**Updated with Pics! Rocky Top Tennessee? More Like RAINY Top!

Today we drove through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and climbed to the top of Clingmans Dome... 

In the rain.  

It was so lush and so beautiful.  The only downside to the rain was the lack of visibility.  


Well that and the fact that we were wet... 

We were not nearly as wet as we could have been though.  You see, we wore these lovely blue Great Smoky Mountain garbage bags, I mean rain ponchos, which we purchased at the National Park store,  to keep the rain off of us.

Poor Lily Anne, She was "told"

Doug, my husband, kept telling people we were celebrating National Blueberry Awareness Day or alternatively, National Trash Bag Appreciation Day.  Besides the obvious fashion statement, the other side benefit was that they trapped in the heat keeping us warm AND dry.  It was pretty chilly up there.

We are TOO COOL for Blueberry Bags!

For those of us with, ahem... issues with heights, lets just say the wind blowing our poncho like a parachute while we climbed up the corkscrew ramp to the top of a spindly tower, was a bit unnerving.

My determined little Sarah Bear

Everyone made it though, even the little ones.  One of my favorite times was walking with Sarah who is five, hearing her say over and over,  "I can do it!  I can do it!"  Walking uphill, up a mountain, for a half mile feels a whole lot farther than walking half a mile. 



Caleb was in his element. We had to wake him up from a nap when we arrived at the park and I was concerned that he'd be grumpy.  Nope! Not a bit! He LOVED the stroller ride up the mountain so much that people coming down, towards us kept commenting on his smile and giggling!  He was literally giddy, more so than we've ever seen him unless someone is actively ticking or playing with him.  So put mountain climbing on his list of activities he loves, along with swimming.

While we were driving down the mountain, we were sobered as we were stuck in traffic due to an accident which was being cleared.  Folks had seen a Mama Bear and her cubs crossing the road, they tried to swerve, so they wouldn't hit her and they lost control flipping their SUV, according to the man in the car behind us.  We saw the SUV and it looked rumpled, but not destroyed.  We prayed for that family and for our safety as well.  
Whew!  We will always remember our hike in the rain in the blueberry ponchos to the top of Clingmans Dome.

It seems that the only sure thing about this trip is that nothing works out exactly according to schedule or plan.  Learning that its not a bad thing, it's just a thing, is the challenge.