The Place of a Thousand Drips is a low flow waterfall that can be seen from your vehicle. Its name is quite fitting. After a good rain it can be quite dramatic as the flow of water splits into many small bands of water cascading around the rocks and creates a “thousand drips”, however if there hasn’t been a good rain recently it is reduced to trickles of water and you’ll drive right past it without even knowing it was there (even when you are looking for it). For this reason, it is very much a wet weather waterfall.
The Place of a Thousand Drips starts at the top with high rocks and a small cave and cascades down 30 feet.
The waterfall is unusual because of the interesting grooves and channels worn into the rocks over time, creating intricate pathways that split apart and rejoin many times on the way toward the bottom of the waterfall. During wet times, the green moss with all the different waterways spreading out across the rock face is a sight well worth seeing. There is a little stairway that runs alongside it to the top of the waterfall.
The waterfall is located in Gatlinburg inside the Great Smoky Mountains National Park on its Roaring Fork Nature Motor Trail at the very end, near post #15. The road is a one-way, winding road that travels about 6 miles through spectacular scenery that you can see from the comfort of your car.
I highly recommend the Nature Motor Trail, even if it hasn’t rained recently. The trail itself is very scenic and beautiful, so even if the waterfall is reduced to a trickle, there is still lots more to enjoy.
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