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M AY / J U N E 2 0 1 5
TRAVEL
Wonderful Wilderness
Wildlife Week
Event in Pigeon Forge is fun for
everyone
by Jan Ross,
Staff Writer
While we were
in Pigeon Forge to
check out Wilderness Wildlife Week, an annual
event that brings together fans of
nature with a variety of presenters,
hikes and bus tours of the area, we
were amazed to discover this event
is completely free. The beautiful
LeConte Center is a great venue
for it, with roaring fireplaces and
comfortable furniture in which to
relax.
A cozy cabin with Eagle’s Ridge
Resort, which offers an assortment of cabins in all different sizes,
provided us with a stay at Eagles
on High, a three-bedroom cabin
with a fireplace, a hot tub on the
porch with an expansive view of
the mountains, a Jacuzzi tub in one
of the bedrooms and a game room
complete with a pool table and a
60-game multi-cade. The wraparound porch was furnished with
rocking chairs, a picnic table and a
gas grill in addition to the hot tub.
The cabin was the perfect place for
our trip to Pigeon Forge.
We enjoyed attending Wilderness Wildlife Week, but two activities were especially memorable.
The first was a bus tour of the Great
Smoky Mountains National Park.
The park is huge, filled with incredible scenery and an amazing variety
of wildlife. Dozens of bus tours and
hikes were offered during the week
and all were free; you just needed
to sign up for whichever one you
wanted.
The tour of the American Eagle
Foundation was a special opportunity to see a variety of birds and
learn about the rehabilitation the
facility offers because it doesn’t
normally conduct tours. It was
amazing to see the magnificent
eagles, the fierce hawks and the
other birds. The
resident biologist talked about
the birds and explained how they
came to the facility, described their
eating habits and shared other
fascinating bits of information.
You can see some of the eagles and
other birds at Dollywood Park,
where the Wings of America show
is presented in an open-air theater
from early April through late
October.
In between the sessions at
Wilderness Wildlife Week, we
sampled some great local dining. We had dinner at the [[[