Clingmans Dome

Gatlinburg, TN · Great Smoky Mountains$Parking tag $5 a day or $15 a week; no entrance fee

About

At 6,643 feet, this is the highest point in Tennessee and in all of the Great Smoky Mountains, and the half-mile paved climb from the parking lot earns you a 360-degree sweep from a spiral observation tower that looks like it spun up out of the spruce-fir forest. On a clear day the blue-hazed ridges stack to the horizon for a hundred miles; on a hazy one the fog rolls through the silvery Fraser firs and you understand where the Smokies got their name. Bring a layer, since it runs ten to twenty degrees cooler up here than down in Bryson City, and time it for sunset if you can.

Highlights

Highest point in Tennessee at 6,643 feetSpiral observation tower with a 360-degree viewBlue-hazed ridge views up to 100 miles on clear daysHalf-mile paved walk from the parking lotSpruce-fir forest with Fraser firs

Getting there

Open in Maps Official website ↗

Related places

Mountains

Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Gatlinburg, TN · Great Smoky Mountains$

About 1,900 black bears live in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, on the Tennessee and North Carolina line, roughly two for every square mile. Getting within 50 yards of one…

Mountains

Cades Cove

Townsend, TN · Great Smoky Mountains$

An 11-mile one-way road loops through Cades Cove, a valley closed in by mountains on every side, south of Townsend, Tennessee. First on the loop is John Oliver's cabin, built in…

Caves

Ruby Falls

Chattanooga, TN · Lookout Mountain$$

Ride a glass-front elevator 26 stories down inside Lookout Mountain, then follow a winding passage past stalactites, columns, and rippled flowstone to the payoff: a 145-foot…