Little River Trail

Horace Kephart first came to the Great Smoky Mountains over a hundred years ago. The land, the nature, and its people inspired him to write 'Our Southern Highlanders' (it's in its twelfth printing). I thought about old Horace as I was running along the Little River Trial near Elkmont on Saturday morning. I thought about how all the things that have changed and all the things that would change in these mountains since Horace first arrived. It is my hope that the beauty that these mountains, valleys, and streams hold will remain constant.


Since I first got this crazy idea to run 26.2 miles, I've always wanted to do a long run in the Smokies. On Saturday, my good friend Josh and I loaded up in his truck and headed into mountains where we would run nearly eight miles along the Little River on the abandoned railroad bed out of Elkmont.

There are several ways to get to Elkmont. We went through Townsend (on the western half of the park) and followed the Little River Road. Normally, the Little River acts more as a stream than a river. However with the amount of rain that has fallen in the past couple of days the, the Little River resembled something you would see if you were in Yosemite. It was a raging whitewater inferno. The scenery was second to none the entire way to Elkmont.

I forgot to mention the snow. The banks of the river and virtually every tree was dusted with a fresh sprinkling of snow. This made the run that much more enjoyable. The run went fine other than a pair of really wet feet, but that was expected. I couldn't imagine doing anything else on a Saturday, than enjoying the mountains. And I would imagine Horace would feel much the same.