, spread and sell their craft.

Living in western North Carolina, I witness that sense of community and tradition every weekend. Whether I’m listening to an Appalachian storyteller at Mountain Heritage Day on the campus

of Western Carolina University, sipping a locally made craft beer at the Knoxville Brewers’ Jam or marveling at a bluegrass act at the Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion, to partake in this southern paradise is an exercise in immersion.

Life here is also rich in under-the-radar happenstances such as the Fines Creek Bluegrass Jam. Tucked off of Interstate 40 in a rural corner of Haywood County, the daylong celebration of mountain music brings together some of the finest musicians in the bluegrass and folk genres.

Each year, hometown heroes Balsam Range headline the jam.

Named the 2014 International Bluegrass Music Association “Entertainer of the Year,” Balsam Range makes regular appearances at the Grand Ole Opry. But they also play their hearts out here. Far from any city, the stage perches two floors up on the backside of a Depression-era elementary school turned community center, nestled in a cradle of ancient mountains. Around a hundred folks in lawn chairs watch the band, eating barbecue and sipping sweet tea.

It’s pure magic.

“I grew up in the mountains and music was a part of our heritage,” said Darren Nicholson, mandolinist for Balsam Range. “My dad played and about everybody in my family played. We’d play every evening, especially on Friday nights when other musicians would come by and sit on the porch. As long as people have been living here, music has been here. Music and dance is a big part of mountain culture. It’s just a way of life—sitting down with your family after dinner and playing. It’s been like that around here for hundreds of years.”

So why does Balsam Range play the jam? Why do all of these bands and artisans do what they do, especially on such a local level? It’s a gift to those who first provided them with a platform for success.

“You’ve got to give back to the community. You can’t lose sight of that,” Nicholson said. “When you’re not in a mainstream genre of music, you become very accessible and close to other bluegrass musicians.

With more people at a bluegrass show, it’s just a bigger porch.” y folkmootusa.org That’s also the y mountainheritageday.com same reason such y knoxvillebrewersjam.com amazing people rey bristolrhythm.com main in this area, rather than hightailing it to the nearest city or trendy spot. Folks raised here understand from an early age the importance of not only giving back to your community, but taking a sincere pride in the people, places and things surrounding you.

There’s a saying here: “I wasn’t born in Waynesville, but I sure got here as fast as I could.” As an arts and entertainment writer for The Smoky Mountain News, I find that statement truer each day. I live and thrive in Southern Appalachia, and the characters I cross paths with—while grabbing a cup of coffee around the corner or meandering around a festival—never cease to amaze me.

Everyone here has a story to share. We all came from somewhere, near or far, and yet we all have come together for one purpose— community.

WWW.SMLIV.COM

Learn more:

13

Heidi Hatcher

To celebrate a thing is to mark its occasion—with joy or in memory, we are moved to remember.

Smoky Mountain Living’s readers shared their images of celebrations with an eye for new beginnings.

Elizabeth Majcher Folkmoot Polish Dancer

In the morning, celebrate the beauty and warmth of sun light; in the evening, celebrate the song of silence and love of night.

Rosemary H. WIlliams Treemont Sunrays

— Debasish Mridha

Max Cooper Maggie Valley Motorcycle Rally

Max Cooper Folkmoot Parade of Nations

Margaret Hester Oconaluftee Indian Village

Margaret Hester King’s Castle

Johnnie Geneva Oliver of Cades Cove, Tenn.

May Queen, 1932, Montreat Normal School, Montreat, N.C

I celebrate myself, and sing myself.

— Walt Whitman

Smoky Mountain Living prominently features images from across the southern Appalachians in each edition. Photo essays adhere to the issue’s overall theme.

Smoky Mountain Living’s April/May edition will celebrate spring renewal. Send your pictures of how the season and this region recharge your spirit to photos@smliv.com by Feb. 20, 2015.

Reader submitted photos are unpaid but those selected are rewarded with publication in our nationally distributed magazine. Each submission must include information about where the photo was taken and by whom. Don't forget to connect with us at facebook.com/smliv and @SmokyMtnLiving on Twitter!

d e p a r t m e n t :

MOUNTAIN MUSIC

Bright lights, city venues Rolling Stone magazine called Asheville’s Orange Peel one of the top five rock clubs in the country. GARRET K. WOODWARD PHOTO

BY JOE HOOTEN

A

s the festival season slowly starts to kick into high gear, music lovers who prefer a seat rather than standing shoulder to shoulder with strangers are reminded of the plethora of opportunities to hear highcaliber music in quality venues across the region. From Knoxville, Tenn., to Asheville, N.C., there’s a 19th-century, fully restored music hall on one end and hipster night lounges on the other. No matter what kind of music one’s seeking, there’s a place to satisfy every niche.

THE GREY EAGLE Nestled in the heart of the River Arts District just above the French Broad River, this former bus garage turned music venue has become a quintessential place to hear music—its listening room has the reputation as one of the best in the Southeast. Recent renovations have improved the sound and lighting, but the Grey Eagle remains unpretentious. Check out the weekly Monday night “contra dance” and don’t leave home without your dancing shoes. thegreyeagle.com

ISIS MUSIC HALL

The Peel is probably the best known option for superb live entertainment in downtown Asheville. Nationally touring acts as well as local musicians have graced the stage. Everyone from Bob Dylan, the Smashing Pumpkins and Jack White to local favorites the Steep Canyon Rangers have played to sold-out crowds. Occupancy is around 1,100 in the former Skateland Rollerdome, and after all the many building updates, Rolling Stone magazine named it one of the top five rock clubs in the country. theorangepeel.net

Just a block over from the Mothlight on Haywood Road in West Asheville is the newly refurbished Isis Music Hall. Complete with a swanky balcony and The Isis Music Hall presents regional and upscale upstairs bar, the venue national acts, such as the Corey Harris provides a unique cabaret-style Band. SCOTT WOODY PHOTO seated dinner for some shows.

“Classical brunch” on Saturdays is a local favorite along with Tuesday night bluegrass sessions. Expect a wide variety of music with both national and regional acts headlining three to four nights a week. isisasheville.com

THE MOTHLIGHT

JACK OF THE WOOD

One of Asheville’s newest music venues occupies the former site of Mr. Fred’s furniture store, a longtime staple in the Haywood

A trip to Asheville wouldn’t be complete without enjoying a show and a pint at the renowned Jack of the Wood. Located on

THE ORANGE PEEL

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Road area of West Asheville. As The Mothlight, it has become the ultra-hip venue in the region. An eclectic mix of national and regional indie music flows in this dark and divey bar. themothlight.com

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

13 Stages of "Traditional Plus" Music!

The Avett Brothers

BĂŠla Fleck and Abigail Washburn

Lee Ann Womack

North Mississippi Allstars

Hot Rize

The Earls of Leicester

Robert Earl Keen

Trampled By Turtles

The Marshall Tucker Band

April 23-26, 2015

MerleFest.org • 1-800-343-7857 W i l k e s b o r o ,

N o r t h

The Del McCoury Band

C a r o l i n a

Plus many more performers!

MerleFest and WCC are 100% Tobacco Free.

The views presented are not necessarily those of Wilkes Community College or endorsed by the college.

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MOUNTAIN MUSIC

Patton Avenue in downtown Asheville, Jack of the Wood has long been a musician’s favorite, as weekly acoustic jam sessions are the norm and in-the-round singer/songwriter nights are popular among those in attendance. The former home of Green Man Brewery, Jack of the Wood offers a departure from downtown Asheville’s hustle with its Celtic pub style and warm decor that transport visitors to another time and place. jackofthewood.com

PRESERVATION PUB Located on the historic Market Square in downtown Knoxville, the Preservation Pub is one of those venues that always attracts flocks Designed in the Spanish-Moorish style, Knoxville’s Tennessee Theatre features opulent accents such as crystal chandeliers and Italian terrazzo flooring. TENNESSEE THEATRE PHOTO of music fans, foodies and beer aficionados.

Boasting all sorts of cool house at one time. With natural accoustics that are nearly second amenities to none, the Bijou has become a world-class theater and major censuch as the ter for the arts.

Moonshine knoxbijou.com Roof Garden, a selection of TENNESSEE THEATRE at least 300 beers and a Another true historic treasure in downtown Knoxville, the Tenstaggering nessee Theatre opened in 1928 and was designated the “Official The second floor of Preservation 200 acts a State Theatre of Tennessee” in 1999. After a multimillion dollar renPub has a modern speakeasy month on its ovation project in the mid-2000s, the Tennessee Theatre has been vibe. SARAH E. KUCHARSKI PHOTO three stages, restored to its original glamour and elegance and offers a one-of-athis lively kind experience no matter the production. Concerts at the Theatre venue should not be missed when visiting Knoxville. sell out frequently, with traveling preservationpub.com Broadway performances a mainstay at this glorious hall. tennesseetheatre.com THE SQUARE ROOM Also found in the Historic Market Square district, the Square Room is Knoxville’s premier listening room—an intimate venue with an impressive sound system that does not compromise its warm and inviting atmosphere. The Square Room showcases a wide variety of music, including singer/songwriters, jazz, Celtic and local indie bands. The place’s name is appropriate—don’t expect a wide concert hall—but the cozy and relaxed feeling make space for memorable shows at this all-ages music venue. thesquareroom.com

BIJOU THEATER Added to the National Register of Historical Places in 1975, the Bijou Theater has been called Knoxville’s “gem of the South.” Formally opened in 1909 as an addition to the Lamar House Hotel, the Bijou has presented many different forms of entertainment since its doors opened—everything from operas, musicals, and orchestral concerts to vaudeville and comedy acts. It was even an adult movie

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LAUREL THEATER As listening rooms go, Knoxville’s historic Laurel Theater offers a truly distinct performance space. With a roughly 200-person capacity, this converted church built in 1898 has also been added to the National Register of Historical Places. It is the home of the Jubilee Community Arts organization and offers space for actors, musicians, storytellers and dancers. Almost destroyed by a fire in the early 1980s, the Laurel Theater stands today as inspiration to artists and audiences alike. jubileearts.org

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

Knoxville’s Laurel Theater.

DONATED PHOTO

13 Stages of "Traditional Plus" Music!

The Gibson Brothers

Bruce Robison and Kelly Willis

Sam Bush Band

The Waybacks

Donna the Buffalo

Peter Rowan

The Kruger Brothers

Scythian

Sutton, Holt and Coleman

The Black Lillies

Nashville Bluegrass Band

April 23-26, 2015

MerleFest.org • 1-800-343-7857 W i l k e s b o r o ,

N o r t h

C a r o l i n a

Jim Lauderdale

The David MayďŹ eld Parade

Chatham County Line

Mipso

Plus many more performers!

MerleFest and WCC are 100% Tobacco Free.

The views presented are not necessarily those of Wilkes Community College or endorsed by the college.

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d e p a r t m e n t :

OUT & ABOUT

CHATTANOOGA’S HOT TICKET

W

hen the Barnum & Bailey Circus paraded through Chattanooga’s Southside in 1903, the neighborhood thrived as an urban center of finance and commerce.

But decades of decline turned the corridor into a seedy strip near the landmark Chattanooga Choo Choo Hotel.

Happily, Southside is back on track, with the onetime train depot in the midst of an $8 million renovation to transform the hotel’s southern facade into a major hub for retail, dining and entertainment. Elsewhere along Main and Market streets, a tight-knit community of creative business owners have revived old warehouses and historic buildings as spaces for contemporary art, startup incubators and artisan food and drink. On Sundays from spring to fall, the open-air First Tennessee Pavilion hums with shoppers browsing local produce and crafts at the Chattanooga Market. And the rest of the city joins the Southside party during the juried 4 Bridges Arts Festival in spring (April 11-12) and December’s Mainx24, an around-the-clock celebration with a pancake breakfast, parade and adult tricycle races.

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In the spirit of Glenn Miller’s famous song about the Chattanooga Choo Choo: Step aside partner, it’s Southside’s day. Here are 10 neighborhood favorites: y Treat yourself to a hot cinnamon roll or take a naturally leavened loaf of sourdough to go at Niedlov’s Bakery (tagline: “we love to knead, we knead to love”), which has built a diehard following since John and Angela Sweet took a chance on the neighborhood in 2002. 215 East Main Street. y Order a pour-over coffee at Velo Coffee Roasters, where sustainably produced beans are sold (or served) within a day or two of being roasted at their shop in small batches. 509 East Main Street. y Experience bicycle-friendly Chattanooga— and save face with the resident Ironman athletes you might encounter on its trails and paths—on a motor-assisted rental from

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

The Flying Squirrel Bar (facing page) keeps spirits soaring in the Southside. A “Hottie” truffle at the Hot Chocolatier (right).

CHATTANOOGA CVB PHOTO (FACING PAGE) BRANDON BUCKNER PHOTO (RIGHT)

Electric Bike Specialists ($24 for two hours, $50 a day). 45 East Main Street. y Lunch like a local at Grocery Bar—at once a specialty food market, cafeteria and meeting place—opened by chef and native son Daniel Lindley. Options span global cuisines, from sushi to smoked pork belly with cheese grits.

100 West Main Street. y Save room for dessert at the Hot Chocolatier, where cocoa pairs with everything from cayenne pepper to Chattanooga whiskey (soon to open next door) in a menu of house-made temptations that includes hot and cold drinks and a vast display case of truffles, cakes and macarons. Sweeter still, glass windows in the kitchen allow anyone to watch the chocolate makers at work. 1437 Market Street. y Admire the fine paintings and bronze sculptures at Gallery 1401, a 17-year

veteran of the local art scene specializing in contemporary realism, impressionism and classical styles. 1478 Market Street. y Pick up a painting or bracelet at the Hart

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Gallery, which sells original works created by homeless and other nontraditional artists. Profits go to the artist and to fund outreach art classes and supplies. 110 East Main Street. y Give in to sensory overload at Area 61, a showroom of objets d’art by some 40 artists and craftspeople working in a 100-mile radius. The bright, eclectic array ranges from garden sculptures made with reclaimed materials to copper-clad custom speakers (at $36,000 or so a pop). 61 East Main Street. y Brush off your table tennis skills while waiting to be seated at Clyde’s On Main, where the Choo Choo Hot Fish sandwich pays a mouth-tingling tribute to a Chattanooga specialty, spicy fried cod. 122 West Main Street. y Sip a house-infused cucumber gin or jalapeno tequila cocktail at the Flying Squirrel Bar (you can’t miss the building with wings). Opened by the rockclimbing friends who run the adjacent LEED Platinum-certified boutique hostel, the sleek industrial space holds court as the Southside’s de facto social anchor. 55 Johnson Street.

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Whitewater in the gorge

OUTDOORS

Bull elk at Cataloochee. HOLLY KAYS PHOTO

Elk herd growing pains

T

he elk herd in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, first reintroduced in 2001, continues to grow and expand its presence outside park borders.

Though there’s no hard figure, the herd now likely numbers somewhere around 150, up from 52, with the animals turning up in the backyards or agricultural fields of area residents.

Consequently, wildlife management agencies have joined forces to seek better ways to count and track the elk.

“It’s definitely gone from an experiment to a region-wide management issue,” said Joe Yarkovich, elk biologist for the park.

Because the Appalachians’ dense tree cover makes it impossible to count elk using a flyover census as officials do out west, the park, together with the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission (NCWRC), is working to perfect a DNA sampling method for use on elk feces.

An adaptation of an existing method, the technique would allow scientists to figure out which elk are related, who they’re hanging out with and which groups are interacting. Those results would lead to a greater understanding of how elk organize socially—without having to tarp or tranquilize the animals.

“We’re busting our butts and wracking our brains,” said Justin McVey, a wildlife biologist with the NCWRC. “It’s going to be a long process.”

HIKING GUIDE DECODES THE FOREST A new hiking guide for the Southern Appalachians is out, highlighting 30 popular hikes in North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia and Virginia. Yet Exploring Southern Appalachian Forests is more than a guidebook: it’s a decoder that tells the story of the region’s tree canopies, forest floors and other natural features.

Authors Stephanie Jeffries and Thomas Wentworth serve as professors at North Carolina State University, Jeffries in forestry and Wentworth in plant and microbial biology. They’ve spent years guiding forest walks throughout the region and wrote the book to help readers more fully appreciate the environmental factors that create the high biodiversity of the Southern Appalachians.

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A national whitewater competition will challenge serious paddlers of all ages and provide entertainment for spectators March 28 and 29 at Nantahala Outdoor Center near Bryson City, North Carolina.

There, the Nantahala River runs through Nantahala Gorge, home to some of the most sought-after paddling conditions in the country.

The Nantahala Racing Club Whitewater U.S. Open will include a slalom through the Class III Nantahala Falls Course, a downriver sprint on the Class III Patton’s Run Rapid and a downriver endurance race from the Class II Ferebbee Park to the Jumping Rock.

Registration costs $25 for downriver and $50 for the slalom. Pre-register by March 19 to avoid late fees. nantahalaracingclub.com.

The book includes summaries of trail distances and difficulty, hike narratives including unique natural features, best seasons for wildflowers and fall color, contact information, photos, maps and an illustrated guide to identifying common trees and shrubs.

Hikes range from short walks along Blue Ridge Parkway pull-offs to day trips through the backcountry.

RACE AWAY THE WINTER A 30K race through the rolling hills of Kingston, Tennessee, will help runners shake off any lingering winter lethargy. Beginning from Whitestone Inn on Watts Bar Lake, the March 1 footrace features a scenic, rural course and offers opportunities for relay teams as well as individual racers.

After the race, an awards ceremony with categories by age and gender will be held, and runners will be treated to a buffet. Cost ranges from $20 to $50 depending on date and type of entry.

Registration deadline is Feb. 24. 865.621.0752 or ktc.org.

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

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OUTDOORS

Gear up for springtime adventures

E

B Y H O L LY K AY S

quipped with a school backpack, which was jerry-rigged with bungee cords to attach half of a tent and a 1980s-era sleeping bag of questionable warmth, I wore sporting jeans, sneakers, a long-sleeve tee and a cotton hoodie. I was ready to go spring camping—or so I thought. Soon after I left the trailhead on my first backpacking trip at Grayson Highlands State Park, the rain started and the temperature dropped. A long, cold night gave way to a cold, foggy morning.

Suffice it to say, my experience left much to be desired—namely, better gear.

With unpredictable weather conditions, springtime adventures necessitate smart packing.

Rob Gasbarro, co-owner of Outdoor 76 in Franklin, North Carolina, offers the following advice on the gear to bring as you head out this spring: Comfortable footwear and a good pack: Unlike most other pieces of outdoors equipment, packs and boots are difficult to buy based on editorials and advertisements. The choice is subject to the individual’s preference and body type, Gasbarro said, so it’s essential to find the right fit at an outfitter.

“Backpacks and shoes are the two most personal pieces of gear that will affect essentially how much fun you have—and that’s why we all do this,” Gasbarro said.

Reliable shelter: Look for a solid three-season tent with plenty of space that also keeps the rain and wind out. A higher price tag usually means a smaller, lighter tent, but for people who are willing to carry a little extra bulk, less expensive models can do the job.

Hammocks remain another popular shelter solution, but Gasbarro advises against coldweather hammocking, which can be gear-intensive. “Personally, I don’t bring my hammock until the low temperatures are about 45 or 50 degrees,” Gasbarro said.

Warm, dry layers: Spring hikers should come prepared for both summer- and winterlike weather. Layers of moisture-wicking synthetic or merino wool products—never cotton—are the way to go.

“The old adage ‘cotton kills’ is very true,” Gasbarro said.

Wear a base layer, an insulating mid-layer and a waterproof outer shell, which can be anything from a basic, bulky raincoat to a $400 Gortex shell. And always take a breather if you

The right stuff Here are Rob Gasbarro’s picks for his favorite gear that 2015 has to offer: y A Patagonia Nano-Air jacket, “the best midlayer that’s ever been made.” y The Sawyer Mini Water Filter, which “outperforms things that cost four times as much.” y Orthotics boots. y Big Agnes Fly Creek UL2 tent, “the tent that everybody wants.” y Marmot Cloudbreak 30 sleeping bag, “a really good bag that just about everybody can afford” or the Western Mountaineering HighLite, which “packs to the size of a Nalgene bottle.” y Klymit Static V2, “a comfortable three-inch mattress for under $70.” y Jetboil Zip Cooking System, which is “lightweight, compact and inexpensive.”

Backpackers walk to get water from a spring near Mount Rogers in Virginia. HOLLY KAYS PHOTO

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

The right gear can make the difference between the best and the worst of times.

HOLLY KAYS PHOTO

catch yourself sweating in cold weather, Gasbarro said, because sweat can quickly turn to cold moisture on the skin.

Food, water and a way to prepare them: For an overnight, this could be as simple as granola bars, trail mix and bottled water. But for longer adventures, Gasbarro emphasizes nutrition.

“Even a two- or three-day hike can be as demanding on your body as running a marathon, so staying properly hydrated and nourished is important,” Gasbarro said.

Pack healthy, high-calorie food—dehydrated whole ingredient meals are one way to go—and a way to cook it. Options range from lightweight alcohol-burning stoves to ones that burn compressed gas.

Also, be sure to research whether water will be available along the trail. If you plan to fill up along the way, Gasbarro said, be sure to pack some method of water purification, such as a mechanical filter or an ultraviolet light wand. Giardia will ruin any camping trip.

A sleeping bag and mat: Gasbarro recommends looking for a bag with an adequate temperature rating and a mat that provides insulation, packs up small and sets up easily. For the Smokies, a 30degree lined sleeping bag is ideal, and Gasbarro recommends a mat weighing in the range of 16 to 22 ounces.

Fillers: Bring quality hiking socks, a hat, gloves, a basic first aid kit, a map and compass, a light source, a pocketknife and a fire starter.

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MOUNTAIN LETTERS

Southern way of life

BY JEFF MINICK

Garden & Gun. The title of this magazine shocked and delighted me when I first came across it. The incongruity of the words garden and gun made me laugh aloud, and I found the articles about life in the South—ranging from making biscuits to fishing bass, from concocting a bourbon punch to growing the perfect tomato—as down-home and comforting as a glass of sweet tea on an August afternoon.

Now the editors of Garden & Gun have selected the best of these articles and packed them up between two blue covers. If you love the South, The Southerner’s Handbook: A Guide to Living the Good Life deserves a permanent home in your library.

In over a hundred short chapters, The Southerner’s Handbook covers cooking and food, drink, home and gardening, arts and culture, style and outdoor adventure.

In “Part One: Food,” for example, readers learn how to care for cast-iron skillets and pots. Chef John Currence reveals how to make what he calls “big bad buttermilk biscuits,” and other writers, including the editors, give lessons on how to boil peanuts, cook okra and ramps, and bake a “drunken pecan pie” that sounds as if it would The Southerner’s rock papaw’s socks.

Handbook: A Guide to Living the Good In “Style,” Cindy Haygood Life. HarperCollins teaches manners to young Publishers, 288 pages. people, Peyton Jenkins shows $27.99. how to make a pocket square, and Roy Blount Jr. shares secrets of telling a great story. (Have an animal in the story and know your audience). Diane Goldsmith explains how to offer the perfect toast at weddings and other celebrations, and Donald Link offers advice on how to party like a Cajun.

The “Drink” section contains recipes for refreshment ranging from mint juleps to sweetened iced tea, from a classic New Orleans sazerac to authentic Dixie lemonade. T.A. Breaux discusses absinthe, a drink once made illegal in the United States, and how to consume this green liquor, once a staple in cities such as Charleston and New Orleans. The editors dedicate several chapters to bourbon, of course, including the amusing “Three Odes to Bourbon,” in which a trio of drinkers describe how they like to take their whiskey.

“Sporting & Adventure” appeals to anyone who takes pleasure in the outdoors. Here are articles on hunting, fishing, river camping, alligator wrestling, the Kentucky Derby, sharpening knives with a whetstone, starting fires, catching frogs and a dozen or so other paeans to the Southern outdoor life. (One of my own favorite

comments appears in a chapter titled “How to Talk to a Game Warden.” Ben Moise, a long-time game warden, says, “Those of us that have been in the business long enough have seen it all. And we have highly developed fertilizer detectors.”)

“Home & Garden” gives advice on such topics as “Rope Swing 101,” “Silver with a Proper Shine,” “An Herb Garden with Southern Roots,” and “Stocking Your Home Library.” One fascinating and very short article focuses on Carole Marsh, author of The Kudzu Cookbook. It was news to me that the Japanese use kudzu in medical teas and fine cuisine, and Marsh has created recipes in her cookbook that include working the leaves into gumbo, frying them like okra and mixing them with Vidalia onions. In his article “In Praise of the Southern Garden,” Robert Hicks reminds his readers that not so long ago in the South “most everyone—rich or poor—was a gardener” and that travelers from Europe “were awed by the South’s gardens, filling travel books and diaries with descriptions of our labor and the fruits of it.”

In the final section “Arts & Culture,” we receive 16 lectures on such topics as “Songs of the South,” “Dance Like a Cowboy,” “The Church of Southern Football” and “The Brilliance of Southern Folk Art.” This last chapter mentions minister and painter McKendree Long, a North Carolinian who led a life stranger than fiction. I was previously unfamiliar with Long, but his autobiography inspired me to find him and his wild paintings online.

“The Crowded Canon of the South” touched on authors familiar to me: Harry Crews, Eudora Welty and of course William Faulkner, but it also reminded me of how many other fine authors the South has produced. “The Truth about Robert Johnson and the Devil,” one of the longer chapters in the book, gives a sketch of the legendary bluesman who, legend has it, sold his soul to the devil at the Mississippi crossroads of Highways 61 and 49. This remarkable man, who inspired such bands as Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones, died before reaching 30, probably from syphilis. Again I turned to my laptop and found his music on YouTube.

The Southerner’s Handbook is not only a great collection to own, but to give to others as well. The articles are short, concise, entertaining and leave readers hungry for more.

“In over a hundred short chapters, The Southerner’s Handbook covers cooking and food, drink, home and gardening, arts and culture, style and outdoor adventures.”

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

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MOUNTAIN CUISINE

Dine “Downton” style at Lex 18

O

ne of author Thomas Wolfe’s favorite Asheville, N.C., haunts has been resurrected as Lex 18, a Southern Appalachian Supper Club and Moonshine Bar with Prohibition-era leanings.

A secret club thrived from 1907 to 1920 when Buncombe County was in a “dry spell.” Known as the Eureka Saloon, the establishment has reopened in downtown and has jumped on the bandwagon of popular PBS series “Downton Abbey.” Lex 18 is hosting vintage banquets during each broadcast through March 1. Only 18 reservations are available per showing.

Dinner is served with post-Edwardian gilded finery at a 16-foot-long banquet table under the dining room’s golden ceiling. Footmen in tails and a head butler serve guests a five-course banquet with wines and champagne and an interactive cast of actors personifies the TV show’s Crawley family members and their lively and gossipy servants.

Evenings begin at 6:30 p.m. with a vintage period cocktail hour, and a special guest historian treats guests to a 15-minute presentation covering music, arts, fashion and culture of the time in both Asheville and England.

After dinner, champagne and dessert accompany the curtains’ parting on Lex 18’s theatre screen. A short intermission permit for a “Downton Abbey” classic coffee and tea service along with digestive liqueur selection including sherry, port, cognac, curacao or brandy. After the show concludes, guests are invited to stay for conversation and gossip.

Advance reservations are required. Visit lex18avl.com or call 828.575.9494 for more information.

PROTECTING FARMS FROM WILD BOARS Boars. Wild hogs. Feral pigs. No matter the term, hogs can be a big problem— especially for landowners who depend on their property to supply crops that provide for their livelihood. Hunters Helping Farmers is a new program combining the efforts of the Georgia Department of Agriculture and the Georgia Department of Natural Resources to help alleviate the

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Friendly French in Biltmore Village Tucked away in a conglomerate of businesses along the French Broad River and Sweeten Creek Road, Fig Bistro isn’t among the easiest to find, which means those seeking its casual French-American cuisine need make a point of it being their dining destination.

And while they’re at it, diners might want to make a reservation—Fig only seats 36.

The intimate and sunny space is popular for lunch, dinner and Sunday brunch, which features house made “Zeppole” donuts with lemon curd; duck confit hash served with a poached egg, creamed kale and shiitake mushrooms; and macaroni gratin made with Cabot co-op white cheddar and Neuske's applewood-smoked bacon. At dinner look for the roasted beet salad with walnut vinaigrette, fennel, navel oranges, frisee, with fig-balsamic vinaigrette and risotto of lemonlime Carnaroli rice with rock shrimp and parsley oil.

Be sure to save a little room for dessert. The lemon A perfectly poached egg flecked with black and goat cheese sea salt rests atop a duck confit salad at panna cotta with Fig Bistro in Asheville's Biltmore Village. sortbet and fig-balSARAH E. KUCHARSKI PHOTO samic reduction is a lovely treat as is the chocolate pot de crème with salted cashew cookie. After dinner cocktails include Limoncello and Prosecco, or look to the Dancin’ Outlaw, which incorporates local libation Troy and Son’s moonshine.

Fig is located at 18 Brook Street in Asheville, N.C. For reservations or more information, visit figbistro.com or call 828.277.0889.

agricultural and financial damage caused by these non-native invasive pests.

“It is a natural fit to connect hunters and farmers together to try and help solve this growing problem,” says Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Gary Black. “In no way will this be a silver bullet, but hopefully in one small way we can help assist in this huge issue for our farmers.”

The goal of the new program is to help facilitate a relationship between farmers looking for ways to control hog issues on

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

their land and hunters looking to hunt them. Farmers experience problems as their crops suffer rooting, trampling and consumption. Crops most often destroyed include rice, sorghum, wheat, corn, soybeans, peanuts, potatoes, watermelon and cantaloupe. Hogs also can potentially contribute to bacterial contamination and sedimentation issues in waterways and they can carry numerous diseases, such as brucellosis and pseudorabies.

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MOUNTAIN CUISINE

Fromage Blanc Drop Biscuits 2 cups self-rising flour 1 teaspoon salt 4 tablespoons (2 ounces) cold butter 4 tablespoons (2 ounces) fromage blanc 1 cup (8 ounces) buttermilk, plus more as needed Extra butter, to grease pan and top biscuits 1/4 cup grated Ashford cheddar cheese

What’s cooking at the Nu Wray Inn

T

he Nu Wray Inn, western North Carolina’s oldest operating inn, has hosted the likes of Mark Twain, Elvis Presley and Jimmy Carter—and welcomes 2015 under new ownership.

Two couples from the Asheville area, Joey and Jill Farmer and Eric and Christy Wilson, purchased the inn this fall. A mainstay in the Blue Ridge mountains since 1833, the 24-room inn is on The Square in downtown Burnsville.

“The Nu Wray Inn is not only an institution in Burnsville and Yancey County, it is the anchor institution,” said county official Jamie McMahan. “It was in operation before the town of Burnsville was even incorporated.”

The new proprietors are lodging industry veterans, having owned the Cabins of Asheville since 2006. They found out about the Nu

Festive Burnsville

The Mount Mitchell Crafts Fair celebrates tradition by hosting more than 200 juried crafters who show and sell their own beautifully handcrafted work on the first Friday and Saturday in August. y Carolina Mountains Literary Festival offers readings, writing workshops, seminars and other types of sessions devoted to writers, writing, and the writing life in September. y “Dedicated to the preservation of mountain music and culture,” September’s Music in the Mountains festival includes music from all across the region including bluegrass and traditional music, ballad singing, storytelling and dancing. y

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Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Put a 10-inch cast-iron pan into the oven while it is preheating. Put the flour and salt into a medium bowl. Cut in the butter and fromage blanc. Make a well in the middle of the ingredients and pour in the buttermilk. Stir until the mix is moistened, adding an extra tablespoon of buttermilk, if needed.

Carefully remove the hot skillet from the oven and put a tablespoon of butter into it. When the butter has melted, drop 1/4 cupfuls of batter into the hot pan. Brush the tops of the biscuits with melted butter. Bake 14 to 16 minutes until browned on the top and bottom. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with the grated Ashford cheddar cheese.

From WNC Cheese Trail member English Farmstead Cheese

Wray, oddly enough, via Craigslist, and are dedicated to preserving the ambience and historical significance of the three-story clapboard landmark.

“We just fell in love with the town, fell in love with the inn, and fell in love with the people of Burnsville,” Joey Farmer said. “It was a great fit. We feel honored to be part of the history of the inn.”

Farmer says the previous owners left the Nu Wray in good condition after rescuing it in 2010. Updated guest rooms are available and there are plans to renovate and open the remaining nine.

“It’s a special place. Time kind of stops at the Nu Wray, and you’re in a simpler time when talking to each other is more important than looking at your phone the whole time.”

As throwback to those times comes this recipe from the Nu Wray Inn’s cookbook.

Leroy’s Holiday Salad 1 cup ground raw cranberries, measured after putting through food chopper 1 cup sugar 1 package lemon-flavored Jello ½ cup boiling water 1 cup orange juice 2 teaspoons grated orange rind 9-ounce can crushed pineapple ½ cup broken pecan meats 1 cup chopped celery Mix sugar and cranberries together, and let stand several hours.

Add the gelatin to the boiling water, and stir until dissolved. Add orange juice and stir, then add other ingredients and pour into mold. Serve on crisp lettuce and garnish with mayonnaise.

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

d i re cto r y :

MOUNTAIN GALLERIES

SOUTHERN APPALACHIAN MOUNTAINS

GUIDE The Southern Appalachians have a rich artistic history. As long as folks have lived in these majestic landscapes, they’ve been molding, shaping and putting together items that serve not only practical purposes but also aesthetic ones, too. From weavers to potters, painters to metalsmiths, glassblowers to woodcrafters, these artisans reflect generations of heritage and innovation. Promoting and perpetuating this beauty are the galleries that are as unique and varied as the artists themselves.

EXPLORE

AROUND BACK AT ROCKY’S PLACE The Ultimate Folk Art Gallery in the South!

Representing a plethora of self-taught artists. Best selection by artist “Cornbread” in the Universe! Established 2002.

3631 Hwy. 53 E. at Etowah River Rd. Dawsonville, Ga. • 706.265.6030 aroundbackatrockysplace.com Sat. 11-5; Sun. 1-5 DOGWOOD CRAFTERS Arts and crafts co-op featuring local artisans.

Stained glass, gourd art, handmade soaps, photography, painting, canned goods, metal work and more. Established 1976.

90 Webster St. • Dillsboro, N.C. 828.586.2248 • dogwoodcrafters.com EARTHWORKS ENVIRONMENTAL GALLERY Since opening in 1992, Earthworks has focused on artists who display stewardship of the Earth, whether through design or crafting techniques. Artisans from a variety of mediums grace the gallery’s collections.

Artists, both regional and from around the world, fit together at Earthworks.

21 N. Main St. • Waynesville, N.C. 828.452.9500 • earthworksgalleries.com GOLDEN CARP, THE Specializing in local and American watercolorists, exhibits of local and global artisans in basketry, pottery and fiber arts, and unique home accessories and fine gifts.

107 Webster St. • Dillsboro, N.C. 828.586.5477 • thegoldencarp.com MAHOGANY HOUSE ART GALLERY AND STUDIOS, THE The Mahogany House Art Gallery is located in the historic area of Frog Level in downtown Waynesville, N.C. Its brick plaster walls, dark plank wood flooring and embossed tin ceiling tiles lend a timeless appeal and complement the treasures of art displayed within. At present, the artist studios feature an encaustic artist, acylic and oil artist, a cold wax and assemblage artist and two woodturners.

240 Depot St. • Waynesville, NC themahoganyhouse.com MUD DABBERS POTTERY Handmade stoneware pottery from a family of potters producing functional and contemporary designs including bowls, mugs, pitchers, dinnerware cassorole dishes, sculptures, masks, raku and Brandon Mountain Gnomes.

20767 Great Smoky Mountain Expressway (U.S. 23-74 in Balsam) 828.456.1916 • muddabbers.com

Southern Appalachian Galleries

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ARTIST OF THE

SEVEN SISTERS GALLERY Discover something different at Seven Sisters Gallery, a staple in charming, historic Black Mountain since 1981. The gallery has one of the broadest ceramics collections available, plus furniture, original artwork, jewelry, and more.

Everything is made in the USA, and much of it is local.

117 Cherry St. • Black Mtn, NC 28711 828.669.5107 • 7sistersgallery.com Mon.-Sat. 10-6; Sun. 12-5

BLUE RIDGE

SUSAN MARIE DESIGNS With visionary talent and skills acquired in thirty-three years as an award-winning goldsmith, Susan Marie transforms nature’s most exceptional gemstones, diamonds and pearls into wearable contemporary elegance. As a G.I.A. Graduate Gemologist, she selects the most vibrant and highest quality cut stones to create fine jewelry.

Four Biltmore Ave. • Asheville, N.C. 828.277.1272

“Forest Realm” Colored Pencil Drawing

Experience Southern Appalachia as recorded, documented, and collected by the students of Rabun County, GA—and shared with the world through The Foxfire Magazine and The Foxfire Book volumes. Visit the legacy they created in honor of their neighbors and ancestors through 45+ years of work gathering and preserving their unique mountain heritage. Museum gift shop offers regional pottery, crafts, Foxfire & other books.

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15 N. Main St. • Waynesville, NC | 828.452.9284 • tpennington.com

TWIGS AND LEAVES GALLERY Stroll down Main Street in Waynesville to find a unique gallery where art dances with nature.

Browse through an unforgettable collection of nature-inspired works by 140 primarily regional artists and crafts persons. Take home a piece of art that echoes the wonder of nature.

98 N. Main St. • Waynesville, N.C. 828.456.1940 • twigsandleaves.com UPTOWN GALLERY (MACON COUNTY ART ASSOCIATION) Uptown Gallery showcases the work of local artists and presents Village Square Arts and Crafts shows in Highlands. Featuring an open studio and monthly presentations. Workshops and classes for adults are available, as well as children’s activities in cooperation with The Bascom, a center for the visual arts.

30 E. Main St. • Franklin, N.C. 828.349.4607 uptowngalleryoffranklin.com

Foxfire

Museum & Heritage Center Take US 441 to Mountain City, GA. Turn onto Black Rock Mtn. Parkway. One mile up, follow the brown signs.

VISIONS OF CREATION With over 40 years of experience, Roberto creates contemporary and one-of-a-kind fine jewelry in gold and silver. Each hand-crafted piece has its own unique properties. Most are Limited Editions and signed. Roberto is constantly creating, evolving and designing new and innovative pieces.

100 Cherry St. • Black Mountain, NC 828.669.0065 • visionsofcreation.com

Monday-Saturday 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. www.foxfire.org • 706.746.5828 75-32

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EXPLORE

Southern Appalachian Galleries

Ultimate Folk Art Gallery in the South!

www.craftguild.org

B I LT M O R E V I L L AG E

828-277-6222

Guild Crafts OPEN Rd MON .-SAT.: 10AM-7PM, 930 Tunnel | 828-298-7903 SUN : 12-5PM 86-40

A Gallery

Art

Dances WITH

Nature

by artist “Cornbread”

For more fine crafts visit: Allanstand Craft Shop at the Folk Art Center Milepost 382 BlueST Ridge Parkway | 828-298-7928 26 LODGE ., ASHEVILLE , NC

THE BEST SELECTION IN THE UNIVERSE

WWW.CRAFTGUILD.ORG

WHERE

86-48

THE

26 Lodge Street Asheville, NC 828-277-6222

ARTIST: SARAH SNEEDEN

3631 HWY. 53 E. AT ETOWAH RIVER RD.

“WHERE ART DANCES WITH NATURE” 98 N. MAI N ST. • WAYN ESVI LLE NC • OPEN MON.-SAT.10-5:30 828.456.1940 • W W W.T WIGSAN DLEAVES.COM

DAWSONVILLE, GA

706-265-6030 aroundbackatrockysplace.com HOURS: SATURDAY 11 TO 5 & SUNDAY 1 TO 5

EXPLORE

Southern Appalachian Galleries

35

Ron Rash.

d e p a r t m e n t :

MOUNTAIN ARTS

DONATED PHOTO

N.C. novels get the Hollywood treatment

W

estern North Carolina author Ron Rash lights up as much talking about his two novels making their film debuts this winter as he does describing the trout stream that runs through campus at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, where he teaches Appalachian Studies in the English department.

In fact, those trout likely hold more sway over the soft-spoken writer, whose acclaimed novels and short stories cast the Appalachian landscape as a perennial protagonist. In the Hollywood adaptation of Serena, his New York Times bestselling novel from 2008, the Czech Republic stands in for the Smoky Mountains, with Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper playing the other leading roles. Noah Wyle, Jeremy Irvine and Steve Earle star in the smaller-scale, independent film based on his 2007 novel, The World Made Straight, which was shot on location in western North Carolina. After languishing in post-production for the past couple of years, both movies will hit theaters in early 2015.

Just don’t expect to see Rash on the red carpet—he’s too busy making the rounds with his latest collection of short stories, Something Rich and Strange, and finishing up his next novel, Above the Waterfall, due out next fall.

Q&A with Ron Rash

course, a bigger book is more difficult than a smaller, tighter book.

Smoky Mountain Living: Are you excited about the films?

Ron Rash: I’m really curious to see how they’re translated. I’m amazed that one got made, much less two—the odds are pretty slim. Just the fact that a movie is being made from the work has brought readers to me that I’ve never had before.

That, to me, is the best part.

SML: What can you share about the filming process?

Rash: I deliberately stayed out of it. It’s hard enough to write a good short story or novel; it would be presumptuous to think I could write a good screenplay. I thought it better to make a clean cut and save my energy for what I do best.

The funniest thing that happened was a phone call with the British actor Toby Jones. He is playing the sheriff in Serena and called from London to hear my accent. It’s almost as if I could hear the screenwriter tell him, “If you really want to know how these people talked, dial this number.” We didn’t talk about much—the weather, that sort of thing. Later he was on the BBC talking about how much he liked the accent and how he hoped he caught some of it in his acting. From what I have caught on the trailer, I think he did.

SML: What do you think of film adaptations of novels, in a general sense?

Rash: With the length of most movies, it’s impossible to capture a novel.

Somehow the director has to not re-create the book but to try to find something of its essence. Winter’s Bone [by Daniel Woodrell] does this really well, for instance, but The Bonfire of the Vanities, by Tom Wolfe, was horrible. Of

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

SML: With landscape such a significant role in your writing, what gets lost in a film version that’s shot elsewhere?

Rash: I do find it amusing that Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain was filmed in Romania and now Serena was filmed in the Czech Republic, though they are both rooted in the Appalachian Mountains.

What’s good is that The World Made Straight was filmed in Madison County, so you get to see the landscape. There is something very striking about the Appalachian Mountains: They’re so old and worn down, with that greenery.

Maybe [Serena] has captured that, but there’s a kind of lushness that you don’t get in the Rockies, for instance, or that you wouldn’t get in Afghanistan.

In a lot of areas of Appalachia, you get deep valleys and coves where a lot of light doesn’t get in. In the novel Serena, I talk a lot about how that affects one of the characters, Rachel. Her mother—one of

the most sympathetic characters in the book—couldn’t handle the oppressiveness of it. But the book also shows the more positive aspect of those areas—like wombs protecting people from the outside. I’m fascinated by how landscape affects the psychological.

SML: How do the two movies compare?

Rash: I’m particularly glad about The World Made Straight because out of all of my novels, it got the least attention. It’s a much lower budget, but the movies I personally enjoy most tend to be independent movies—there’s more emphasis on story and character development, less on blowing up things.

My sense from interacting with the director [David Burris] is that he’s trying to be true to the book but also to the region.

For instance, he went to the trouble to get Plott hounds, like I have in the novel.

Probably most people who see the movie wouldn’t even note that detail, but it fits the region perfectly. And they’ve done as good a job with the Appalachian accent as I’ve ever seen. The young British actor Jeremy Irvine nails it.

“Though these people speak differently, and their accents and education are different, ultimately the reader should recognize that these are fellow human beings who feel, fear and love.”

— Ron Rash SML: What do you think about the casting of Serena?

Rash: I thought they were impressive choices. Jennifer Lawrence is a talented actress and has the physicality—she grew up riding horses.

SML: You’ve called Serena the story of the Smoky Mountains. What element of that history do you hope the movie illuminates for a new audience?

Rash: One of the reasons I wrote Serena eight or nine years ago is because I

WWW.SMLIV.COM

was so worried about the political attempts—which are ongoing—to open up national and state forest for development, timbering, minerals. The book was a way of reminding people how hard won this park was, and also to remind them of what was there, because I’d say that probably most tourists who go through the Smokies today think it is virgin forest. But if they’d have gone through there about 1910 all they would have seen were scalped ridges.

SML: What are the other messages of your work that you hope come across in the films?

Rash: One of my goals as a writer is to subvert stereotypes. You have to be careful, because you could sentimentalize the people as long-suffering hill folk; or you could go the other way where they’re Deliverance types. When someone reads Serena, those easy stereotypes have been undermined. Though these people speak differently, and their accents and education are different, ultimately the reader should recognize that these are fellow human beings who feel, fear and love. That’s crucial.

37

reunion

A.T. festivals keep “trail families” together B Y H O L LY K AY S

E.J. “Passover” Horrocks had never been backpacking in her life and had barely a shred of gear in her closet when she showed up at Trailfest in Hot Springs, N.C., a couple years ago. The festival’s culture of camaraderie and adventure called to her.

“I felt left out,” said Horrocks, 24. “I wanted to be part of the A.T. crew.”

She picked up the phone to dial her longtime friend Alex “Ember” Manfred and popped the question: Do you want to hike with me?

When Horrocks was 13 she had traveled with her family to the Trail Days festival in Damascus, Va., to support her older cousin who had hiked through.

38

“I got to go be part of the parade, and I got to meet a ton of fabulous people,” Horrocks said. Hiking the A.T. “just got tucked away as something I had to do.”

Trail festivals like those in Hot Springs and Damascus dot the length of the Appalachian Trail. Spring on Springer, held in March, kicks off the season in Dahlonega, Ga., 15 miles from the trail’s southern terminus, while mid-December celebrates the trail’s end near Mount Katahdin. More than just another place to buy corndogs and hear some music, these festivals carry all the importance and familiar excitement of a family reunion for hikers who, if so-motivated could, theoretically, stop at nearly every one on their way north.

Horrocks saw this dynamic in Hot Springs—hikers reuniting with those they’d met out on the trail; colleagues in town just for the weekend; families’ friendly competition along an obstacle course or showing their stuff in a talent show; live music scoring the whole scene—she was determined to one day experience from the inside, as a hiker.

So she did.

Horrocks and Manfred stepped off from Springer Mountain in Georgia on March 1, 2013, and Horrocks—she and Manfred

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

The streets of Damascus swell with hikers during the annual hiker parade at the town’s Trail Days festival. TOWN OF DAMASCUS PHOTO

WWW.SMLIV.COM

39

Celebrate the A.T. Appalachian Trail festivals are for current hikers, past hikers and people who want to have a good time and see what the trail is all about. Check out one of these festivals along the southern end of the A.T.

Horrocks, front row in red pants, and her crew reunited at the 2014 Trail Days festival in Damascus.

E.J. HORROCKS PHOTO

hiked together up until Harpers Ferry, West Va.—arrived at Mount Katahdin four-anda-half months later, July 16.

“It’s not quite out of my blood. It’s part of my culture now,” Horrocks said. “I talk about it quite a bit.”

A PROFOUND AWARENESS A lot happened during those months on the trail. A hiking family formed as the miles passed, cohesion accelerated by common obstacles of weather and environment and by absence distractions pervading off-trail life.

“You get to be in majestic, beautiful places, and you don’t have to check your cell phone and you don’t have to have a planner,” Horrocks said. “You just have to worry about food and water. There’s just something so simple and natural about that, and I think everyone should experience that at some point in their lives.”

That’s a message that Jim “Trailvis” Harrison, 45, always is trying to deliver to his students at Emory & Henry College.

Harrison and his wife Aliese did their thruhike in 1997, an adventure that Harrison said “played a tremendous role in my life,” as the Memphis-area couple fell in love with the Appalachians enough to try out Damascus for a semester while Harrison took an adjunct teaching job. Sixteen years later, they’re still in Damascus, living on property that abuts the Mount Rogers National Recreation Area—the 40

Appalachian Trail runs through the front yard. Harrison, originally a writing instructor, now runs an outdoor program at Emory & Henry that began as a little hiking club run out of a corner of his office. Now, it’s possible for students to get college credit for a semester on the A.T. It’s important, he believes, for students to have that experience of being out in the elements, forced to be alone with their thoughts, discover who they really are. Those moments of terrifying self-discovery are much of what sticks with him from the trail.

“The lid comes off your id just a little bit, out there. When you cross a road and the cars that are whizzing by, it hurts your feelings, it’s devastating to your heart,” Harrison said, recognizing in his own eyes a look he’s seen among the wild.

“It brings you to a profound awareness of what a human really is,” he reflected.

“We’re animals.”

It’s a singular experience, agreed Damascus native and class of 1990 thruhiker Dave Patrick, 71. Patrick grew up half a block from the A.T. and started contemplating a thru hike at an early age.

He loved the outdoors and said he “couldn’t think of anything better than being able to spend six months in the woods.”

But the trip also was hard, unnerving.

“What happens when you spend a lot of time in the woods, you no longer find yourself somebody observing and looking at it,” he said. “You find that you’re a part of it.”

Things come unhinged. Patrick, who his friends knew as someone who wasn’t much SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

y Spring on Springer A.T. Trail Fest in Dahlonega, Georgia, March 27-29. The festival includes music, workshops, gear vendors, guest speakers, shuttles for hikers, trail races and movie screenings. dahlonegatrailfest.org y April Fool Hiker Bash, Franklin, North Carolina, March 27-28, with other A.T.related activities happening March 20-April 22. Activities will include food and music at Sapphire Inn and Three Eagles Outfitters, presentations, vendors and library programs. aprilfoolstraildays.com y Hiker Haze Weekend, Fontana Village Resort in Graham County, N.C., March 25-26. Activities will include karaoke, campfire and food for hikers, a cornhole tournament, presentations on plants and Native American artifacts and a movie night. fontanavillage.com. y NOC Founder’s Bridge Festival, Nantahala Outdoor Center near Bryson City, North Carolina, April 3-4. Activities will include gear and vendor fairs, a hiker Olympiad, food and music, guest speakers and a bonfire. noc.com y Trailfest, Hot Springs, North Carolina, April 17-19. Events will include a spaghetti dinner, obstacle course, climbing wall, parade, talent show, camp stove cook-off and live music. hsclc.org/newsevents/trailfest.html y Trail Days, Damascus, Virginia, May 1418. Events include a hiker parade and talent show, gear repair, food, music, contra dancing and vendors. traildays.us

“You just have to worry about food and water. There’s just something so simple and natural about that, and I think everyone should experience that at some point in their lives.”

— E.J. Horrocks

Nantahala Brewing in Bryson City, N.C., donates proceeds from its Trail Magic Ale releases to the Friends of the Smokies Ridgerunners program.

MARGARET HESTER PHOTO

is a special release series called Trail Magic Ale. Trail magic is also the name for the random acts of kindness thru-hikers encounter from people along the A.T. The brewery does three Trail Magic releases each year, one in March when the northbound hikers come through, one in June to kick off the summer and one in October to nab the southbound hikers.

“I’d say, conservatively, there’s probably a couple hundred [thru-hikers] that come through in March and early April,” Rowland said.

“For the folks who are hiking south, it really depends a lot of times on the weather.”

All the proceeds from the Trail Magic Ale releases go to Friends of the Smokies, earmarked for the Ridgerunners program. The brew brings in between $500 and $1,500 per year, Rowland said, but the brewery also donates money raised the Friday night before each release at what it dubs the Rare and Wild Party.

Throughout the year, people bring six packs from breweries across the country and leave them at Nantahala. The brewery isn’t allowed to sell these donated beers, so instead it holds a sampler of sorts for the people in the taproom the Friday before each Trail Magic Ale release.

“We just do a tasting with all these different beers, and anyone who wants to donate, they just give a donation to whatever cause we identify for that particular event,” Rowland explained.

“Usually it’s just the A.T.” In all, Nantahala Brewing’s contribution to the Ridgerunner program is about $3,000 per year, McDaniel said, though Rowland said that he “honestly has no clue” what the number is.

Mostly, he’s just interested in supporting the trail, perhaps partly because of the parallel he sees between the brewery’s story and those lived out by A.T. thru-hikers every year.

Like the A.T. hikers who take a hiatus from real life to traverse the trail, Rowland said, “we gave up other lives and other places to live in this town of 1,400 people” and pursue a dream in the midst of top-notch natural beauty.

And like the hikers who return from the trail with a lifechanging experience in tow, the last few years have been dramatic ones for the Nantahala Brewing crew. They’ve been invited to Sierra Nevada Brewing’s Beer Camp Across America and won plenty of awards for their beer. In 2014, Rowland was elected president of the Asheville Brewers Alliance—the first ever to come from outside Asheville’s city limits.

“We’ve met so many amazing people being out here,” Rowland said. “We probably don’t talk about it as often as we should, but the experiences we’ve been able to have as brewers out here in the middle of nowhere is crazy.”

— By Holly Kays

A brewery befriends the A.T

T

he magic of the Appalachian Trail has been part of Nantahala Brewing’s story since the company began in 2009.

The trail gave the brewery its current brewmaster, Greg Geiger, who first encountered Nantahala Brewing during a brief respite from the 500-some mile section he hiked. A flux of thru-hikers visit the brewery each year on their journey to Maine or Georgia, and the local trail crews that maintain the A.T. often stop by for a beer after a day in the woods.

So, as the fledgling brewery became more established in Bryson City, N.C., co-owner Joe Rowland couldn’t think of a better recipient of the business’s efforts to give back than the trail itself.

“It’s pretty awesome to be this close to the A.T.,” Rowland said.

“There aren’t that many breweries that are this close.”

Now, every year, Friends of the Smokies can count on a donation from Nantahala Brewing to support the Ridgerunners and Caretakers program, operated under the Appalachian Trail Conservancy. Ridgerunners in the Smokies typically hike and camp along their designated section of trail for 10 days at a time during trail season, alerting hikers to danger, passing on educational tidbits and helping with litter pickup and trail maintenance. In the Smokies, three ridgerunners care for sections of 20-25 miles each, which in 2014 cost Friends of the Smokies $38,500.

The ridgerunners don’t do it for the money.

“It works out to be like a stipend that covers gas and meals and that kind of thing, but it’s not a lot,” said Brent McDaniel, marketing director for Friends of the Smokies. “The ridgerunners really do it because they love that kind of work and the park.”

It wasn’t hard for the folks at Nantahala Brewing to decide that the ridgerunners program was a cause they wanted to support. Geiger’s on-trail experiences alone made a strong case—during his time as a hiker, an A.T. ridgerunner helped him out of a tricky situation with a bear, and as frequent users of the trail, the Nantahala Brewing crew knows the importance of a well-maintained path.

Aptly enough, the main vehicle of their contribution to the trail

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

inclined to either sing or cry, soon found 1950s tunes erupting from his mouth as he hiked. Or, he’d think of something sad and discover tears falling down his face. “My friends would say I went crazy,� he said.

TENT CITY MYSTIQUE Which perhaps is why the A.T. seems to beget new families. That shared experience of hiking the trail together, undergoing the same athletic challenge of carrying a backpack over 2,179.1 miles of ridgeline, of dealing with those same unsettling moments of quiet, that same perspective on “the real world� versus the natural world—it creates a closeness that’s hard to match.

But after reaching Katahdin (or Springer), hikers return to their scattered hometowns, leaving their trail family behind. Often, these friends-turned-family don’t exchange contact information or even know each other by anything other than their trail names, monikers bestowed somewhere along the way.

Horrocks went to Trail Days in Damascus in 2014, the year after her hike. Though she said it “got a lot more wild than I expected,� it

was “the best family reunion of my life.� She’d hiked most of the trail with the same set of hikers, and the group had grown much closer than their home states, spread from Texas to Massachusetts, Colorado to North Carolina. “It’s really cool that that can bring us back together and to know that every year we can go back and see that,� Horrocks said. “There’s no way I would get to see all of them if it wasn’t for the festival.�

Damascus has been holding its festival for nearly 30 years—the ďŹ rst was held to commemorate the Appalachian Trail’s 50th anniversary. “It’s amazing how well the thing has worked, considering we don’t have a town big enough to have a professional staff to do economic development,â€? said Tim Williams, vice mayor of the town and head of the Trail Days committee.

Though Damascus has a population just a hair over 800, Trail Days brings in an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 people every year.

Always held the weekend after Mother’s Day—May 14-17 in 2015—the festival draws in craft and food vendors, some of who have been to every festival, as well as professionals

such as doctors, veterinarians and gear repairers to help out the hikers, pro bono. “I remember the mystique of a campground ďŹ lled with tents and knowing that any number of people that I might know might inhabit them, but also getting to meet the people that I didn’t yet know,â€? recounted Leanna “Moonshadowâ€? Joyner, 37, who hiked the trail in 2003.

Before stepping off from Springer, Joyner had been working for a leadership organization in Washington, D.C., and was preparing to buy a condo in the city. But instead of taking the plunge, she chose a different path. She quit her job, geared up and hiked the A.T. Today, she’s based in Asheville as the trail resources manager for the Appalachian Trail Conservancy. “I guess discovering who and what all these people are is a feeling that I can recall,â€? she said. “It was very free-spirited in the sense that there was a bonďŹ re and drumming and that kind of communal experience that happens when you’re around a ďŹ re.â€?

Elements of that communal experience, and even the majority of festival amenities— free food, free gear repair, discounted

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43

“Long Spoon,” a member of Horrocks’ crew, demonstrates the high wind speed at Max Patch in North Carolina. E.J. HORROCKS PHOTO

accommodations—often are available at trail towns throughout the year. Trail towns tend to pride themselves on their capacity to give hikers a hearty welcome.

That’s certainly what Harrison found the first time he and Patrick met. At the time, Harrison was a thru-hiker and Patrick several years into owning Mount Rogers Outfitters, a business he started after completing his own hike.

“Mount Rogers Outfitters, they had lost money on us,” Harrison recalled. “They fixed our gear and took us places. We didn’t spend any money in there. They gave us stuff.”

Generally, hikers are too busy making miles to jaunt off the trail to hit every festival along the way. That’s just not something that hikers tend to do.

“There’s a forward momentum that must be maintained if you’re going to successfully complete the trail in one season,” Joyner said.

“It’s possible, but I think it would be a challenge and they would have to be a superefficient, fast hiker to hit all of them.”

The Dahlonega festival kicks off the season in March, followed by April Fool’s Trail Days in Franklin, N.C., and Hiker Haze Weekend at Fontana Village Resort in Graham County, N.C. Next comes the A.T. Founder’s Bridge Festival at Nantahala Outdoor Center near Bryson City, N.C, Trailfest in Hot Springs, N.C., and Damascus’ Trail Days in May. Even more festivals dot the trail as it heads north.

CAPITALIZING ON THE A.T. More towns are holding A.T. festivals than ever. A lot of that has to do with the 44

increasing number of designated Appalachian Trail Communities; having a festival can help fulfill designation requirements. The Fontana festival, for instance, is only in its second year, the Dahlonega festival is in its fifth year and the Franklin festival is entering its seventh.

“A lot of local folks don’t realize that it [the A.T.] is there and that you can walk from Georgia to Maine, so part of it is making sure that they are aware what a great resource it is for physical and spiritual well-being,” said Bill van Horn, Franklin festival coordinator. He completed a section hike of the A.T. in 2013.

By publicizing the trail and the opportunities it brings, towns help their citizens use and appreciate the A.T. But there’s also an economic component, and it’s a big one.

Damascus was a product of the logging industry and, later, textiles. But by the 1980s both industries had fallen by the wayside, and the tiny mountain town was struggling.

Then, two things happened. The Virginia Creeper Trail, a 34.3-mile trail that runs from the top of Whitetop Mountain through Damascus and into Abingdon along the route of an old railroad track, was completed in 1984. And in 1986, the inaugural Trail Days festival started drawing crowds.

“It’s had a big positive impact on the town of Damascus,” Williams said. “Without that, I don’t know what we would do.”

Besides the direct economic benefit from sales of campsites, vendor space and the like—Williams estimates the town comes out about $20,000 ahead on that—there’s the revenue from food and lodging tax, the extra sales that local businesses rake in and the

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hard-to-quantify benefit of people who’ve had a good time at Trail Days returning either to try out the Creeper Trail, stay in town for a weekend or, even, to live.

“Our bed and breakfasts are always busy,” Williams said. “A lot of times they’ll get booked the next year for Trail Days before they even leave.”

The Hot Springs festival is also growing, having passed to new management under the Hot Springs Community Learning Center three years ago. Attendance is up from a couple hundred to as much as a thousand, hikers past and current accounting for about one-third of that number. The festival now has a greater emphasis on children’s activities and events to make it clear that both hikers and non-hikers are welcome to take part.

“We started coming up with ways to incorporate some diversity and make activities so we can do things with the kids and the hikers can share some of their experiences,” said Debbie DeLisle, event coordinator.

The goal is for it to be a community event, and integrating activities helps achieve that.

But having more non-hikers there also makes it easier for the event to pay for itself, because DeLisle has no desire to gouge the hikers.

Services for them are pretty much free, but it’s the other visitors who engage in the silent auction fundraiser and spend the money at vendor stations and around town.

Franklin, meanwhile, is taking its April Fool’s Trail Day festival in a different direction this year. Rather than heighten the activity around a few select days, as Franklin has done in the past, the town’s Appalachian Trail Committee will this year spread the

Kids gear up to celebrate the A.T. with a bike ride through Hot Springs during the town’s Trailfest.

HOT SPRINGS COMMUNITY LEARNING CENTER PHOTO

activity out from the first day of spring on March 20 to Earth Day on April 22.

“Because of Franklin’s involvement with the thru-hikers coming into town, a number of businesses have started their own little thing for the hikers,” Van Horn said. “Instead of putting our resources toward a town festival on that one particular Saturday, the committee decided that we were going to use our resources and support these other events.”

At the April Fool Hiker’s Bash, held March 27-28, Nantahala Hiking Club will hold a picnic lunch for hikers at the Lazy Hiker Brewing Company and Sapphire Inn and Three Eagles Outfitter will host celebrations for the 2015 thru-hikers. But other events surrounding the weekend, including a month of free hiker breakfasts at a local church, a series of A.T.-related programs at the library spanning five weeks this year rather than two and celebrations at a variety of local businesses.

A TRAIL THAT KEEPS GOING In some ways, one never truly finishes hiking the A.T. The experience stays, as does the desire for its realness to continue. The

trail leaves its mark on everyday life in mysterious ways.

For Joyner, it took on the shape of a move to the mountains and a career promoting the wonder of the A.T. For Harrison, it was the desire to live out his life among the mountain people he’d learned to love, and to pass on the A.T. bug to the next generation. For Patrick, it sprung from the epiphany he had on the trail that Damascus could really use an outdoor outfitter’s store, so he’s been running one since 1991.

For Horrocks, it was that desire to disconnect from the distractions of the networked life, and instead just be.

“My voicemail’s been full for years,” she said.

“Since the A.T. I actually filled it up because I didn’t want people to call me on the A.T.” But the A.T. itself never stops calling.

“It’s all about relationships,” said Harrison.

“The path to the Appalachian Trail, the people you meet, the relationships you form in the backcountry. You have genuine relationships with both place and people.

There are no distractions. You are immersed in that world.”

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NOT YOUR ORDINARY MOUNTAIN MUSIC An unconventional music and arts festival rooted in collaboration— and Appalachian folk traditions—grows in Knoxville

B Y K AT I E K N O R O V S K Y

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A lute player, an Inuit throat singer, and a punk rocker walk into a bar in Knoxville, Tennessee …

That’s not a joke.

Actually, it’s the setup for Big Ears, a music and arts festival making global waves with its no-holds-barred staging of what its organizers call the “indefinable avant-garde.” As for the punchline? One of the world’s most high-concept cultural experiences takes place right here in a relatively isolated city in the foothills of the Smokies.

Throughout the weekend-long festival, which returns to downtown Knoxville this March 27-29, music, art, and film merge and multiply in power as genres interweave and dissipate. True to its Big Ears name, the festival presents artists who demand thoughtful listening—whether it’s a matter of discerning the message in a wall of distortion, the soul layered in a tape loop, or the precision of a symphonic crescendo.

Boomer legends jam with Brooklyn hipsters. Minimalism meets rock bravado. Classical collides with folk. Museum galleries entertain thrash metal. Japanese urbanites mingle with local street buskers. Iconoclasts are welcomed as insiders.

If all goes according to plan, audiences will leave Big Ears with their minds opened, blown, boggled—and everything in between. It’s apt to get a little weird at times, but that’s just how the global intelligentsia who convene here like it.

BIG EARS, BIG AMBITIONS The brainchild of Knoxville native Ashley Capps and his music promotion company, AC Entertainment, Big Ears has established itself as a tour de force since debuting in 2009. As the co-producers of the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Tennessee—an anchor of the summer festival season, with up to 100,000 annual attendees—AC Entertainment knows a thing or two about building buzz. When the lineup hit the Internet this past fall, the New York Times wrote that “downtown, in the musical sense, seems to be expanding southward,” comparing the Big Ears 2015 programming to a “season listing for Greenwich Village and Brooklyn, compressed into a single weekend.”

The prolific Kronos Quartet holds court as this year’s artists in residence, themselves an embodiment of the festival’s exploratory credo. For the past 40 years, the San Francisco-based string quartet has released more than 50 albums that skewer and reinvent genres, its

contemporary sound as steeped in Béla Bartók as it is in Jimi Hendrix. The 2015 lineup is stacked with other visionaries: performance artist Laurie Anderson, rock guitarists such as Wilco’s Nels Cline and the National’s Bryce Dessner, composers Terry Riley and Max Richter, the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra and jazz trio Big Ears Festival venues range The Bad Plus, folk singers Sam from the Knoxville Museum of Art Amidon and Rhiannon Giddens (facing page) to downtown clubs and many more. such as the Square Room and Scruffy City Hall (above).

A mix of big names and more SCOTT CHRIS PHOTO (FACING PAGE) obscure artists, the lineup avoids BILL FOSTER PHOTO (ABOVE) obvious boundaries while celebrating a diversity of discovery.

“Seeing the look on people’s faces and hearing them talk about an amazing artist they’d just seen that they hadn’t heard of before they came to town is richly rewarding,” Capps said.

Part and parcel of the Big Ears mission is also the way careful curation makes way for in-the-moment collaboration. Last year, Mark Ribot’s guitar line riffed over Charlie Chaplin’s The Kid, at once reframing the silent classic and becoming completely absorbed by it.

With Andy Warhol’s 1960s screen tests as their backdrop, husbandand-wife indie rockers Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips performed The Velvet Underground’s “Not a Young Man Anymore” while a young Lou Reed sipped out of a glass Coke bottle, earning an outbreak of applause from the rapt audience.

And at the culminating performance of Big Ears 2014, guitarist Jonny Greenwood of mega-group Radiohead took the stage at Knoxville’s landmark Tennessee Theatre for an ambient-rock take on minimalist composer Steve Reich’s “Electric Counterpoint.” Next came the New York-based Ensemble Signal’s performance of Reich’s 1976 masterpiece, “Music for 18 Musicians,” a hypnotic pulsation of pianos, marimbas, xylophones, clarinets, strings and voices. A final bow by Reich himself capped off the weekend.

ALL A MATTER OF CONTEXT An Appalachian theater known best for its original Mighty Wurlitzer pipe organ may seem like an unlikely centerpiece of a pioneering music

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North Carolina singer Rhiannon Giddens (left) will perform at this year’s Big Ears. Knoxville’s historic Tennessee Theatre (bottom) is a centerpiece of the festival. DONATED PHOTO (LEFT) • BILL FOSTER PHOTO (BELOW)

festival of international prominence. “An element of surprise is important to me,” Capps said. “That an event with this type of cuttingedge artistic character is taking place outside the major cultural centers—in a small town in the South—enables it to have a presence and a profile that might be more difficult to create in a larger city where cultural events like this are more of a common part of the fabric.”

That’s not just lip service. Rolling Stone has praised the festival as “arguably the classiest, most diverse festival in the country” as well as “the most ambitious avant-garde festival to emerge in America in more than a decade.”

Capps and downtown advocates say that the festival’s rising star puts the spotlight on Knoxville’s walkable core as well as its homegrown cultural community.

“When we announced this destination, especially early on, people were like, ‘Why the hell is that happening in Knoxville?’”

Capps said. “Getting people to Knoxville is one of the initial hurdles, from a marketing perspective, but it’s wonderful that, after spending a weekend here, it becomes one of the things they talk about most, because they love the character and experience of being in the city.”

The quality of the festival venues play a key role in that impression. Since the Tennessee Theatre first opened as a cinema in 1928, Glenn Miller, Kenny Rogers, Patricia Neal, Bob Dylan, and B.B. King have darkened its door. In the Tennessee’s turn as a Big Ears venue, Rolling Stone writer and Knoxville resident Matt Hendrickson wrote that the setting is “like watching a show inside a Faberge egg.” New York Times critic Ben Ratliff called the space “a palace as big as an ocean liner, where sound reveals itself naturally and precisely” in his 2014 review.

In addition to the Tennessee Theatre, Big Ears takes over the 750-seat Bijou Theatre, an historic landmark that sits just a couple of blocks away and had its first heyday in the 1870s as a hotel. President Rutherford Hayes once gave a speech from its balcony. In the era after reopening as a theater in 1909, vaudeville shows kept its seats filled with both black and white patrons, then a rarity. In the decades since, the site has hosted everything from a fruit stand and used car lot to an adult 48

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movie house and burlesque stage. In 2006, the Bijou unveiled an extensive renovation.

AC Entertainment manages its programming as well as that of the Tennessee—a business arrangement that was another major part of Capps’ decision to locate the festival in Knoxville. “The Tennessee and the Bijou theaters are beautiful, extraordinary places to experience concerts and are especially appropriate for a lot of the music we bring to Big Ears,” Capps said.

Performances also happen in intimate downtown music venues such as the Square Room as well as the nearby Knoxville Museum of Art. There’s a smile in museum director David Butler’s voice when he talks about the festival and the way it has stoked Knoxville’s cultural energy. “When Big Ears first started off, none of us really knew what was going to happen or that it would be as big a thing as it was—sure, it sounded like fun,” Butler recalled. Last year’s festival doubled as a housewarming party for the newly renovated museum, with the packed opening night taking place under internationally renowned Knoxville glass artist Richard Jolley’s massive, DNA-like installation, suspended like a celestial thought bubble above the crowd.

“At a stroke we became a place that mattered on an international scale, in terms of new music and interesting things that important artists are doing around the world that manifest themselves here for that long weekend,” Butler said. “Just by taking place here, Big Ears enhances other programs we’re doing locally and pulls up the level of everything.”

Michele Hummel, the director of the Knoxville Central Business Improvement District Management Corporation, credits the influx of visitors with bringing marked vitality to town. During last year’s festival, downtown Knoxville swarmed with nearly 2,000 daily attendees. Some 65 percent of festival attendees came from more than 100 miles away, according to Hummel, which lead to sold-out downtown hotels and packed restaurants. “From an anecdotal perspective, I heard from one downtown restaurant that he cracked more eggs that morning than he had the whole time having his restaurant open,” added Hummel.

It’s no wonder the downtown business community rallied to revive Big Ears when the festival took a three-year hiatus after the 2010 festival. With a stated goal of expanding minds and experiences in Knoxville, the Aslan Foundation stepped up to underwrite last year’s event through the Knoxville

Central Business Improvement District.

Following the successful return of the festival, the Aslan Foundation has pledged its continued support to the tune of $900,000 spread out over the next three years.

“We felt the event was so unique to the evolving character of Knoxville as an arts and cultural hub that it was important to bring back the festival,” said Jeffrey Mansour, executive director of the grantmaker. “It’s such an eclectic mix of music that to make it more profitable would have harmed that uniqueness. We didn’t want to fund just another run-of-themill music festival but something special that would raise the profile of Knoxville — David Butler, Knoxville Museum of Art director as a community and broaden and deepen the quality of musical expression here.”

Mansour believes the foundation’s financial support two more sentences,” Amidon said. “With allows the festival’s bottom line to be about Big Ears, it’s more of a weekend; musicians benefiting the community, which in turn actually interact and hear each other’s sets. helps bridge cultural divides between visitors Instead of feeling like a conference where and residents. “You’d see these urban hipsters you’re rushing around, there are more all dressed in black and they’re standing there genuine interactions.” talking to a family playing bluegrass busking Capps intends for Big Ears 2015 to delve at Market Square, just relating to each other even deeper into Knoxville’s cultural fabric— as musicians or music lovers,” he said. “I from “secret,” last-minute shows at offbeat think we destroyed a lot of stereotypes.” sites to a showpiece collaboration with the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra. In addition, CREATIVE COMMONS this year a portion of each ticket sold will benefit music and arts education programs at The compact nature of downtown Knoxville’s Joy of Music School and Knoxville lends an intimacy that goes hand in Community School of the Arts, and students hand with the Big Ears experience. “Venues, will have the chance to get involved with hotels, restaurants and retail stores are within workshops and rehearsals. “The evolution is short walking distance,” Capps said. “That to aimed at strengthening our ties in the me is an essential quality in creating a festival community as well as the community’s such as this, so everyone is coming together experience of the festival,” Capps said. for a shared purpose. There’s a real spirit of Even so, not everyone in Knoxville has camaraderie and shared exploration.” jumped on the Big Ears bandwagon. A Sam Amidon, a progressive folk singer couple of alternative events—or rebel returning to Big Ears 2015 after an festivals, depending on who you ask— appearance in the 2010 edition, describes emerged last year to showcase local talent. the Knoxville festival as a more authentic Hello City bills itself as “an indigenous artistic experience, thanks in part to that companion” to Big Ears and last year brought village-like feel of the city. “In the summer four days of performances, DJ sets, and a gear especially, musicians go to a lot of festivals show to art galleries and the Pilot Light, an in a row and will see everybody and have experimental independent venue in time for three-minute conversations, then Knoxville’s Old City. you see them the next weekend and pick up

“At a stroke we became a place that mattered on an

international scale, in terms of new music and interesting things that important artists are doing around the world that manifest themselves here for that long weekend. Just by taking place here, Big Ears enhances other programs we’re doing locally and pulls up the level of everything.”

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“This music is not the result of one person’s idea; it’s this weird hybrid beast, and yet these songs have incredible truths to them, mysterious plot twists and strange encounters.”

— Sam Amidon, folk singer

APPALACHIAN ROOTS Though Big Ears has built a reputation for the way it eschews labels, this year’s lineup makes a point to celebrate at least one distinction: its Appalachian underpinning.

Folk music has always had a spot at Big Ears, but this year Capps has placed particular emphasis on traditional Appalachian influences. In fact, he found early inspiration for Big Ears at a new-wave music festival he attended several years ago, called Punkt, in a small sea town on the southern tip of Norway. Ground-breaking electronic music took center stage, but Capps walked away most struck by fiddle player Nils Økland’s interpretation of traditional Norwegian folk songs.

“For me, any great festival creates or celebrates a sense of place,” Capps said. “With exploratory music it can be useful to acknowledge and highlight its roots.

Appalachian traditional music, which of course goes back to the music of the British Isles, is an enormously influential cultural force.”

The Kronos Quartet will draw from folk influences throughout the weekend, and performances by folk artists Sam Amidon as well as Rhiannon Giddens will further surface the Appalachian angle. Both as a founding member of Grammy-winning old-time revivalists Carolina Chocolate Drops and as a solo artist, Giddens explores the vital but oftforgotten role African-American performers have played in the folk music heritage of North and South Carolina. The Carolina Chocolate Drops grew out of jam sessions with old-time fiddler Joe Thompson, and Giddens says that 50

mountain balladry seeps into everything she does. “My set will be wide-ranging—from Appalachian love songs to country laments to jazz ballads to work songs to rock ‘n’ roll gospel to Gaelic mouth music,” she said. “We will be touching on many different aspects of what makes up American music.”

The collaborative spirit of Big Ears flows through Amidon’s Appalachian-inspired music, which is forged through a symbiotic relationship between ancestral hymns and tunes and radical reinterpretations. When Amidon sings a folk song, it becomes a platform for storytelling as well as experimental composition; the result manages to be rooted in heritage while simultaneously detached from time.

“Great material came out of those mountains,” said Amidon, who grew up in the Vermont end of the Appalachian Mountains and plays fiddle, banjo and guitar.

“These mysterious folk songs have been passed from one person to the next in an era before we had recording devices; the next guy who sang it probably forgot two of the verses so he wrote two of his own. The cultural process that creates this music is not the result of one person’s idea; it’s this weird hybrid beast, and yet these songs have incredible truths to them, mysterious plot twists and strange encounters.”

ECHOES OF BLACK MOUNTAIN A gathering of the vanguard in Southern Appalachia, where lines between art forms are blurred, redrawn and then exploded? If the

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San Francisco’s legendary Kronos Quartet (above) will headline Big Ears 2015 with a variety of performances and artist collaborations. DONATED PHOTO

formula sounds like a second coming of Black Mountain College and its legendary Happenings, that’s purely coincidental. Yet a certain spiritual connection is hard to ignore.

Capps admits that he wasn’t trying to invoke Black Mountain or its legacy when he dreamed up Big Ears. “But there are some interesting parallels in the sense that these young, cutting-edge artists came together in a very unlikely location, the mountains of western North Carolina,” he says. “I’m sure gatherings like that happened all the time in New York, but because people were outside a major cultural center and they were together in this unexpected environment—which opens people up to new collaborations and experiences—it gave them the ability to explore connections in their own way.”

In fact, this past fall the Brooklyn Academy of Music staged a tribute to Black Mountain College’s “spirit of radical democracy” in the form of a choral and visual collaboration called “Black Mountain Songs.” Capps attended the performance and, in the excitement of the moment, sent out a missive on Twitter for Big Ears fans to take note.

“After the performance, I was floating on a cloud. It was a powerful experience,” Capps says. “In so many ways, the piece crystallizes what the Big Ears concept is all about—bringing together poetry, visual arts, dance, music, folk music, classical music, with this rich sense of history and complete sense of now.”

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THE TROUT DERBY Casters of all ages cash in on this mountain community tradition

This pair chooses a shady spot for sneaking up on a fish at the Blowing Rock Trout Derby. DONATED PHOTO

BY ANNA OAKES

pringtime is near, and with budding green and showy blooms comes the beginning of derby season. Not the derbies of fleet-footed horses and fancy hats; not the derbies of cars crunching and colliding in fields of smoke and mud, either. We’re talking trout derbies.

These community events are held each year for kids young and old, celebrating the fishing pastime and introducing new generations to the sport. Fish tales, family fun, free gear, and fabulous prizes—like the feisty fish in the ponds, rivers and streams—are in plentiful supply.

Trout and fishing derbies are typically held on a weekend morning, inviting participants to cast away for a chance to win prizes. Entrants return with the day’s bounty to have their fish measured and recorded, and organizations often award prizes for the largest catches by species

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

and by age range. Doug Besler, mountain region supervisor for the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission, said more than 50 trout and fishing derby events take place annually in the 32 western counties of North Carolina. Civicminded citizens or organizations founded many derbies in mountain communities, but state agencies such as the commission now are sponsors of these events to support their role in nurturing young outdoorsmen and women and in the growth of state tourism and recreation industries.

“A kid’s fishing derby is a great opportunity to introduce children to fishing,” according to the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, which aims to expand trout fishing opportunities for children as part of its 2006-2016 trout management plan. The agency plans to continue supporting fishing derbies by providing hatchery-raised trout and by developing new youth fishing events, especially in urban areas.

Outdoor education and engagement is core to the mission of the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission, Besler noted.

“Fundamentally as an agency, we’re well aware that among most people who are involved in the outdoors, almost always there’s a link to being involved in the outdoors as an adult and as a kid,” he said. “Research shows you need to have kids involved at a young age, and it needs to be a repeat occurrence.”

The commission is also focused on providing more fishing opportunities for anglers with disabilities. “If you’re a fully able-bodied adult or child, there are lots of opportunities. For people who don’t have those abilities, it’s really a challenge to trout fish,” Besler explained. The commission has constructed piers on ponds and streams throughout the state that are fully compliant with Americans with Disabilities Act standards. And in midMay each year, the U.S. Forest Service hosts a fishing day for special populations at Boone Fork Pond in Caldwell County, N.C. Besler said the commission assists derby organizers with fish stocking, loans of rods and reels, staffing, instruction of volunteers, and giveaways for kids, including small tackle boxes, coloring books, bait, and more. Of course, sales of fishing licenses help support Wildlife Resources Commission programs, so “it’s somewhat in our interest to maintain an angling public out there,” Besler acknowledges. But there are plenty of other reasons to keep hooks and flies in the water.

Kids young and old turn out for a fishing event as part of Youth Conservation Day in Brasstown, N.C. DONATED PHOTO

Derby Dates Trout and fishing derbies for youth and adults take place throughout the year. y Blowing Rock Trout Derby, April 4, American Legion Hall and Broyhill Park, Blowing Rock, N.C. 877.750.4636 y Chambersburg Noontime Lions Club Trout Derby, May 2-3, Franklin County, Pa. troutderby.com y Special Kids Fishing Rodeo, May 13, Chattahoochee Forest National Fish Hatchery, Suches, Ga. 706.838.4723 y Special Populations Derby and Kids Fishing Derby, mid-May, Boone Fork Pond, Collettsville, N.C. 828.652.2144 y Troutacular!, June 6, Riverside Park, Spruce Pine, N.C., and Bakersville Creek Walk, Bakersville, N.C. 828.765.3008 or 828.765.9033 y Family Fishing Festival, June 6, Chattahoochee Forest National Fish Hatchery, Suches, Ga. 706.838.4723 y Talking Trees Children’s Trout Derby, Aug. 1, Oconaluftee River Islands Park, Cherokee, N.C., children ages 3 to 11, sponsored by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. cherokeetroutderby.com y Rock Creek Kids Fishing Event, late September, Rock Creek Recreation Area, Erwin, Tenn., ages 12 and younger. 423.638.4100

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Southern Appalachian trout species

A

Adult brown trout usually reach larger sizes than brook or nglers are typically casting for one of insects. rainbow trout. As a result, they often consume larger food items, these three types of trout in such as crayfish, mollusks and fish, including other trout.

Appalachian mountain streams.

RAINBOW TROUT Fishing dry flies, streamers, and nymphs Scientific Name: Oncorhyncus mykiss that imitate natural food items works well, World Record: 42 lbs., 2 oz., from Bell especially in streams that support wild trout. Island, Alaska, June 22, 1970 The rainbow Fishing baits, such as worms and corn, trout is named for work well for hatchery-reared brook trout. the broad, lateral stripe on its sides, Spin casting small spinners, spoons, and which ranges from pink to red. crankbaits can be productive as well.

Its back is olive green, and its belly is whitish

BROOK TROUT Scientific Name: Salvelinus fontinalis World Record: 14 lbs., 8 oz., in Nipigon River in Ontario, Canada, July 1916 The brook trout, also known as the speckled trout, is greenish brown, often iridescent, with light red spots on its sides. It has dark, wavy, worm-like lines on the back and white edges on the fins, including the tail. Brook trout are native to the eastern United States and Canada.

Rainbow and brown trout, two non-native trout species, are thought to outcompete brook trout for habitat and food resources. As a result, wild brook trout are often restricted to small headwater streams. Spawning occurs in the fall. Young brook trout feed on small aquatic and terrestrial insects. Adults eat a wide variety of aquatic and terrestrial insects, as well as crustaceans, fish and other small vertebrates.

BROWN TROUT Scientific Name: Salmo trutta World Record: 40 lbs., 4 oz., from Little Red River in Arkansas, May 9, 1992 The brown trout is golden brown to olive brown with yellowish sides. Its back and sides have dark spots encircled with light yellow or white.

Some brown trout also have orange or red spots on their sides. Native to Europe and western Asia, brown trout were introduced to North America in the late 1800s.

Brown trout are often reclusive, hanging out close to underwater structures, such as fallen trees and undercut banks. Larger specimens are often caught near dark and after rainstorms that result in dingy water. They can survive slightly warmer water temperatures than other trout species. Spawning primarily occurs in the fall.

Young brown trout feed on small aquatic and terrestrial

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with heavy black speckling on all fins and the entire body.

Rainbow trout are native to the Pacific drainages of western North America but have been introduced throughout mountain streams in North Carolina. As with other trout, rainbows inhabit streams, rivers, ponds and lakes with good water quality and temperatures that rarely exceed 70 degrees Fahrenheit. They have a tendency to hang out in faster currents, such as riffles and swift runs, more so than brook or brown trout. Spawning occurs primarily in late winter.

Young rainbow trout feed on small aquatic and terrestrial insects. Adults eat a wide variety of aquatic and terrestrial insects, as well as crustaceans, fish and other small vertebrates.

Source: N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission

Fly fishing museum to open in Cherokee The Cherokee (N.C.) Chamber of Commerce last fall announced May 1, 2015, as the opening day of the new Fly Fishing Museum of the Southern Appalachians. The museum will gather and preserve the artifacts and history of fly fishing while educating the public about the fly fishing heritage in the Southern Appalachians.

The facility will be staffed by the chamber and is expected to present workshops, exhibits, and presentations related to the sport. Cherokee has 30 miles of well-stocked freestone trout streams and was the site of the 2011 U.S. National Fly Fishing Championship. The Cherokee museum is said to be the only one of its kind in the Southeast.

For information about the museum and fishing tribal waters, call the Cherokee Chamber of Commerce at 828.788.0034 or visit cherokeesmokies.com.

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

This young angler receives some helpful instruction at the Youth Conservation Day fishing event in Brasstown, N.C. DONATED PHOTO

“Almost always there’s a link to being involved in the outdoors as an adult and as a kid.”

— Doug Besler, N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission mountain region supervisor

There’s nothing fishy about this tale: when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service commissioned a study of trout fishing in 2006, it calculated a total of $24.6 billion in spending by freshwater anglers, with $4.8 billion spent by trout anglers on food and lodging, transportation, guide fees, equipment rentals, and gear. That $4.8 billion in direct spending produced an overall economic impact of $13.6 billion, as well as $1.8 billion in tax revenue and support for more than 100,000 jobs nationwide, the USFWS study indicated.

The WRC conducted its own study of mountain trout fishing, concluding that North Carolina reeled in $174 million in economic impact from the sport in 2008, supporting nearly 2,000 jobs. The most heavily fished counties were Transylvania, Watauga, Haywood, Cherokee, Henderson, Jackson, and Ashe, the study said. “In addition to the economic contributions trout fishing provides are the intangible benefits of a wholesome outdoor recreational activity that is familyoriented and adds to our quality of life,” said Robert L. Curry, chief of the WRC Division of Inland Fisheries.

LEAF FESTIVAL

MAY 7-10 OCT. 15-18

2015

Music. Dance. Handcrafts. Healing Arts. Folk Art. Lake Sports.

9*& 20 4 *91 - 40 1& #* 1! #1 'MKA; # 1 ' 'MKA; =KLAN9D c #1 =KLAN9D >GJ %A<K c #1 Festival for Camping

Kids Villages. Great Outdoors. Local Brews & Eats. Camping & Cabins.

Every Living Thing March 19-21, 2015 Park Vista Hotel, Gatlinburg, Tenn.

Keynote Speaker Dr. Rob Dunn Renowned scientist & author of ‘Every Living Thing’ Conference participants will present broadly on a variety of topics, including the taxa that comprise GSMNP and other national parks and protected areas; species inventory and climate change; the human impact on biodiversity and community composition; and the use of technology in science.

WWW.SMLIV.COM

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programs for the visually impaired. “Countless hours of preparation are spent by many, many people, all of which are volunteers, and none of them take a penny in compensation,” states Nogle. “In the 17-year history of the event, we have been fortunate enough to have raised $300,000.”

There’s the Jaycees’ Portsmouth Fishing Derby— Ohio’s first and oldest trout derby—held every fourth Saturday in April at Turkey Creek Lake in Shawnee State Park. This year marks the 50th annual. And for the Athens Kids Fishing Derby in Georgia, the amateur anglers hope for a little extra help from Lady Luck: a number of the trout are tagged beforehand, and reeling in a tagged fish can result in a cash prize up to $500.

A rainbow trout is reeled in from a river in Avery County, N.C. ANNA OAKES PHOTO

This lad’s catches of the day are measured at the American Legion Hall as part of the Blowing Rock Trout Derby in northwestern North Carolina.

DONATED PHOTO

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One of the most popular trout derbies in the region is the Talking Trees Trout Derby in Cherokee, N.C. The Cherokee Chamber of Commerce sponsors the tournament, which is restricted to kids 11 years old and younger. In 2013, more than 2,500 kids participated, and kids received a fishing rod and reel, hat, and T-shirt for signing up. Prizes that year included a camper, ATVs, and much more. In Franklin County, Penn., is what the Chambersburg Noontime Lions Club calls “The Nation’s No. 1 Trout Derby,” with more than one thousand participants, $25,000 in prize money, and $3,500 in raffle prizes. And although children are welcome at the Chamberburg Derby, it is certainly not a kids-only event, says club member John Nogle.

“We have families that come into town every year to spend time with their local Franklin County family. It’s great to see generations of fishermen and women enjoying our derby,” Nogle said. The derby raises about $20,000 each year for Lions Club projects such as financial support for vision exams, eyeglasses, and other

One of the year’s earliest events is the Blowing Rock Trout Derby in North Carolina, which is always held the first Saturday in April to coincide with the opening of trout season. Kim Rogers’ father and two others started the event 36 years ago.

“Dad [Elmer Jenkins] and Earl [Trexler] were both fisherman, and they loved fishing, and the opening of trout season is a big deal for fishermen,” Rogers explained. “They wanted to do this for kids, but they also were thinking it would be good for tourism.” Turnout was good even in the first few years. “Back then, you registered the fish at the hardware store—it was like a mini-mob scene down there,” said Rogers. Cash prizes go to the angler reeling in the biggest fish of each species in categories for girls and boys, men and women, and “small fry” (11 and under). Kids and derby participants with disabilities can fish at the village’s Broyhill Lake, where a fishing license is not required. Other popular fishing locales include the Watauga and Middle Fork New Rivers and Price, Bass and Trout Lakes on the Blue Ridge Parkway. “Then there’s always those who have secret places—they won’t tell us out loud because they don’t want others finding it,” Rogers said, snickering.

Though the town of Blowing Rock and local chamber of commerce have lent a helping hand in past years, the derby continues to be a family project for Rogers, who raises money throughout the year to fund the prizes and giveaways. She gets help from other local families, the Watauga Gun Club, Hunters Helping Kids and others.

“It’s always fun. You get to hear lots of fishing stories.

People getting together.”

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

The Steep Canyon Rangers were one of the headline acts of 2014’s Merlefest, held annually in Wilkesboro, N.C. MERLEFEST PHOTO

Festival finder A s the weather warms, festival season gets underway. Whether one seeks music or crafts, heritage or craft brews, there’s a celebration for it somewhere across the region. Get to planning 2015 travels with this round up of festivals highlighting just a few of those that are not to be missed.

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DOGWOOD ARTS More a series of events than a single festival, Dogwood Arts kicks off in February with the Home & Garden Show, occupies the entire month of April with events such as the Rhythm N’ Blues festival and Bikes & Blooms, incorporates a film festival in September, and closes out in December with a community-wide dogwood tree-planting program. dogwoodarts.com.

GREENING UP THE MOUNTAINS An ecologically-focused festival, this Sylva, N.C., event features a 5K run, two music stages, a children’s stage, talent show, craft demonstrations, kids’ activities on April 25. greeningupthemountains.com.

ROSSINI FEST Dedicated to celebrating the arts with the region’s best talent, the Rossini Fest in Knoxville, Tenn., does away with pre-conceived notions of “highfalutin’” symphonies and operas. Organizers ask, “Are you bored by murder, betrayal, lust, extravagance, the supernatural or madness?” This year’s festival is held April 25. knoxvilleopera.com.

MERLEFEST Considered one of the premier music festivals in the country, Merlefest serves as an annual homecoming for musicians and music fans. Held in April 23-26 in Wilkesboro, N.C, MerleFest was founded in 1988 in memory of the late Eddy Merle Watson, son of American music legend Doc Watson.

MerleFest is a celebration of ‘traditional plus’ music, a unique mix of music based on the traditional, roots-oriented sounds of the Appalachian region, including bluegrass and old-time music, and expanded to include

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

Americana, country, blues, rock and many other styles. merlefest.org.

MOUNTAIN DANCE AND FOLK FESTIVAL

BREVARD MUSIC FESTIVAL

Since 1928, mountain fiddlers, banjo pickers, dulcimer sweepers, dancers, balladeers and others have come to enjoy themselves “along about sundown” the first weekend in August. Founded as a means for people to share and understand the beauty and dignity of the Southern Appalachian music and dance traditions that have been handed down through generations in western North Carolina, the festival is held in Asheville. folkheritage.org.

This summer festival includes more than 80 opera, chamber, and orchestra performances over seven weeks each summer.

Brevard Music Center students, faculty, and guest artists perform a variety of concerts ranging from baroque and classical to modern and pops. Many events are free and held on the campus in Brevard, N.C. brevardmusic.org.

VIRGINIA HIGHLANDS FESTIVAL

LAKE EDEN ARTS FESTIVAL Known as LEAF, this unusual festival includes an educational outreach program matching artists with youth in schools and communities for hands-on workshops, residencies, interactive performances and mentoring that includes opportunities for youth to perform at twice-yearly events. Look for slam poetry, live music, a zip line into the lake, culinary arts, storytelling, outdoor adventures for kids, heritage crafts… really more diversity than most any other festival around. May 7-10 brings LEAF’s 40th anniversary—which continues with the fall festival Oct. 15-18. theleaf.org.

BISCUIT FEST Biscuit lovers rejoice at this carb-loaded festival featuring biscuit cooking competitions, biscuit art, biscuit songwriting, a Mr. and Ms. Biscuit pageant, and the Southern Food Writing Conference in Knoxville, Tenn. This year’s festival will be held May 14-16. biscuitfest.com.

SINGING ON THE MOUNTAIN The oldest ongoing old-time gospel convention of its kind in the Southern Appalachians, this free day-long event is held at the foot of Grandfather Mountain in June.

The day includes top Southern Gospel groups and Grand Ole Opry performers, plus a midday sermon. grandfather.com.

GRANDFATHER MOUNTAIN HIGHLAND GAMES Held July 9-12 at MacRae Meadows on Grandfather Mountain near Linville, N.C.,

In the Caber Toss, the athlete must turn a telephonepole sized log end over end. Tosses that fall the closest to the “twelve o’clock” position are winners.

JOHN GROGAN PHOTO • COURTESY OF GRANDFATHER MOUNTAIN HIGHLAND GAMES

Robert Porterfield held the first festival in 1948 on the front porch of Abingdon, Va.’s Martha Washington Inn in conjunction with the founding of the famed Barter Theatre, the State Theatre of Virginia, to preserve and celebrate the region’s cultural heritage. The festival, held in early August, has grown and now represents the whole of Southwestern Virginia. vahighlandsfestival.org.

the Highland Games are a celebration of all things Scottish. There’s dancing, piping, drumming, athletic competition, music and Gaelic culture including sheep herding, geneaology, and a Kirkin ‘O’ the Tartans. gmhg.org.

BLAIRSVILLE SCOTTISH FESTIVAL AND HIGHLAND GAMES Watch athletes compete in traditional games, including caber toss, putting the stone and tossing the sheaf while border collies herd sheep and falcons swoop down on prey, Gordon setters hunt game birds, and Clann Nan Con recreate the feel of early Scottish settlers in Georgia with their period clothing and weapons. This annual festival will be held June 13-14 in Blairsville, Ga. blairsvillescottishfestival.org.

Southern Appalachian traditions combine with artistic flair during Mountain Heritage Day, held annually on the campus of Western Carolina University.

MARK HASKETT PHOTO

FOLKMOOT USA

MOUNTAIN HERITAGE DAY

North Carolina’s official international dance festival, Folkmoot brings cultural groups from around the world to locations across the mountains. Dance performances, workshops and a festival and parade day make this an extraordinary event for the whole family. This year the festival, based in Waynesville, N.C., will be held from July 1626. folkmootusa.org.

A combination old-fashioned mountain fair and showcase for Southern Appalachian music, arts, dance and song, with the atmosphere of a big family reunion, Mountain Heritage Day is held each September on the Western Carolina University campus in Cullowhee, N.C. Visitors to will find three stages of traditional old-time, gospel, and bluegrass music and dance, with plenty of

WWW.SMLIV.COM

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Winterfest brings the spirit of the season to several cities in Eastern Tennessee.

clogging and fiddle and banjo music. This year’s festival will be held Sept. 27. mountainheritageday.com.

MYPIGEONFORGE.COM PHOTO

BOOMSDAY A huge Labor Day celebration in downtown Knoxville, Tenn., this familyfriendly event features entertainment, fireworks and an after party each September. boomsday.org.

GEORGIA MOUNTAIN FALL FESTIVAL Each October, this 9-day event in Hiawassee, Ga., features musical performances, arts and craft vendors, demonstrations, a flower show and the ever-popular Georgia’s Official State Fiddlers’ Convention. This year’s festival will be held Oct. 9-17. georgiamountainfairgrounds.com.

WOOLY WORM FESTIVAL Since 1978, residents of Banner Elk, N.C., nestled between the

Carolina’s largest ski resorts, have celebrated the coming of the snow season and relied on which one worm will have the honor of predicting the severity of the coming winter—determined by winning heat after heat of hard-fought races up a three-foot length of string. This year’s festival will be held Oct. 17-18. woolyworm.com.

WINTERFEST An annual four-month long celebration from November to February, Winterfest is filled with light displays, music and special events such as the Trolley Tour of Lights, Wilderness Wildlife Week and Saddle Up throughout Pigeon Forge, Sevierville and Gatlingburg, Tenn. mypigeonforge.com.

ISSUES OPINIONS A&E OUTDOORS & MORE

FOR WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA Smoky Mountain SUBSCRIBE OR READ ONLINE AT

smokymountainnews.com 828.452.4251 60

SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

c ro s swo rd :

ACROSS THE MOUNTAIN

Across 1 Group playing Celtic music at Brevard’s White Squirrel Festival 6 Large hardwood tree 9 Prefix with cook or heat 11 The in French 12 The Appalachians include many of these mountain systems 13 Many of these will help keep you warm in the cold mountain air 15 Popular 17 Bird creations 20 Gig equipment 21 Cauldron 23 Stumbling expression 24 Prepare a deer for cooking 25 Grizzly’s young (2 words) 27 Easter lead-in 30 William Penn state 31 Mosquito or gnat for example 32 Verb ending 34 ____moot festival 35 Spring sign 36 April adviser 38 Trout fishing contests 40 Church instrument 42 Kilogram, for short 43 Fish eggs 44 Okra dish

DONATED PHOTO

Down 1 2 3 4 5 7 8 10 14 16 18 19 22 26 28 29 33 36 37 39 41

Water source for backpackers Long-legged bird Longing for Pays attention to Morning time Vital camping gear for overnight Smoky mountain hiking (2 words) Not him Pitches a tent Prepared How-to book Take in the scenery Skeet launcher Singer Yoko Whitewater ____ Going on horseback Ornithologist, e.g.

Nantahala ____ Small salmon Press guy The Lord of the Rings good guy Alias, for short

Answers can be found on page 8. By Myles Mellor • ilovecrosswords.com WWW.SMLIV.COM

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d i re cto r y :

SELECT LODGING

BOYD MOUNTAIN LOG CABINS AND CHRISTMAS TREE FARM Featured in Southern Living’s Best Weekend Getaways. Enjoy a peaceful country setting in charming authentic log cabins, 1-4 bedrooms, located on 130 beautiful acres. Full kitchens, wood burning fireplaces, Wifi, & A/C. The cabins overlook the Smoky Mountains, a Fraser Fir Christmas tree farm, 3 stocked fishing ponds, flower and vegetable gardens. Hiking trails to the top of Boyd Mountain, volleyball, basketball and badminton, swimming hole in the creek, sledding in the winter.

Open every season.

Waynesville, N.C. 828.926.1575 boydmountain.com HEMLOCK INN This historic inn, set just off Main Street in downtown Blowing Rock, is only steps from shopping, restaurants and event activities. Eighteen unique rooms, including suites with fully-equipped kitchens. All rooms are non-smoking.

Rooms feature private baths, cable TV, air conditioning, phone services, microwave ovens, refrigerators and WiFi. Take advantage of a variety of packages

offered throughout the year.

Downtown Blowing Rock, N.C. 828.295.7987 • hemlockinn.net MOUNTAIN JOY COTTAGES These cabins, located in Maggie Valley, N.C., offer all of the expected modern conveniences with year-round access and seclusion seldom found. Relax in a peaceful country setting surrounded by a panoramic mountain view. All of the cabins have wood-burning fireplaces, cable TV with HBO, BBQ grills, picnic tables, central heat and air, and fully equipped kitchens. Located in the center of activities and high in North Carolina’s Smoky Mountains, Mountain Joy Cottages is open all year.

Maggie Valley, N.C. 888.926.1257 mountainjoycottages.com SMOKETREE LODGE Smoketree’s cozy atmosphere and prime location gives visitors the choice of enjoying the peace and solitude of the Blue Ridge Mountains or the opportunity to partake in the many activities available in the High Country.

11914 NC Hwy. 105 S. • Banner Elk, N.C. 800.422.1880 • smoketree-lodge.com

THE SWAG COUNTRY INN Chosen by readers of Conde Nast Traveler magazine as the #2 Best Small Hotel in the Unites States, the secluded hideaway itself consists of 250 private acres. The main lodge and cabins, consisting of 15 rooms, are built of 17th and 18th century hand hewn logs and local field stone. For 33 years, visitors have been able to experience just how remote, rustic, refined and remarkable it can be at 5,000 feet. Three gourmet meals are served daily, with turn down service each evening.

Waynesville, N.C. 800.789.7672 • theswag.com THE WAYNESVILLE INN GOLF RESORT & SPA This resort has been welcoming visitors to the mountains with southern hospitality since the 1920s. Traditional resort amenities include historic and mountain view lodging, 27 holes of championship golf, restaurant and tavern, plus outdoor event space and pro shop. Convenient location provides easy access to shopping, skiing, fishing, hiking and more.

176 Country Club Dr. • Waynesville, N.C. 800.627.6250 • thewaynesvilleinn.com

79-39

85-11

A REMARKABLE MOUNTAINTOP INN AT 5,000 FEET 2300 Swag Road • Waynesville, NC

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www.themartha.com 86-07

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SMOKY MOUNTAIN LIVING VOLUME 15 • ISSUE 1

827 Main Street Blowing Rock, NC 28605

(828) 295-7991 MountainaireInn.com

86-26

Smoketree Lodge

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11914 Hwy. 105 S. Banner Elk NC 28604

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86-28

Overlooking the Blue Ridge and Smoky Mountains.

112 Guest Rooms, 2 Restaurants, Spa, and 27 holes of Championship Golf.

Perfect for Vacations, Meetings, and Weddings.

Whether you’re in the mood for kayaking and rock climbing, or maybe just a stroll through the woods, the WNC Travel Guide is a great starting point for your Smoky Mountain adventure.

Welcome to the heart of Maggie Valley.

(888) 926-1257

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PICK ONE UP WHILE YOU’RE HERE OR VISIT WWW.WNCTRAVEL.COM 63

d e p a r t m e n t :

MOUNTAIN VIEWS

Call of the wild

BY LINDY KEANE CARTER

I

n the same way that water beckons boys to skip rocks across it, the outdoors called constantly to the orange Maine Coon cat I used to own. He would sit on the windowsill, tail twitching, ears alert, and turn to look at me with yearning in his yellow eyes.

Yam never knew when I might relent and let him out, so he pressed his hope upon me with unwavering ardor.

On a chilly but sunny March morning, I too felt a call to escape our four walls. I grabbed coat and cat and went into the backyard, cat brush in hand. I wiggled down and set Yam on the grass. He purred immediately.

I began pulling the comb though his long hair with an amazing steeltoothed thing called a Furminator, which penetrates the thick undercoat. Soon, I had a golden mountain of fur beside us, enough to represent an entire other cat. Using the tool is like eating a bag of potato chips, so I would have been more than happy to keep at it, but Yam had had enough. He took off across the yard, and so I leaned back on elbows to enjoy the sun on my cheeks. Overhead, birds called to one another, males to females I assumed, as they carried on nature’s age-old ritual of seduction and assessment. In the naked tree branches, I spotted the beginnings of nests, or perhaps what was left from last year.

At this time of year, my mother would scatter remnants of yarn, dryer lint, even hair from her own brush across the yard for the birds to weave into the linings of their nests. In north Georgia where I grew up, winters weren’t harsh, but nevertheless when the season began to release its icy grasp, my mother just had to get outside. With my two brothers and me in tow—and my father if he couldn’t find a fix-it project to claim—she would head for the woods. We owned property 30 miles outside of town, about 100 hilly acres of massive pines and hardwoods bisected by a pristine stream. Like a rambunctious child, she would soon have a stick in hand. We poked at leaf mats and the fungi spiraling up the trees.

We turned over rocks as we meandered, with no destination or goal other than to fill our lungs as one cannot inside.

What is it that clicks within the human spirit when the days become longer, driving us to the place of big sky or cathedral forest? For one thing, I believe that our senses are starved. Don’t we all savor the sweet crunch of acorns underfoot? The smell of moist soil? Surely we all want to pick up sticks and pry up soggy layers of leaves to see the pale green shoots of wildflowers

What is it that

clicks within the human spirit when the days become longer, driving us to the place of big sky or cathedral forest?

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working its way up to the sun. For another, we seem to seek confirmation that once again life has begun to renew itself, that buds stir, that tree canopies will return.

Spring also brings us yet another chance to realize the potential of a new year or to right the wrongs we may have pondered during winter’s confinement. As the modern world increasingly encroaches upon the natural world, for some of us, our time to embrace it may feel short and thus more precious.

As for Yam and his spring fever, he eventually circled back to me and, with equal yearning in his eyes, demanded to be let inside. I left his fur scattered on the grass, partially for the birds, partially because I assumed the wind would carry it off.

That afternoon, I answered the doorbell to find Mr. Wilson, the man who cuts my grass, looking worried.

“Mizz Carter,” he said. “I was just in your backyard.”

At the sound of the pitch of his voice, my daughter joined me at the door.

“Well, ma’am,” he said. “I just wanted you to know that a hawk done got your cat.”

My daughter and I laughed, then quickly explained the wonders of the Furminator. While doing so Yam wandered over to the doorway as if to confirm. Mr. Wilson looked relieved. I have never seen hawks in our neighborhood—only Canada geese and the occasional duck—but Mr. Wilson would know if there were hawks about. Perhaps somewhere nearby there is a hawk’s nest lined with downy fur of orange tint where next spring little round eggs will stir on schedule, in their own answer to nature’s call.

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MANDY NEWHAM-COBB ILLUSTRATION