Fun in the Smokies

After a good meeting in Athens this week, we drove on eastward into North Carolina. We first stopped in Durham, NC, so I could spend time researching at the archives of the Forest History Society, looking up old logging company pictures and articles. We then drove on to Asheville, NC, to spend the night and meet with Tim Grotenhuis and his family. Tim and I went to school together in Rhinelander, from grade school through high school. I then hadn't seen him for years after graduation until one day a fellow student had turned to me in a class I had at Utah State and asked if I had recognized him...well, you can guess who it was--Tim! He was working on a master's degree at USU, and we happened to be in the same biometerology course... He and his wife Leslie also worked at a local bar and grill in Logan that Hope and I frequented, so we would see him periodically. Soon after we arrived at USU, he graduated and moved on, and I didn't hear from him again until just a few weeks ago, when out of the blue he emailed me. He and his family were now living in Asheville, NC. We decided to get together on this trip, and spent much of Friday evening catching up.

This morning, we drove from Asheville about 30 miles to the west into Great Smoky Mountains National Park. I was on a quest to take Hope and the kids to see the tallest known eastern white pine--a tree that is over 180 feet tall. Tim, his wife Leslie, and their 4 kids (yes, 4--Wyatt, Hazel, Oliver, and Scarlet, all between 9 months and 6 years old) joined us on this hike. It was about a mile up a well-marked trailhead near a campground nestled in the mountains. The day was sunny, brisk, and breezy, but a beautiful day for a hike. The kids all had fun walking the trails, playing with sticks, and throwing rocks into the creek. I think Tim and Leslie enjoyed the day, and Hope did too, if you don't count crossing the log bridges at the beginning and end of the trails...

This picture is of Kenny standing next to a large yellow-poplar near the large eastern white pine. The stand of timber, though very beautiful, is suffering from infestation by the hemlock woolly adelgid, a small bug with a big name (http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/forestry/woollyadelgid/index.aspx), that acts like an aphid and sucks the juices out of the tree. Though small in size, the enormous numbers of this introduced pest are devastating the hemlocks across much of the eastern US. It was hoped that cold weather would keep this bug limited in its distribution, but so far this hasn't been happening...

We should be back in Arkansas tomorrow, and we'll hopefully get back in the swing of things soon thereafter.