Cliff

The Natchez Trace National Historic Parkway is just across my boundary line. Got interested in that park as a very young child and it stays interesting now that I am in my mid 50s. There is a deer trail that runs as far north as I have yet followed it, a reminder of what park historians say is the way the Trace started. There is something wonderous about going out and standing in the woods, looking at that trail and thinking that if I wanted to, I could set out on it and, with minor deviations, walk 350 miles north on it, or turn around and walk 107 miles south. All without seeing more than a smidgin of modern life.Dad took me to the Smokies in '58 and got me hooked on the park there. Coming home, Grandpa got me hooked on the Trace. In my childs' mind, I figured that somehow the Trace would take me to the Smokies. Well, my cousins live up there, just outside the Smokies, in view of Chilhowee Mountain. So there was a bit more to it than just park.