My family and I are planning to go down to the Smoky Mountain area in late July/early August this year for ten days, which will be three days travel there and three back, and then six there. We're brand new to RVing (but not to tent camping). We're trying to do a mix of hookups and dry camping. For the dry camping, we'll be exclusively staying in the national forest campgrounds. However, for the days we'll be taking advantage of hookups, I'm in need of some advice. I'm looking for out of the way, state/national forest type camping, but with hookups, well at least electrical. In other words, I like secluded forested type camping, not large open fields with RVs on top of one another. I've never cared for the KOA type camping experience. I've always looked for ma and pa type small establishments with more privacy (if I'm not doing state/national parks or dispersed camping). When tent camping, it's much easier to just show up and look for open sites. Now that we're giving RVIng a try, we want to have reservations first for our maiden voyage. So, I'm hoping some of you guys can give me some recommendations given what I'm looking for down in the Smoky Mountains. Thanks!

Check out Indian Boundary Campground. It is definitely off of the beaten path.

SMNP is the most visited national park in the country. Most sites are reserved 6 months in advance. There are some first come sites. Sites with services are nearly nonexistent. With tat in mind you should now be aware of your chances for a string of 6 days open.

Unless you plan to grab some really out of the way site, you won't find much and most of the sites within a 45 minute drive are large RV parks with FHU and neighbors about 15' away. You might want to look at some of the Corp of Engineers places on the lake. The Douglas Dam Headwater campground is located about 30 minutes away. It's $25 per night and has water/electric only. It is right on Douglas Lake and you MIGHT be able to catch an opening. The DD Tailwater Campground is also just down the road and is also right on the water.

jbc28 wrote:Check out Indian Boundary Campground. It is definitely off of the beaten path.Thank you! This is exactly what I was looking for. And there was plenty of availability for the time frame I was looking for. I just booked!

bgum wrote:SMNP is the most visited national park in the country. Most sites are reserved 6 months in advance. There are some first come sites. Sites with services are nearly nonexistent. With tat in mind you should now be aware of your chances for a string of 6 days open.I was actually surprised at how much availability there was only two months out... But like you said, not much with services.

Smoky Mountains camping | Good Sam Community

jbc28
Explorer
Jun 08, 2020
Check out Indian Boundary Campground. It is definitely off of the beaten path.
bgum
Explorer
Jun 08, 2020
SMNP is the most visited national park in the country. Most sites are reserved 6 months in advance. There are some first come sites. Sites with services are nearly nonexistent. With tat in mind you should now be aware of your chances for a string of 6 days open.
Merrykalia
Explorer
Jun 08, 2020
Unless you plan to grab some really out of the way site, you won't find much and most of the sites within a 45 minute drive are large RV parks with FHU and neighbors about 15' away.

You might want to look at some of the Corp of Engineers places on the lake. The Douglas Dam Headwater campground is located about 30 minutes away. It's $25 per night and has water/electric only. It is right on Douglas Lake and you MIGHT be able to catch an opening. The DD Tailwater Campground is also just down the road and is also right on the water.
GravelRider
Explorer II
Jun 08, 2020
jbc28 wrote:
Check out Indian Boundary Campground. It is definitely off of the beaten path.

Thank you! This is exactly what I was looking for. And there was plenty of availability for the time frame I was looking for. I just booked!
GravelRider
Explorer II
Jun 08, 2020
bgum wrote:
SMNP is the most visited national park in the country. Most sites are reserved 6 months in advance. There are some first come sites. Sites with services are nearly nonexistent. With tat in mind you should now be aware of your chances for a string of 6 days open.

I was actually surprised at how much availability there was only two months out... But like you said, not much with services.
GravelRider
Explorer II
Jun 08, 2020
Merrykalia wrote:
Unless you plan to grab some really out of the way site, you won't find much and most of the sites within a 45 minute drive are large RV parks with FHU and neighbors about 15' away.

You might want to look at some of the Corp of Engineers places on the lake. The Douglas Dam Headwater campground is located about 30 minutes away. It's $25 per night and has water/electric only. It is right on Douglas Lake and you MIGHT be able to catch an opening. The DD Tailwater Campground is also just down the road and is also right on the water.

Thank you. I'm looking for a single night heading out of GSMNF, and this might be just the ticket!
jbc28
Explorer
Jun 08, 2020
GravelRider wrote:
jbc28 wrote:
Check out Indian Boundary Campground. It is definitely off of the beaten path.

Thank you! This is exactly what I was looking for. And there was plenty of availability for the time frame I was looking for. I just booked!

Nice...glad I could help.
RoyB
Explorer II
Jun 08, 2020
We always stay at ELKMONT Campground. We try to always get the F8 camp site up on the Little River that flows through the campground.

Campground is very popular and may get crowded sometimes...

Kids love the Little River and like to float down stream in an innertube that walk back to the camp site and do this over and over haha...

The sites do not have electrical hookups but there are several central located Bath Room buildings with AC power... Generators are allowed only in certain areas of the camp ground... We like to run off our Battery banks and then run the 2KW generator for three hours during breakfast each morning recharging our battery bank... Then we are good to go again for the next day/night run off the batteries.

Typical setup...

Roy's image

We always go to Townsend TN for supplies and things...

Roy Ken
bgum
Explorer
Jun 08, 2020
Glad it worked out for you. It appears they were closed thru 6/3 and had refunded those reservations. I am not familiar with this campground and don't know if availability is normal or due to covid 19 scare. In any case it appears you found just what you need. This site can be a valuable resource for RVers.
GravelRider
Explorer II
Jun 08, 2020
RoyB wrote:
We always stay at ELKMONT Campground. We try to always get the F8 camp site up on the Little River that flows through the campground.

Campground is very popular and may get crowded sometimes...

Kids love the Little River and like to float down stream in an innertube that walk back to the camp site and do this over and over haha...

The sites do not have electrical hookups but there are several central located Bath Room buildings with AC power... Generators are allowed only in certain areas of the camp ground... We like to run off our Battery banks and then run the 2KW generator for three hours during breakfast each morning recharging our battery bank... Then we are good to go again for the next day/night run off the batteries.

Typical setup...

Roy's image

We always go to Townsend TN for supplies and things...

Roy Ken

This is a nice looking place to stay as well. Thanks for the recommendation!