On Thursday afternoon, May 6, we drove over to Gatlinburg - through the rock slide area. Even though we were on the westbound side where traffic is reduced to one lane, we sailed right through. Here are three pictures of what it looks like:
This is the spot where the traffic goes from two lanes to one lane. As you can see, we never even slowed down.
This is the actual slide area. Notice the ropes running up the mountain and the equipment still there.
One more - with more equipment. Just past this spot, there were about 15 vehicles belonging to all the workers.
Okay, that was Thursday. On Friday afternoon, May 7, about 2:00 pm, we came through the area again - this time going eastbound. We had no traffic problems. But the westbound side was a mess. The backup from the spot where the road narrows to one lane was about 3 miles long, and it was even pretty slow going through the whole slide area. Here is one picture taken from the eastbound side:
This is just west of the slide area and shows a little of the equipment. By this time, the westbound traffic had thinned out. I tried to get a picture of the traffic but there was too much traffic on my side to do it safely.
I apologize for the quality of the photos. There was no way to stop and take pictures, so I did it through the windshield while driving. So you get windshield glare, bugs, reflections - the whole bit. But you get the idea.
Check back in a few days for a very interesting photo of "Spring in the Smokies."
