Now that it’s too cold to swim or go tubing in Deep Creek, that’s no reason to stay away. The area’s three sparkling waterfalls are a treat any time of the year, and you can see them all in an hour’s walk from the trailhead parking lot. Because they’re on the main trail, Tom Branch Falls and Indian Creek Falls are the most-visited. But if you follow the short quarter-mile uphill trail to Juneywhank Falls, you’ll be rewarded with a beautiful 80-foot cascade, a quiet out-of-the-way spot that has inspired numerous wedding proposals.

Deep Creek is one of the most accessible areas of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, just two miles north of Bryson City. For more information on these and other area waterfalls, visit the Bryson City online visitors guide, GreatSmokies.com. Download a printable PDF map of Deep Creek’s trails and waterfalls.

The Nantahala River’s summer-long parade of inflatable rafts, kayaks and duckies was recently interrupted for an entirely different kind of parade — the Nantahala Outdoor Center’s annual “Christmas in August” parade of outrageous, oddball rafts.

Each year in early August, NOC closes its facilities for a one-day staff appreciation celebration. The parade is the biggest draw of the event, but there’s also a duckie rodeo in the Nantahala Falls, BBQ, live music and a DJ’d dance party. The “French Broad Express” (above) was just one of many ‘floats’ constructed by NOC staffers, each attempting to out-shine the others. More photos

Thanks to Lloyd Brown, of Miami, for this week’s Postcard photo.

Two local fishing guides — Ken Kastorff of Endless River Adventures and Nick Johnson of Rivers Edge Outfitters — fish the scenic Little Tennessee River which flows north out of Macon County into Swain County before entering Fontana Lake.

Ken calls the “Little T” one of the easiest places to catch fish. He adds “and you never know what you’re going to catch” While the river may be best known for small mouth bass, there’s also redeye, redhorse, crappie, walleye, carp and even muskie. And in the springtime, there’s a run of trout.

The water is exceptionally clean with no commercial development to spoil the scenery. Wildlife sightings are commonplace, including deer, bald eagles and osprey.

The future is bright for the continued health of the Little Tennessee thanks to the efforts of the Little Tennessee Watershed Association and the Little Tennessee Land Trust, owners of the 4400-acre Needmore Game Lands, which encompasses a 27-mile stretch of the Little Tennessee.  The game lands are managed by NC Wildlife Resources Commission.

To learn more about fishing in the North Carolina Smokies go here.

Patricia and James Fields of Crossville, Tennessee explore the 275-foot, double-span Needmore suspension footbridge over the Little Tennessee River. It’s one of two suspension footbridges in Swain County. A smaller one spans the Nantahala River west of Wesser.

Suspension bridges were originally built to allow children from local farms to cross the river to catch the school bus in the days before good roads lined both sides of the river. The Needmore bridge is now part of the 4,525-acre Needmore Game Lands, located in Macon and Swain counties and managed by the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission.

To visit this bridge, from Bryson City drive west on US 74 approximately ten miles. Turn left on Needmore Road at Smoky Mountain Jetboats (just before Hwy 28 North). Continue south on Needmore for about four miles to the bridge. The GPS coordinates are N 35.32544, W 83.52328.

A group of colorful rafts emerge from the morning mist. They’ve just begun their eight-mile journey down the wild and scenic Nantahala River.

The first few minutes of a Nantahala rafting trip are rather calm and uneventful, giving everyone in the boat time to get settled and practice paddling. Guides will take this time to discuss maneuvering techniques and teamwork. But just around the bend is one of the most exciting whitewater features on the river — Patton’s Run. And that’s when the fun begins.

For more about whitewater rafting in the Smokies, including a directory of outfitters, visit the Travel Guide to Bryson City and The Great Smoky Mountains.

While their horses enjoy the cool water, these riders drink in the beauty of Fontana Lake and the surrounding Smoky Mountains. The Great Smoky Mountains National Park has more than 800 miles of trails, and most are open to horseback riding. Water features — streams, cascades, waterfalls — are plentiful, including the massive Fontana Lake with its more than 240 miles of shoreline.

You’ll find more information about trails, Fontana Lake and horseback riding in the Smokies at the Bryson City area online travel guide.

Photo courtesy of James Clark, Deep Creek Boarding Stables

Each Spring, while Fontana’s lake levels are still rising, fields of grasses and wildflowers briefly appear, but their flowering season is short-lived. As the lake gradually swells to full pool, scenes like this patch of Purple Toadflax give way to the rising lake.

Photo by Scot Warf

Just below the third bridge on the Deep Creek Trail, little Hammer Branch bursts out of the thick Rhododendrons and tumbles into Deep Creek. Writer and Deep Creek historian Jim Casada tells us that this spot was once the home of Sam Hunnicutt, a legendary mountain sportsman and author of the extremely rare book, Twenty Years Hunting & Fishing in the Great Smokies. Casada added “You can still see the yellow bells (forsythia) blooming there about this time of year. Old Sam was a mighty bear hunter. He always wore high boots, thanks to having been snake bitten at some point in his life.”

Click here for a PDF map of Deep Creek’s trails and waterfalls.

Any time of the year is a great time to visit Deep Creek’s three waterfalls, especially the largest – Indian Creek Falls (above). You can see them all in an hour’s walk from the trailhead parking lot at the Deep Creek Recreation Area.

Deep Creek is one of the most accessible areas of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, just two miles north of Bryson City. For more information on these and other area waterfalls in the North Carolina Smokies, visit the Bryson City online travel guide, GreatSmokies.com. Download a printable PDF map of Deep Creek’s trails and waterfalls.

The January 10th snow created an endless tableau of winter scenes worthy of a Postcard From The Smokies …like this view of Alarka Creek, photographed by Faye Bumgarner.

Best known for whitewater rafting, the Nantahala River is now the focus of a different group of paddlers — the world-class athletes who will compete in two upcoming international events to be held in the Nantahala Gorge. In 2012, a Junior World Cup Freestyle Kayaking competition will be held on the river. And that’s merely a warm-up for the World Freestyle Kayaking Championships, which will focus worldwide attention on Bryson City and the Nantahala River Gorge in 2013.

This week’s postcard, a photo entitled “Cartwheeling” by Erin Worley of Bryson City, captures a paddler performing an acrobatic maneuver  typical of freestyle kayaking. It also captured the third place in the Marianna Black Library’s “Life in Swain” photo contest.

To learn more about freestyle kayaking, visit the International Canoe Federation’s website.

Half of the residents of Western North Carolina insist the other half misspells our favorite river. Over in Jackson County, it’s the “Tuckasegee”, while in Bryson City it’s usually the “Tuckeseigee”. To others, it’s the “Tuckaseegee”. It’s a long-standing disagreement that’s partly territorial, partly hereditary. But spellings aside, we all agree on one thing — it’s a beautiful river.

As it flows over rocks and ledges on its way to Fontana Lake, the Tuckaseigee is rarely placid. But as it widens across the sandy bottoms at Governors Island, the Tuck briefly becomes calm, smooth and reflective — a delightful scene that includes beehives, Fall plantings and an old red canoe at Darnell Farms.

This morning, the North Carolina Smokies awoke to a thick blanket of snow. While the peaks of the Smokies have already had several snowfalls, this is the first of the year in the lower elevations. And what better time to adorn a postcard with Scott Hotaling’s “Winter Gold”. Scott is an area photographer who routinely captures the Park’s beauty. For more of Scott’s photography and print information, visit his website at LightOfTheWild.com.

Last Winter, Michelle Archer of Bryson City captured this beautiful image of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park’s snow-capped peaks high above the mouth of Eagle Creek on Fontana Lake. The image recently won first place in the Marianna Black Library’s “Life in Swain” photo contest — a reminder that the Smokies are beautiful in every season of the year.

Thanks to Scott Hotaling for this week’s Postcard From The Smokies. Scott is an area photographer who lives near the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and routinely captures the Park’s beauty, as in his atmospheric “Mountain Cascade” above. For more of Scott’s photography and print information, visit his website at LightOfTheWild.com.

Except for a few kayakers, the Nantahala river is relatively quiet in the Fall. But an event planned for mid-September 2013 will be unlike anything the river has ever experienced. That’s when the Nantahala Gorge hosts the World Freestyle Kayaking Championships.

The event will attract up to 500 paddlers from forty to fifty countries and thousands of spectators to the Bryson City area. The Gorge was selected by the International Canoe Federation, the sanctioning body for all world championship and Olympic canoe and kayak events.

The Nantahala will also host a Junior World Cup Freestyle event in 2012 as a test event for the World Championships in 2013. To compliment the 2012 World Cup on the Nantahala, two other World Cup Freestyle events will occur in the Southeastern United States during 2012. The Nantahala Gorge has been home to several national slalom championships over the years, but this high-profile event solidifies the area’s status as a paddling destination.

Each Fall, in order to provide a catch-basin for heavy Spring rains, the Tennessee Valley Authority begins its annual 56-foot winter drawdown of Fontana Lake. And while some may find exposed rocky shoreline less attractive, fishermen view it differently — with less water in the lake, there’s a greater concentration of fish. Do the math.

Photo by J.R. vanLienden

A few hundred feet below Indian Creek Falls is a much smaller cascade where Indian Creek narrows to just three feet in width forcing the water to churn through the narrow opening between two boulders. The “baby’ falls can be viewed up close from a bridge on the Deep Creek Trail.

You can see Indian Creek Falls, Juneywhank Falls, Tom Branch Falls and the baby falls on a short walk through the Deep Creek recreational area of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park,  just two miles north of Bryson City. More about waterfalls in the North Carolina Smokies.

Photo by J.R. vanLienden

This week’s double postcard of Fontana Lake scenery provides a beautiful followup to our July 25th mountain sunrise and sunset photos. Gloria Kaylor, who rents cabins in the Smokies, captured these early morning and late evening images of her ‘favorite place on this earth’.

Interested in spending the day on Fontana Lake? You’ll find more information here.

Virginia Hill came all the way from New York to celebrate her birthday in the Smoky Mountains of Western North Carolina. Her father, Garius, snapped the above photo and provided the following caption —

“This was a wonderful moment for Virginia and our family. Bryson City and the Nantahala area provided an amazing 12th birthday for Virginia. In one day, we camped in the Smokies, rode on a scenic train through the mountains, whitewater rafted, zip lined through the canopy of giant trees, ate a fabulous dinner in a mountain resort and slept that night in a yurt.”