Volunteer Appreciation

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park holds an annual Volunteer Appreciation banquet sometime in the late winter. It is sponsored by the Great Smoky Mountains Association and the Friends of the Smokies (no tax dollars are spent on it).  We have never been to one because we are always in the Florida Keys at that time and 968 miles from Gatlinburg.  However, this year there was a snowstorm on the day of the banquet and it was canceled.  The people who showed up anyway ate the food.

They rescheduled the event, minus the food, for May 18.  Even though we seldom go out at night anymore, we drove over to the Park Vista Hotel.  We took the bypass to the hotel and saw many more signs of the big fire. The road getting up to the hotel was an adventure in steepness, but the view was really nice. The hotel sits atop a little mountain high above and overlooking the town of Gatlinburg.

Ranger Heath was one of the folks tending the registration desk. He told us he had seen our folder in the box and said he would handle M through R.  Heath has lost some weight since we saw him last fall.  He said it was Weight Watchers.  He also turned 50 in April.  He is Lookin' Good!

We saw Heath's wife, Dana, in uniform, and said hello to her.  Then we ran into other campground hosts we know - Regina, Clyde and Deborah, Bob and Shirley, and well as Henry and Bonnie whom we just met a week or so ago.

The last picture I took was of the banquet hall. We went in and found an empty table.  The dinner may have been eaten in the winter, but there was a wonderful dessert spread. Three flavors of cobbler with vanilla ice cream and a large variety of little candy and petit four bites.

A few other people joined us and we began chatting.  Then, one of our camp-host friends came to say they had saved us seats at another table.  I thought it would be rude to abandon our table mates at that point, so we stayed where we were.  I missed the camaraderie of my friends though.

A wonderful slide show of the park and volunteers was on the big screen.  The park superintendent, Mr. Cash, gave a nice speech, saying over and over how important the volunteers are to the park. He must have said "thank you" a hundred times. He also showed several videos of volunteers working. Then, each department head also gave a speech lauding the volunteers that work for them.  There were awards for hours milestones.  Some people have devoted their retired lives to the park by putting in thousands upon thousands of hours.

We hear those volunteers on the park radio all the time.  VP1 and VP2 drive the park roads and help park visitors in distress - locked out, out of gas, lost. needing a ride, needing a wrecker.  One year I heard them taking a jacket to a woman at Clingman's Dome who had locked herself out of her car, with her coat inside.

Then, there are rovers.  Laurel Falls Rovers apparently walk up and down the trail helping hikers, scaring away bears, and calling for a ranger when someone gets hurt.  I learned last night that there is also a Dome Rover at Clingman's Dome.  Cades Cove has a volunteer team of bicyclists who stations themselves along the Cade's Cove loop road on Wednesday and Saturday mornings when the road is closed to cars.  They help the cyclists and warn them about the dangerous spots where too many accidents have occurred. Oconoluftee has volunteers who attempt to keep the elk off the roadway and the tourists moving.  There are volunteers who pick up litter, plant seedlings, and conduct bio inventories. Of course, there are countless volunteers who help maintain the trails.  There are horse-riding teams who saw fallen trees and remove them from the trails. The list goes on and on.

Where else are you going to find so many people doing so much work for no pay? We love our parks.