6 Day Smoky Mountains Itinerary – 2 States, One Grand Adventure

The legendary Great Smoky Mountains National Park conjures up images of classic blue silhouette of mountain ridges, black bears, elk, and rolling waterfalls. The national park spans both North Carolina and Tennessee and makes for quite the epic road trip. The question is, what’s the best way to do it?

With this 6 day Smoky Mountains itinerary, you’ll gain inspiration for how to make the most of a trip that covers both states and includes the best places to see, do, eat, and stay for those with an adventurous spirit.

Great Smoky Mountains Road Trip Guide

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is the most visited of all of the US national parks but for someone that’s never been there, it’s a daunting task to put together an itinerary, especially when you only have 6 days to work with.

If you love the outdoors, beautiful landscapes, wildlife, and exhilarating adventure, this one’s for you!

What To Know Before Planning Your Road Trip

There are probably a million ways to see the Smoky Mountains.

Something you’ll learn is that most road trips will include a combination of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park itself and the surrounding towns and cities that flank it on both sides of Tennessee and North Carolina.

Since there’s so much to see, do, eat, and stay in the region, you’ll have to pick and choose what you want to do. Much of it will depend on your travel style, your group, the number of days you have, and how much of the national park you want to do versus the periphery.

As we’ve mentioned, this Smoky Mountains itinerary is meant to be guide for a trip that someone real has actually done, to give you an idea of one way to plan a trip here.

To help put this together, we employed our art of planning trips as a way to visualize the trip and stay organized. Keep reading to find out how you can get access to the 6 day Smoky Mountains itinerary spreadsheet.

How To Get Around The Great Smoky Mountains?

Like most, if not all national parks in the United States, The Great Smoky Mountains and its surroundings are best explored by car.

This means that your best bet to getting around here is to come here by your own car if you’re doing a much larger road trip through the US or simply…