We first visited Creekwood Farm RV Park in Waynesville, NC, for seven nights (June 22-29, 2018) as part of Road Trip 2018 (Stop #12). We knew we wanted to be close to the Smoky Mountains again, having been in the area when we stayed in Pigeon Forge in 2017. However, Pigeon Forge was just a bit too busy and “citified” for us, so we were searching for a more laid back experience in a woodsier setting. Having a creek in our backyard was a bonus! We loved it so much that we added it to Road Trip 2019, for a whopping twenty-three nights from June 15 to July 8, 2019, also as Stop #12. We were able to get the same site both years!
Both years, we had shade and a breeze which meant that we could open our windows and shut down the A/C. Hooray! It was such a peaceful setting here, and the sound of the creek water flowing was incredibly relaxing. We splurged with a premium site on the creek, which gets us more landscaping, a fancy fire pit, and a concrete patio. There are other sites on the creek as well, but without these particular amenities.
This environment is perfect for fireflies, too! Each night they come out at dusk and it’s so much fun to watch them twinkling around us and in the woods on the other side of the creek. It looks so magical!
Road to the sites 
Small dog run by trees 
Tight when sites fill up 
Beautiful pavilion area 
Premium site landscaping 
Unique bird houses 
This was our site’s birdhouse, but sadly no birds.
We spent the Fourth of July weekend here in 2019, and one of the fun things that we did was to make szalonna. Not that it has anything to do with Independence Day, but it’s something my Hungarian husband raves about regarding his heritage and childhood memories. When he first described it to me long ago, I was skeptical about how good it is. However, Dean has made me a convert.
To make szalonna, you need the right kind of bacon, and it’s just hard to find out in Las Vegas. However, when shopping in Waynesville, we found some jowl bacon and decided we had to put it to use! Yum! Basically, you melt the bacon grease onto the bread, and then add onions and green pepper. Melt some more grease on top, add tomatoes, add grease. Salt and pepper. Consume.
We love this campground and will definitely be back in the future. There’s so much to do in this area, you can’t see it all in a few days. Stay as long as you can!
Regarding our cell data signal, Verizon checked in at 1.30 Mbps while AT&T was a blazing 88.5 Mbps! Campground wifi was not particularly reliable, so I rarely relied on it, although that’s par for the course at a campground.
Blue Ridge Parkway
In 2018, we drove about 35 miles along the Blue Ridge Parkway to enjoy the view at various overlooks. Yellow Face (milepost 450) and highest elevation (milepost 431) are shown below. We also explored a few waterfalls: Soco Falls, Lower Bubbling Spring Falls, and Sunburst Falls. Each of these falls is easily accessible. On a clear day, it truly feels like you can see forever from the Blue Ridge Parkway.
Gatlinburg
Both years that we stayed at this park, we took a drive over to Gatlinburg by driving through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The drive takes about an hour and a half from Waynesville.
In 2018, we made the mistake of trying to get back to I-40 for a faster route home, but our truck’s GPS took us through a long section of unpaved road, and we were getting worried that we would never escape! So much for faster!
In 2019, we tried again, but this time we avoided that particular turn at which there is a sign warning of the unpaved road down the way. We don’t recall if that sign was there last year. However, we found that the road leading to I-40 from Gatlinburg really wasn’t faster at all. It didn’t help that we got stuck behind a very slow construction vehicle for miles and miles.
So…just bite the bullet and go back to Waynesville through the Smokies. It’s a beautiful drive and seems to be the most direct route.
Our first visit to Gatlinburg was in 2017 when we stayed in Pigeon Forge and took a trolley, so we had no need for parking. In 2018, we found a parking lot just as you enter town from Highway 441, near the Gatlinburg Trail Trailhead. Yes, it’s on the edge of town and you have to walk a bit, but… when you’re driving a beast of a truck, this parking lot is great! We really appreciated this lot even more in 2019 when we had to park our F350 dually. In 2019, it cost $5 to park all day.
I don’t recall what we did in 2018. Nothing too exciting as there is not much photographic evidence from either one of us! I do recall that we had lunch at Tom & Earls Back Alley Grill, a repeat from 2017. They have good burgers and other pub food. , and it’s set back from the crowds for some peace and quiet.
In 2019, we tried to expand our horizons a bit by going to Blaine’s Grill and Bar, but… they were packed. Although we got a seat, the service was slow and then the bar was shut down for unclear reasons, and, well, we wanted an adult beverage! So we ambled down the road to Smoky Mountain Brewery, which did not disappoint. In addition to interesting cocktails, the food was tasty. Dean had a burger, and I had wings. We noticed (and smelled) the pizza getting served to diners nearby, and would consider that as an option if we were to get to Gatlinburg in the future.
I did find this photo of the Skylift which we rode in 2017, but not 2018. Here you can see the building construction. The Skybridge wasn’t built yet so there wasn’t much to do. Just turn around and go back down.
In 2019, Dean coerced me back up the Skylift. You have to understand that I’m really nervous about heights, and we had been stuck on this lift in 2017 for about 10 minutes. But… he prevailed and I went. And survived to tell the tale!
This year we not only rode that chairlift but also walked across the Skybridge. I had no idea it has a glass bottom about halfway across. Yikes! At that point, I was committed to continuing, but I do have data to prove that my heart rate was quite elevated from this experience!
On a different day, we went back to Gatlinburg to check out Anakeesta. This adventure required another, longer chair lift ride. Yelp!
At the end of the lift, you arrive in a little village that has zip lines, a mountain coaster, and a canopy walk. We ate at the Cliff Top Grill & Bar. You line up to place your order, you get a little gadget to put on your table, and then as if by magic the server finds you to deliver the food. Which happened to be average. However, you’re really here for the view.
There’s a lovely garden to wander through. Selfie opportunities abound, and there are nice plaques with cool quotes interspersed among the flowers.
And that’s not all. Dean made me go on the Tree Canopy walk with him. This was pushing me all out of my comfort zone! Fortunately, there were not a lot of other people so I could go across with no one else on the suspension bridge at the same time. If a crowd came along, I just let them pass. Meanwhile, Dean has no fear! The bridges start off relatively short but get longer (and higher from the ground) as you go. And that was enough for me at Anakeesta!
Another Waterfall Hike
We wanted to do some hiking in the area (in July 2019), but we didn’t want to have to drive far and we didn’t want the hike to be too time-consuming. We have a time limit on how long we leave our dogs behind in the RV, after all. And for bonus points, a hike that leads to a waterfall would be nice, but without a lot of visitors! I decided to try out the AllTrails app to narrow down our choices, and settled on the Little Fall Branch hike.
This hike is in the Pisgah National Forest, which sprawls across North Carolina. The forest road leading to the hike was only a few miles away from our campground and itself was a lovely drive along a creek as you wind up the side of a mountain. I should say that it was a lovely, but bumpy ride! I couldn’t imagine trying to drive a regular car up that mountain as it was pretty intense on our dually! And there were butterflies everywhere!
The parking at the trailhead is not well marked. Basically, you pass the horse camp and a picnic area, and then, when you hit the end of the road at a gate, you find a place to park on the side of the road. Then cross over the creek not far past the gate, and find the trail on the left leading away from the road. Most of the trail follows the creek, and when you can’t see it, you can hear it. Next thing you know, you’re at the waterfall!
As I was hanging out admiring the waterfall, I made a new friend, which I think is a Polygonia Comma butterfly. It came close enough and stayed long enough for me to really examine it and then it started crawling on to my foot. And then it wouldn’t leave. And then when I decided to leave, it flew off and then found me again a bit farther away and landed on my leg, but I had put away my gear by then so no photo of that!
Biltmore
We had heard so much about the Biltmore in Asheville, NC, AFTER we had left in 2018 that we decided to see it in June 2019. For me, the appeal was the historical aspect as it was finished in 1895, and has quite a lot of interesting history associated with it. For example, the National Gallery of Art stored many items here in secret during World War II.
If you’re into art, you might like the collection of lithographs and engravings collected by George Vanderbilt, the original owner of the estate. Or if you like flowers, you can spend wander the gardens and conservatory. The estate’s landscape was designed by Frederick Law Olmstead, who was famous for his work in designing Central Park in New York.
After our tour of the mansion and the gardens, we drove over to another section of the estate where we had lunch at Cedric’s Tavern. We sat out on the covered patio and appreciated the light breeze that provided some respite from an otherwise hot afternoon. If you’ve read any of our other posts, you will not be shocked to learn that we started with deviled eggs, which were ama-a-a-zing! The salad looks simple and plain, but it popped with flavor and texture. I had wings tossed in a peach glaze and adorned with lemon cream, which overall was a bit messy but incredibly tasty. Dean had a sandwich of some sort, probably the special.
After lunch, we enjoyed a complimentary wine tasting at the Biltmore Winery. Some of the grapes used in the wines are grown on the estate, but some grapes are purchased elsewhere ranging from North Carolina to California. We’ve heard from people who aren’t crazy about the wine here, but we found a few that we like. Such is the way with wine. You just have to keep tasting until you get to the winners!
Local Dining and Wine Tasting
Apart from our day trips to Gatlinburg and Asheville, we didn’t leave the campground very much for a three-week stay in 2019. We simply enjoyed our site so much that it was hard to get motivated to get out. However, we did get to three places of note.
For local wines, we went to investigate B & C Winery in nearby Maggie Valley where we met Chris, the owner and winemaker. Interestingly, she started out as a pharmacy technician, but discovered and pursued a passion for creating wines. She explained to us how she buys grapes from all over the world and then creates her own style of varietals and blends. We did a wine tasting focused on her reds and found a few that we really liked. And we enjoyed talking with Chris about her life in the area.
Every now and then, Dean gets a hankering for Italian food. We had noticed Frankie’s when we drove through Maggie Valley on our way to and from Gatlinburg, so we made it out to dinner one late afternoon. We wanted to arrive early because our Ford F350 dually is a beast of a truck to park, and we often saw the parking lot full here.
Frankie’s is supposed to be open from 11:30 am to 10 pm on a Saturday, but they were closed when we arrived at 3:30 pm. There was a note on the door that they would reopen at 4 pm, so we went down the street to visit Chris again at her wine shop. We had a glass of wine to pass the time and discussed the family of bears that hang out at her home in the mountains. Not a bad way to pass the time!
Returning to Frankie’s, we found that they had indeed opened but had a few minutes wait and people started pouring in. It’s quite a popular place and we can see why because the food was quite good. We started with the calamari, which was delightfully crisp, light, and well-seasoned. Dean had the lasagna and I had the mixed seafood with linguini.
I have only one complaint. I couldn’t finish my meal and asked for a box, and the server had it wrapped up for me, but it was oddly packaged in a brown paper bag. As we walked outside, I realized that the box was not secured as sauce started dripping down the front of my shirt. Dean took my box and threw it away in the garbage. Sad trombone…
My biggest regret about our stay in this area is that it took so long to discover downtown Waynesville. It was our second trip to this area, after all! We had driven into town for grocery shopping at Publix a few times and made one trip to Walmart for RV supplies, but that had been the extent of our adventures.
On our last Sunday in town, we went for breakfast. That’s when we realized we had erred in not exploring this part of town earlier! It’s a cute area with many shops and dining establishments, and worth spending more time here the next time. We were able to find parking for the beast in a public parking area a few blocks away on Miller between Montgomery and Haywood Streets.
This time (in July 2019), we went for Sunday brunch at Firefly Taps & Grill. Our choice of eggs benedict did not disappoint. It was actually quite difficult to decide on a menu option as there were many interesting choices, but bennies are our go-to breakfast! Yum!
This part of North Carolina is definitely a favorite of ours. I think I’m Gatlinburg-ed out in 2019, but there’s still plenty more in this area that we want to see. We’ll definitely be back!
From here, our next location depends on the road trip. For Road Trip 2018, we stop next in Waynesboro, VA. Road Trip 2019 takes us to Virginia eventually, we stopped first in Pinnacle, NC.
