Another drive into the Great Smoky Mountains NP. We drove up to Newfound Gap again and then returned back down the NC side to a town called Cherokee, which, surprisingly, is filled with Cherokees. There were Cherokee gift shops, Cherokee restaurants, Cherokee antique stores and most everything else Cherokee. We had no hankering to stop for anything here so we whizzed straight through town. We continued on down the rural road (Hwy 19 although highway is a bit much to call this road) through Birdtown and Ela until we reached Bryson City where we returned to Hwy 74 and turned east back to Waynesville.
We ate at a Bojangle’s chicken & bisquit place in Waynesville (the food was actually quite good – no french fries required to be purchased with your meal) before pulling into an Ingle’s supermarket in Waynesville to re-stock the larders in the Invader. We returned home just in time for me to catch the last 125 laps of a NASCAR X?#!!?? (next lower class to Sprint Cup) race from Richmond, VA, which I thought was terrific.