Rainy Friday

It didn't actually rain all day, but it was wet and damp with a shower now and then.  That Smoky Mountain mist was hanging in the air.

It was wet and shiny in the forest with the field of boulders along the campground road.  This picture does not capture it. Speaking of boulders, Spence was telling us about some poachers who were in Big Creek earlier this year.  They had gathered ten garbage bags of moss from the tops of boulders in the forest.  When Richard and Spence came into the campground, the people got in their pickup truck and drove away without the bags of moss they had stashed behind the toilet building.  Spence says they sell it to florists and such for $10 a bag.  That is not worth the risk of the fine or jail time they would get if caught taking resources from a national park.

We just heard on the park radio the other day of a couple loading up their car with pretty creek rocks somewhere else in the park. The ranger made them put all the rocks back.  If all twelve million visitors per year took a few rocks from the creeks, the creeks and rivers would be all muddy in short order.

Here is a sad thing along the campground road.  Someone placed some smashed and apparently lost glasses atop one of the boulders lining the road. The lenses were not broken, but the frames were toast.

Andy inspected the glasses and put them back on the boulder.

The bridge was also very wet. 

This picture is for Cas.  The Balsam has my favorite "spring green"- tipped branches. They remind me of lights, especially when the sun shines on them after a rain.

Spence has been clearing downed branches and twigs from the picnic area and sidewalks around toilet buildings since the storm last week.  He brought us a Gator-load to use as kindling in our campfires.

This tree stump in the horse campground was surrounded by hundreds of tiny mushrooms, some of them about the size of a pencil eraser.

These two horses did not seem perturbed by the dampness. They were busy munching hay and only looked up to pose for me.