Balsam Mountain Campground Is Closed in Great Smoky Mountains

If you're planning a trip to the Smokies, there's one thing worth noting before you lock in your itinerary. Balsam Mountain Campground is currently closed to the public until further notice. The park hasn't announced a reopening date, so we're staying cautious: treat the site as unavailable until things change.

Balsam Mountain isn't your average campground. Sitting at nearly 5,250 feet, it's the highest in the park, and also one of the quietest, well away from the crowds in the busier areas. People come here for the cool air in the heart of summer and for a spruce-fir forest that feels nothing like the rest of the region. So its closure isn't a small thing if you were hoping to pitch a tent up there.

If Balsam Mountain was part of your plans, line up a backup. The park has other campgrounds spread across its land, and reservations are still the rule for most of them in peak season. Check availability before you hit the road, because driving all the way up the mountain only to find the gates shut would waste a travel day. We'd also suggest confirming road conditions in the area, since they're often at the mercy of mountain weather.

Closures like this are common in a park this big, and it's better to plan around them than to find out on-site. To build an itinerary that holds up despite these surprises, we've pulled together the essentials in the Great Smoky Mountains park guide: the areas worth prioritizing, where to stay, and the best times to visit.

Bottom line: skip Balsam Mountain for now and shift to another campground in the park. We'll update this post as soon as a reopening is announced. In the meantime, the rest of the park is still wide open, and there's no shortage of great hiking.