The Great Smokey Mountain Jeep Invasion
Once again, Nicole and I made the trek to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee for the Great Smokey Mountain Jeep Invasion. This is our third year attending. The attendance this year was over 50,000 people and over 20,000 Jeeps. There was nearly 300 vendors and parties by local businesses and trail rides including Invade the Cove. We chose to stay at a nice little Air b-n-b cabin in the mountains this year. Last year I camped in the roof top tent, this year I wanted to sleep in comfort of air conditioning. The first day we went to the the show and had to wait forever to get inside. The weather was hot and humid. By the time we got to the door I was drenched in sweat.
Once inside the building we made our way down the isles. The LeConte Center was packed. The vendors had quite the displays and products. I saw some familiar faces from different YouTube channels, or from being at the Invasion from prior years.
I have been looking for repalcement seats for my Jeep, so I was paying particular attention to those booths. I found the PRP booth and tried most of their seats they had. After sitting in them for a period of time I found the set I wanted. They actually had them in stock. I made the purchase along with some 4 pt harnesses and we trucked them out the door to my JKU.
Once we got them shoe horned into the jeep, it isn’t easy when your jeep has drawers and a fridge mounted inside we headed back to the cabin. Once I got there it took me about 45mins per seat but I had them swapped out fairly quick.
The following day we headed to Cades Cove. We stopped at the Cades Cove Jeep Outpost. It is a nice little touristy store with shirts and hats and of course some Jeep parts. We then headed to Cades Cove in the Smokey Mountain National Park. There is a 11 mile loop road the proceeds through the valley. We turned off the loop road and followed a trail. The trail had many stream crossings and some steep hills and some washouts. There was actually a minivan that tried to make it down the trail, then had to retreat because the minivan didn’t have the required clearance. This trail eventually dumped us on to the famous “Tail of the Dragon” at Deals Gap. The dragon has 318 curves in 11 miles of road and is a motorcycle and sports car destination. The Jeep, not so much, although the scenery is beautiful.
The following day, Sunday, we packed up or belongings and headed for home. With a stop at Buc-ees of course.