travel dates: March and April, 2025
That’s right: there’s a lot going on in this post! Because we keep going to Dollywood.
So since our last Dollywood check-in, Abe and I have been back for two more trips–one with Ari and Abby over their spring break and then again with Dave during his spring break.
The trip with Ari and Abby was a quick one: we drove up one evening, did a day at Dollywood, then drove home the next morning. My last Dollywood post was full of sad tales of long lines and crowds, so I’m happy to report that this visit was much less congested. We even walked right in to Aunt Granny’s to eat lunch with no waiting! We stayed at the Valley Forge Inn in Pigeon Forge, which is frequently recommended on my assorted Dollywood Facebook groups because it’s clean and in a great location with excellent prices. Indeed, we had a two room suite for right around $100/night with breakfast included. It’s within easy walking distance of The Island in Pigeon Forge, and Ari and Abby walked over there our second night to check out the fountain show.
Like Epcot, Dollywood is fond of having some sort of “festival” going pretty much all the time, and our visit coincided with the “I Will Always Love You Music Festival.” Mostly this meant there were some seasonal food items on offer and lots of love-themed photo opps, like with the word LOVE itself (the promotional material touted the letters as “life-sized,” which amused me endlessly):
More photo opps:
We finally made it to some shows, including this one that was a sort of musical biography of Dolly Parton and which appears to no longer be showing. Oh well. It was colorful!
We took the scenic route through the national park on the way home, which gave us chances to stop for views:
And then we returned! Again! This trip, during Dave’s spring break, was actually the original motivation for the whole grand year o’ Dolly. At some point we had a big Outer Banks/Williamsburg, VA trip planned, but it started to seem like an awful lot of driving, and we were a little worried about beach weather that early in the year, so we switched gears and ended up in the Smokies over and over and over instead!
Dudley Creek RV Resort
We brought the RV on this trip, finally, and we tried out the new Dudley Creek RV Resort in Gatlinburg, largely because of its great reviews and reasonable prices (particularly compared to campgrounds closer to Dollywood in Pigeon Forge). We very much enjoyed our stay and recommend Dudley Creek, with one caveat about that reasonable pricing: they don’t seem to have quite decided on a pricing model yet, and it’s a little hard to figure out what’s going on. Right now the website seems to be leaning in to being a value-priced option, proclaiming “Great Stays, Even Better Prices” right up top. Then they advertise their rates, again right on the front page, as $49/night for standard sites and $59/night for creekside sites. I was pretty sure both that we’d paid more than that and that there had been a bigger difference between standard and creekside pricing when we booked, so I did a little investigating. When I actually went to book a site, the rates were all over the place, depending on dates. I saw rates well over $100 in October, all the way down to $49 for all sites in February. So I’m not sure what the deal is. The website really does not say or at all suggest that there’s dynamic pricing like this. So I’m not sure if they’re changing how they do their rates and the booking engine hasn’t caught up yet or if they’re actually just giving “as low as” pricing on the website but not making that at all clear. But they really need to fix that. In the meantime, I’d call and ask rather than just booking online.
Dudley Creek is maybe 3 miles off the main strip in Gatlinburg, so a bit of a drive (maybe half an hour) to the entrance of Dollywood, but very close to all the action in Gatlinburg and on that side of the National Park (Sugarlands Visitor Center is around 10 minutes away).
We had a creekside site, and it was very nice, but the interior sites looked nice and roomy, too, so don’t hesitate to book one and save some money if you’re so inclined.
Amenities were very nicely done. It’s a small place, but it packs in a nice pool with a small waterslide, playground, small dog park, sparkling bath houses, and really nice communal area with a pavilion and fire pits.
Also, as you can see, lots of bears. One potential negative is that the whole place is gravel, aside from the little dog park. This keeps things looking very tidy, but our dogs would have preferred more grass or dirt. There is a Dollar Tree adjacent to the campground with a big grassy area out back, though, and we took the dogs over there a couple of times.
Back to Dollywood
Since this trip was just the three season pass holders in our family (we’d used Bring a Friend passes for Ari and Abby in March), we finally got to take advantage of some perks we hadn’t been able to use before. Like the front of the line access for pass holders during the first hour the park is open. This was huge the morning that we got there at park opening! We were able to easily ride Big Bear Mountain, Dragonflyer, and Firechaser Express, and we could have gotten another ride in before the hour was up, but we decided to make a run for the first train of the day instead (which we didn’t make it to in time, sadly).
We also benefitted from low crowds both times we came to the park this week, even though it was still prime spring break season. The second day we came it was raining off and on this day, and the park was nearly deserted. If you don’t mind getting wet, rainy days can be a great line-avoiding strategy. We rode Thunderhead twice in a row with no wait at all:
(when I say “we” I am often referring to me and Abe. Dave can’t do too many roller coasters in a row, so the second Thunderhead run was just us).
Fun decorations were still out!
Seeing the bird show was high on Abe’s list, and we finally made it. Here he is posing awkwardly with Challenger, “the most famous Bald Eagle in the world:”
(also you can see here that we were caught in the rain, improperly equipped)
And we finally tried a potato tornado!
Another nice thing about having passes was that we felt totally okay popping into Dollywood for a few hours and then leaving, since we could come back anytime. So we were there twice during our four full days in the area, but only for half a day or so each time. This is less exhausting than being there open to close.
Hiking in the Smokies
We split our time between highly commercialized Dollywood fun and the offerings in the National Park. We live four hours from the Smokies, so we’ve made several trips there over the years, and every time we go I feel like it’s way harder than it should be to find good, accessible, family-friendly hikes. Part of the problem is the park’s massive popularity (and small parking lots): word gets out about any impressive and relatively short trails, and you find that you need to be there by sunrise to get a parking space. And some areas of the park were still inaccessible this early in the season, complicating matters further. But in the end we settled on two trails that we were really happy with and we were still able to sleep until it was light outside every day!
There are only two trails in the whole park that allow dogs, and we decided that Fiesta the Beagle is such an excellent girl that we needed to take her on one of them. The Gatlinburg Trail runs between the Sugarlands Visitor Center and the town of Gatlinburg (the other trail that allows dogs is by the Oconaluftee Visitor Center on North Carolina side of the park). It’s 1.9 miles each way and mostly takes you along a lovely little creek (with some less lovely roadside and parking lot-side sections). Fiesta looks like she’s not having a very good time in the pictures, but really she just doesn’t like posing for photos.
We stopped for a snack in Gatlinburg at the halfway point and then turned around and headed back. The trail is mostly flat and easy; it’s more of a nice stroll than a real hike, but it’s a great option if your Beagle wants to get out and see the park!
We were very pleased with our other hike on this trip: Andrew’s Bald. I don’t know if this is exactly a hidden gem; there were a good many other people on the trail with us…but it doesn’t seem to get as much attention as some of the other trails, particularly the ones with waterfalls. But it’s a really lovely hike, winding through beautiful, moss-covered wooded areas before emerging to a great view, and…it’s pretty easy to find parking! Because it shares a large parking lot with Kuwohi (FKA Clingman’s Dome). The parking lot will often fill up later in the day, but we arrived mid-morning and had no trouble finding a spot.
The trail is 3.5 miles round trip, with close to 900 feet of elevation gain. The thing to know about it is that the vast majority of the elevation gain is on the way back, since you’re starting from the highest point in the park. In particular, the last half mile or so is a doozy. But it’s reasonable for most people who are casual hikers.
Word is the trail used to be extremely rugged, but improvements were made in 2008, adding lots of steps and whatnot and making the trail a lot more accessible. We really enjoyed it. The views are mostly at the end (and, honestly, the view at the end isn’t any better than what you get from the Kuwohi parking lot), but it’s a completely charming trail all along, with moss-covered trees and some giant rocks to stop and climb midway. Very enchanted walk through the woods feel to it.
The “bald” means you get a big, open, grassy area at the end, where you can stop and have a snack or a picnic lunch and admire the view before starting the uphill trek back.
And finally I’ll give a shout out to Split Rail Eats, a slightly off the beaten path (or at least off the parkway) restaurant where we ate twice. We were impressed enough the first time that we came back a couple of days later to do trivia there. And we won! In a stunning come from behind victory that we owed to being the only people there that night who knew anything about Canadian geography. Thanks, Canada! In addition to great food, we were impressed with the beer wall(!) where one could choose from a variety of beers, get as much as wanted, and pay by the ounce.
And that wraps up our third Dollywood trip of the year! Hoping to get back at least one or two more times before our passes expire!
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