Caution: The trail to the Bluffs is steep and strenuous …

Whomever wrote this gem of a line, wasn’t kidding. The 2.3-mile hike, up the side of the mountain, nearly killed me. But it was certainly worth the views once I got there and my heart had regained its normal beat!

As you step across the first wooden bridge on the Alum Cave Bluffs Trail in the Smoky Mountains National Park, and the constant splashing of the Little Pigeon River drowns out the sounds of the road, you enter a very special environment, a place peculiar to the Smokies, where human meddling has been kept to a minimum.

Sheltered by steep slopes and spared by the logger’s axe, the forests surrounding the trail look much as they did in the days when the Cherokee hunters slipped silently beneath their branches.

When I finally reached the Bluffs, the view of the spectacular Appalachian scenery and the cave, which is really a rock overhang, made me momentarily forget the tingling muscles in my legs.

The cliffs around the Bluffs are natural and are covered with numerous colonies of small plants, including ferns and herbs. The Bluffs is an outcrop of the Anakeesta rock formation which is high in sulfur and has interesting chemical properties where it is exposed and weathering.

The very picturesque Little Pigeon River which hikers hear burbling for the first half of the trail.

The top of the Alum Cave Bluffs Trail. On a clear day, which finally arrived, the view was spectacular and well worth the hike.