NC Appalachian Trail - Section 3 - Fontana Dam Road to Yellow Creek Gap

Date	Distance	Time	Elevation Gain	Average Moving Time	Year to Date Miles
2/26/2022	6.1 miles	3 hours 47 minutes	1,060'	1.8 mph	118.7

Parking: Yellow Creek Gap, Fontana Dam Road 

Maps:

• FarOut app (Guthook)
• Appalachian Trail Conservancy North Carolina-Georgia Map

Directions:

• At Yellow Creek Gap parking area, cross the street and follow the AT southbound to Fontana Dam Road

Our original plan today was to leave one car at the Fontana Dam Visitor Center. I think there's one more parking area south of there, but it's in the Smokies, and dogs aren't allowed in the Smokies, so we weren't sure if it would work for us. Well, when we got to where our car's GPS told us the parking lot was, it was obviously wrong. We ended up at the town hall. We had no cell service at that point, so it was challenging to figure out where we should go. We drove around quite a bit, and eventually found AT parking. Turns out it wasn't the visitor center. We parked near a sign for the marina. We drove to Yellow Creek Gap and started our hike. The first part of the hike is climbing, but it's not bad. There are breaks in the climbing, and its only 1,000 feet up. We saw very few people on the trail today. I thought we'd see more thru hikers. We only saw 3 backpackers. Once we got to the top of the climb it started raining. We had a bigger descent, and it went slowly. The leaves and rocks were wet, so I was very, very careful. I have PTSD from breaking my ankle on a leafy rocky descent. We made it safely down to our car and considered our options. We could do an out and back to Fontana Dam. We could drive back to Yellow Gap, pick up our car, and re-spot the cars to do the remaining piece one way. We ended up choosing to go home. It was pretty cold and dreary out, and we just wanted to get warm and dry. One of our cars needed charging in order to get home, so we stopped at a charger in Sylva. I brought my backpacking stove and heated up some soup for us.  

This is the parking area where we parked. Oops - 1.4 miles away from our intended parking lot.