At 6,643 feet, this Tennessee peak is the highest point on the entire Appalachian Trail

It’s called Kuwohi, and it’s been waiting

Great Smoky Mountains National Park gets more visitors than any other national park in America, and Kuwohi pulls in more than 650,000 of them a year.

At 6,643 feet, it’s the tallest point in Tennessee, the highest spot along the entire 2,192-mile Appalachian Trail, and the third-highest peak east of the Mississippi. But the number that matters most isn’t a measurement.

It’s a name, and for 165 years, the wrong one was on the sign.

The mountain sits at the roof of the East

Stand at the summit and you’re higher than anywhere else in Tennessee, and almost anywhere else east of the Rockies. Only Mount Mitchell and Mount Craig in North Carolina rise higher on this side of the country.

The mountain straddles the Tennessee-North Carolina border and climbs nearly 5,000 feet from its base to its peak. That kind of elevation doesn’t just change the view.

It changes the air, the trees, the animals, and the weather entirely.

Cherokee medicine people climbed this mountain to pray

Kuwohi, pronounced koo-WHOA-hee, means “mulberry place” in the Cherokee language. In Cherokee syllabary, it’s written ᎫᏬᎯ.

This is the highest point within the traditional Cherokee homeland, and for generations, medicine people made the climb to seek guidance from the Creator on matters that affected their communities.

Cherokee oral tradition held that the White Bear, the great chief of all bears, lived here, and that one of the bears’ council houses sat on this very summit.

A senator’s name replaced a people’s name for 165 years

In 1859, the mountain was renamed Clingmans Dome after Thomas Clingman, a North Carolina senator who later became a Confederate brigadier general.

That name lasted until September 2024, when the U.S. Board of Geographic Names voted to restore Kuwohi.

The effort started in 2022, driven by Lavita Hill and Mary Crowe, both enrolled members of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.

By June 2025, permanent signs showing the Kuwohi name and Cherokee syllabary went up along Newfound Gap Road.

A concrete tower from 1959 waits at the top

The 45-foot observation tower at the summit was built in 1959 as part of Mission 66, a National Park Service push to upgrade facilities during the postwar era.

Only nine towers went up under the program, and Kuwohi’s served as the prototype for two others. The structure sits on the National Register of Historic Places.

A 375-foot spiral ramp winds up to a circular observation platform, and when you reach the top, the Smokies open up in every direction around you.

On a clear day you can see more than 100 miles

The platform gives you a full 360-degree panorama.

On the clearest days, the views stretch more than 100 miles, though haze and air pollution typically cut that to around 20.

Cantilevered signs around the platform point out the peaks, ridges, and distant cities within range. Sunrise hits the eastern ridgelines in long horizontal light, and sunset pulls everything into silhouette.

Most people time one or the other. Both are worth the early alarm or the late drive up.

The trail is short, paved, and will still test your lungs

A half-mile paved trail connects the parking area to the tower.

Half a mile sounds easy until you hit the 13 percent grade and the 6,600-foot elevation working against you. Benches appear at intervals, and most people use them.

The trail doesn’t qualify as wheelchair accessible despite the pavement. Leave the pets and bikes at the car, as neither is allowed on the trail.

Give yourself 20 to 30 minutes up and a little less coming back down.

The trees here belong to a different world

The summit sits inside a Southern Appalachian spruce-fir forest, a forest type that exists only at the highest elevations in the Southeast.

It has more in common with the boreal woods of northern Canada than with the valleys 5,000 feet below. The cool, wet conditions make it function like a coniferous rainforest.

A non-native insect called the balsam woolly adelgid, introduced from Europe in the early 1900s, has killed many Fraser firs here.

Their pale trunks stand among the living trees, bare and upright, giving the upper forest an eerie quality that the mist only deepens.

Andrews Bald opens up below the summit

The Forney Ridge Trail starts near the Kuwohi parking area and drops 1.8 miles through spruce-fir forest to Andrews Bald, the highest grassy meadow in the park at 5,920 feet.

When the trees give way, you’re standing on open ground with Fontana Lake in the distance and the southern Smokies spread wide around you. In mid to late June, flame azaleas cover the bald in reds and oranges.

The full hike is 3.6 miles roundtrip, rated moderate, but the climb back earns that rating on the return.

Three major trails cross at the summit

The Appalachian Trail runs directly over Kuwohi, passing just north of the tower.

The western end of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, which runs all the way to North Carolina’s Outer Banks, begins at the summit. The Forney Creek Trail heads south toward Fontana Lake from here too.

In winter, when Kuwohi Road closes to vehicles, the only way up on foot is the 7.5-mile stretch of the Appalachian Trail from Newfound Gap. People do it. Snowshoes help.

The weather here runs by its own rules

Temperatures on Kuwohi run 10 to 20 degrees cooler than in the valleys below, and the mountain generates its own weather patterns. Clouds move through fast.

Fog drops visibility to yards. Rain arrives without warning.

This is the mist that gave the Smokies their name, and at 6,643 feet, you’re inside it as often as you’re above it.

An EPA air quality monitoring station on the summit ranks as the second-highest in eastern North America. The climate classification up here is humid continental, closer to Vermont than to Tennessee.

Black bears still keep this mountain

Black bears turn up regularly along Kuwohi Road and on the trail to the summit.

The mountain sits inside one of the largest protected black bear habitats in the eastern United States, and the Cherokee belief that the White Bear holds court here doesn’t feel far off when you see bear scat on the trail every hundred yards.

Dark-eyed juncos hop along the path. Red squirrels chatter in the firs. Saw-whet owls work the upper forest at night.

These are high-elevation species, and this is one of the few places in the South where you’ll find them.

The mountain closes three days a year for Cherokee schools

Three half-days a year, the park closes Kuwohi so predominantly Cherokee schools can visit without the crowds. Students hear from elders, Cherokee language speakers, and culture bearers at the summit.

The Kuwohi Connection Day, run by the Center for Native Health, brings Cherokee songs, dances, and storytelling to the mountain.

On clear days, you can see Kuwohi from the Qualla Boundary, the home of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina. The mountain they named is still in sight.

Now the name is back on the map.

Visit Kuwohi in Great Smoky Mountains National Park

You can reach Kuwohi from Gatlinburg, Tennessee, by driving 13 miles south on Newfound Gap Road, then turning onto Kuwohi Road for the final seven miles to the parking area.

From Cherokee, North Carolina, take US-441 north through the park to Newfound Gap, then follow Kuwohi Road. There is no entrance fee for Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Parking tags are required if you stay more than 15 minutes: $5 for a day pass, $15 for a week, or $40 for the year. Check the official website for road closures before you go, as Kuwohi Road closes in winter.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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