What section for two week

[cometcoach13]

My wife and I are going to hike on the A.T. for two weeks beginning in Mid-May. I know this is a relatively short hike, but we have been reading about the A.T. for about a year now and want to "try it out" for maybe a longer hike in the future. We have both done some backpacking locally: OK, AR, TX. Longest being four days. Even though we will just have two weeks on the trail we are taking this very seriously. My wife is an elementary teacher and I am a H.S. science teacher/Bball coach. I am looking forward to the trail and so is my wife, however she is also very interested in history. We will spend most of our time on the trail, but a couple of days in trail towns. Is there any particular part of the trail that would be very scenic and also have a couple of historical towns that we could hit during a two week hike. We would appreciate your help.

[Papa D]

Mid May would be a very nice time to hike the Great Smoky Mountain National Park section of the AT (the thru hikers will pretty much be north of you by then) ; S-N it starts at Fontana Dam, NC - 25 trail miles or so north of the Nantahala Outdoor Center and ends at Davenport Gap, TN - the park is 73 miles of beautiful hiking -- with two weeks most folks could easily do the 100 miles from NOC to Davenport Gap -- that would only be about 7-8 miles a day which even for a newbie is a pretty casual pace (you could take a couple of days to just relax) -- you could also extend your trip from the NOC to Hot Springs, NC - a great little trail town with a bar, a river (the French Broad) and hot tubs - that would be about 135 miles -- just about perfect for a casual 2 weeks (one solid week for a thru-hiker with legs) -- If you really want to get ambitious, I'd suggest NOC to Elk Park, NC - you'd get the Roan Mountains inc. Big Hump - - there is a hostel there called Mountain Harbor - you'd be doing 18 miles per day - 254 miles - this is the sort of nonsense I love - you might too if you are an avid runner and outdoors person. There is pretty much as much as you want.

These folks are real nice and would give you a shuttle if you needed it (assuming you want to do the GSMNP)

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