| Pigeon
Forge, TN – August 2015 / Newsmaker Alert / Wilderness
Wildlife Week™, Pigeon Forge’s 25-year-old annual salute to Great Smoky
Mountains National Park and an array of outdoor topics, is moving from
January to May.
Dates for 2016 are May 18-22
(Wednesday through Sunday), with indoor programs at the LeConte Center
at Pigeon Forge and outdoor activities nearby in the national park.
“Moving to spring opens the
door to attract visitors who were reluctant to travel in winter. It also
lets us introduce a variety of new programs,” said Leon Downey, executive
director of the Pigeon Forge Department
of Tourism.
“We especially look forward
to using Wilderness Wildlife Week to draw attention to the centennial year
of the National Park Service. ‘Find Your Park’ is a big theme of the centennial
celebration, and we’re certainly going to help people get to know the Smokies
better,” he continued.
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Wilderness Wildlife Week
is a free event. Experts in numerous fields donate their time to deliver
programs about wildlife, botany, nature photography, mountain crafts, Appalachian
music and other topics.
Complementing those programs
is a series of hikes in the national park. In the 11 years that hiking
records have been kept, Wilderness Wildlife Week hikers have logged 3,631
miles on trails in the Smokies. Pigeon Forge provides hike leaders and
transportation to and from the trailheads.
Wilderness Wildlife Week
attracts people from throughout the U.S. A voluntary sign-up sheet last
January identified visitors from 28 states. The most distant were from
Alaska, California, New York and Wyoming.
Wilderness Wildlife Week
was inspired by local nature photographer Ken Jenkins, and his popular
photography presentations remain on the week’s schedule.
Information about all aspects
of visiting Pigeon Forge is online at MyPigeonForge.com
and by calling 800-251-9100.
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Contact:
Tom
Adkinson, APR
for Pigeon Forge Department
of Tourism
615-341-8796 |
