2026 Summer Adventure Series: Townsend, TN & the Smoky Mountains
The next leg of our trip brought us to Townsend, TN: The Quiet Side of the Smokies. We planned our entire vacation around securing a riverfront site at Little Arrow Outdoor Resort and it did not disappoint. Many campgrounds adopt “resort” in their name, but this one earns the right to be called a resort. We had a covered cabana overlooking the rapids of Little River and the grounds are filled with amenities, even a hot tub. We stayed four nights and loved every minute of it.
We started off with some excitement… after getting settled, we headed to the pool where one of our neighbors approached us to let us know that a bear was on our site and had helped himself to a bag from our garbage. (She shared the picture with me.) We thought we were bear-aware campers, but realized more diligence was needed!
The following day we drove through Cades Cove early in the morning where we saw even more bears. There was a mama bear and her cubs in a tree and we had a close encounter with “Betty the Bear” walking around the Visitor Center. Amazing! On our way back, we enjoyed the scenery at Laurel Creek (parking #1) pull-off which boasts a small waterfall. Afterwards, we headed to the nearby Ace Hardware to pick up some rafting tubes that ended up being a great investment. The campground has entry and exit points along the river to enjoy tubing. However, the following day we drove with the tubes two miles down to the Townsend Wye and floated back to the campground. Mommy and Daddy both took turns tubing with the older girls. The Wye has amazing rapids and a swimming hole with plenty of parking, we highly recommend!
We didn’t allow our Trachie to tube down the river, but we did tie off to a tree and let her sit in a boat to enjoy the rapids.
We did a driving tour on the Foothills Parkway, the Alpine Coaster near Pigeon Forge, lots of swimming at the campground pool, and enjoyed the sound of rushing rapids from the cabana. It was such a relaxing and refreshing four days. We can’t wait to return to the campground in any season. Oh, and if you do visit the Secret Slice has great pizza and it’s onsite!
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