Meandering up Fie Top Road in Maggie Valley, just as your vehicle’s engine is pushed to the limit and it seems you may eventually drive off the edge of the earth, you emerge atop a mountain ridge, a large rustic lodge appearing in the distance — the Cataloochee Ranch. 

Friends of Panthertown was recently awarded an Environmental Enhancement Grant by the North Carolina Department of Justice for a remediation and restoration project. 

The Town of Sylva is embarking on a five-year plan to revitalize Mill Street with updated façades as part of the design pillar of the Main Street Sylva Association. 

More than two years after flooding along the Pigeon River and its tributaries killed half a dozen people and destroyed businesses, cars and homes from its headwaters near the Blue Ridge Parkway on down through the towns of Canton and Clyde, contractors are set to begin some of the most intensive debris removal operations in Haywood County since the floods of 2004. 

Gary Wade grew up in Pittman Center, Tennessee, just 7 miles from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park trailhead leading to Mt. Cammerer. But despite being a lifelong hiker, he didn’t reach the storied fire tower  at the summit until 1993, when he was in his mid 40s. 

Rex Mann’s father was the kind of storyteller whose voice would make everyone in the room stop what they were doing, come and listen. 

It’s quiet and peaceful on the hillside of Bryson City Cemetery. Overlooking the hustle and bustle of downtown, all you can hear are birds chirping and the freshly cut grass crunching underneath your feet, but if those old stones could talk they’d have some stories to tell. 

Waynesville is in the midst of a makeover on three of its streams, and it’s a renovation that fish, crayfish and tadpoles alike are likely to find satisfactory.

One of the three projects is already complete, a rehabilitation of Shelton Branch at the Waynesville Recreation Park that wrapped up in October, with stream restorations at East Street Park and Chestnut Park poised to start soon.

If all goes according to plan, within the week folks in Jackson County will have their choice of pools to soak in the summer as renovations finish up at the Sylva and Cashiers pools. 

Rainbow Falls Trail: The Rainbow Falls Trail is the next trail in line to get a complete rehabilitation through the Smokies Trails Forever program, funded by Friends of the Smokies.