Abandoned Ghost Town | Hidden In The Smoky Mountains (Revitalization)

[Music] as you can see right here are the two stone pillars set on each side of the staircase they had the arch over it it was right up there where the hotel once stood we're gonna walk up here and see what remains of the old wonderland hotel let's look at this old stone here i love that a lot of this is still intact it's crazy got these walls here as you can see in a lot of old pictures of this place as i turn around you'll see down the old staircase check this out as soon as you get to the top of the hill you find an old fountain check that out there's several pictures of this when it was actually operable when it was being used you see water spraying up the middle there welcome everyone it is john here and today's adventure brings us to the great smoky mountains national park i wanted to revisit a location that i've been to a couple years ago and a few times since but not in depth like i'm doing today i've returned to elkmont and i'm going to check out the where the old wonderland hotel used to be as well as a lot of the old houses and of course daisy row or daisy town excuse me and i want to just kind of show you some updates of this place and revisit some of these locations i've been to it's changed quite a bit so let's get into it and check this place out so i just came up the stairs and come up this trail and this is where the old hotel stood as you can see here is a set of stairs that led up into a side entrance you even got the old stone path and over here is the old annex like the uh kinda like the ballroom and other hotel rooms was over here you see this was the fireplace into the grand ballroom that was that was here now there's some old footage of this place now when i came here the first time you can see all this overgrowth here was not there and there was a lot of remnants from the fire the fire had just happened and this place had just burnt really close to when we came here you can see now you can hardly tell if it weren't for this fireplace and this great chimney here you wouldn't be able to tell there was ever a building here but this they would have you know i'm standing like right in the middle of where the ballroom was of the wonderland hotel and as we go this way see if there's any relics they might have cleaned it up extra well you can see this fresh grass you can see a little charring on the ground it's not a whole lot left of what was here but you can kind of see a fine line of the way the grass is growing all this was where the fire happened this was a structure they've been here for many many years and is now gone it is quite peaceful up here today as we look back you can see the fireplace there there's the stairs i showed you earlier that led into the actual hotel now i'm standing currently where the hotel stood and as we move over you can see here i don't know if this was a fireplace or what but there's a lot of brick piled up right here that was from the hotel itself i'm going to continue on this way this place looks a lot different than the last time there used to be a bunch of houses down through here that we're in a lot of disrepair but i believe they're all gone now we're gonna go find out over here is like a little concrete area you can see through the trees there and then out here here's the old road that you used to drive up here and you would park and this is where all the hotel was probably get a better view over here now back myself as far up as i could to the tree line here this was as you see in the photograph the old photograph that was the hotel if you look the tallest tree there this one right here is actually the tree small tree you see in the middle of that turnabout that's crazy so i'm gonna walk down this trail where a lot of the old houses used to be um i heard they had tore them all down but i was going to take a little walk through here i hear thunder so i'm going to try to make this brief and i already see one of the fireplaces over here of one of the houses i had visited the last time i was here so show you guys around here a little bit so you see his fireplace here i actually had visited this house when it was still standing if you turn and look there was a house up here as well that is now gone there were a few houses down the way here that have since been removed but we're going to head down and take a look at a couple other things on the bottom part of that month so just a brief history if you're not familiar with this town and the history of outmod i'm just going to give you a brief rundown this was originally a logging community back in the 1800s they had a railroad through here and everything that would haul in the logs haul them out or come in and haul the logs out so this town once the national park was formed of course the logging industry was gone at that point you couldn't walk here anymore all the houses became essentially vacation spots they were the government leased all the housing out to people to families that lived here they said well we'll give you a lease and you can pass it down to your family you can't own it but you can come here and stay for vacation what not so they were rented out to people the people don't stay here and then they built this hotel the wonderland hotel and in 1992 the government the national park canceled the lease they said no more we're not gonna do the lease anymore so all these houses were just essentially left here to rot now most of them did but a small portion of this town was saved and is being revitalized now we're going to check that out later but first there's a couple spots i want to show you before we get to daisy town now i'm up here at what is known as the spence cabin really awesome cottage style this one's not accessible because i actually use it for vents and such but still it's pretty big too like it's long but i love that stone work right there in the front so a little admission so the fir what you've seen so far before me arriving here was actually filmed a little over a month ago um they were doing the firefly event here then so it was just so crowded i couldn't find anywhere park i just had to leave that day so i've come back today to kind of revisit and capture the rest of this video for you guys and we'll continue on so there's a nice little sign here it talks about the spins cabin is built in 1928. it's pretty bad we'll walk around the backside here and catch a little view of it oh yeah you get a good idea of its size back here look at all this beautiful forest i wish i could take a look inside and this thing's been here for nearly a hundred years just think about that that is crazy there's definitely some old window panes there beautiful river i'm on this side of the house here that's checking out this awesome patio when i look down here and thought i saw a helicopter pad for a second but i got to check this out this looks amazing i built this patio right here on the river this is so awesome look at that beautiful i love the old stone work along this old driveway here so i'm over here in the old millionaires row area and there's a foundation here and i'm looking for this bridge and i think i see it up ahead so we're gonna go check that out i actually have never been to the bridge yeah there it is that's so cool i took the long way to it but nevertheless we made it and i am in a thicket of briars and of course i've got my short pants on they call this the troll bridge so glad i finally got a chance to come back here and see it that's so cool that's just so neat i'm gonna walk across it because it appears that you still can okay this is just beautiful back here guys i love this place here we go it holds me it did that's good see the rebarb siding so i can't park right there and this actually leads over to the cabin i showed y'all amigo let's go back here and check out that foundation better looking at the back side of the entry steps to this once cabin you can see it was pretty grand look at this fireplace isn't that crazy the floor used to be here yeah that is nuts it's like four feet up they actually had a second fireplace back there i'm thinking that was for cooking probably that's probably the kitchen area yeah and look still got the old tile the old heat brick i think that's what that is it hold heat for a lot longer it even still has the stone mantel that's crazy let's check this one out back here this is actually the chimney oh yeah it is it's off of that one yeah [Applause] yeah this would have been where they probably cooked dinner i don't know what time frame these were built i know the millionaires row was built towards like i want to say 20s yeah you know the 10 10s or the twenties a lot of the old old buildings from when it was a logging town are been gone for a long time this is cool man imagine how awesome i've been to be able to have a lease here and come stay in somewhere like this that has been something it's time creek right in the front yard yeah so this is cool i'm so glad i got to come here and check out this bridge i always want to say i ever exactly knew where it was at um i knew i had to come over here i knew the vicinity of it but i'm glad josh and i were able to find it now i want to show you the rest of what exists here in elkmont um the good news is is the the daisy row they call it a lot of those cabins have been renovated and are looking pretty spiffy so we're gonna go check that out we're gonna go through here first there's a familiar sight over here i want to go revisit so let's do that one thing josh was pointing out it's the stonework you don't see that much anymore but it's beautiful that's one of my favorite things about this town is all the they used they repurposed the riverbed rocks river rocks to make their walls and build their fireplaces like that one back there if you remember it's from way back first time ever filmed here i came here one day and walked back through here i saw some interesting stuff and there used to be a cabin over here that i visited then that is now gone we'll go back and see what that place looks like a couple of remnants there i want to kind of compare to then to now see what it looks like all of these walls so cool so here where this concrete is now back in 2017 or 16 rather when i was here there was a cabin here let's sit oh wait a minute yeah and it sit right here now one thing in particular is this boulder the house you can see how close it was to this boulder and you can even see in the video at one point heather very cutely squeezes between the boulder and the house and makes her a little cute sound but yeah it used to sit right here there's even a piano in the basement of it and it is gone they tore it down it and that surprises me because it was still in pretty good shape i mean it wasn't in bad shape at all yeah i turned my camera around like this you see heather squeezing right here this little structure here was sparked a lot of conversation in my original video here i wasn't sure what it was and a lot of you had ideas that some sort of oven like used to either heat down metal or you know something i mean i had a lot of people tell me about it it's a pretty cool little structure back here and you see that's some old block old style cinder block it's actually you still see the rocks and stuff in it it's been here for quite a while this is probably with the original town i don't know what is used for exactly but feel free to comment down below and let me know i'm just standing here admiring this lovely creek and just looking at how steep this mountain goes up i mean that is some steep dense forest right there you imagine trying to make your way up to that ridge that would be a daunting feat i've climbed hills like that before now over here you can see it's straight up that's almost impossible highly dangerous too man you never know what kind of cave or anything's on the side of this that's crazy so it was walking up the hill here and there's a cemetery i actually hadn't been to before and i looked up the hill and i see this big fence and there's something in here i don't know what it is but try to get you a good view of it here if you zoom in you see there's big old school pipes sticking out of the ground and it's like a purposely built mound so i'm gonna walk around the fence and see if i can see it from a higher view just to see what it is curiosity's getting to me on this one check out this looks like quartz that's pretty cool still making my way up here looks pretty dense right here i'm gonna try to get up high enough to see if that's like a big pit i think it might have been like the town's water source at one point i'm not sure we'll find out though either way okay so this is becoming more and more of a mystery look at this it's a vault there's two hatches right there i mean this very much looks like a uh well you call it a uh a bunker i don't know what these pipes are for but damn this is crazy if any y'all know what this is maybe you work for national park please comment down below and let me know because this is crazy huh the fence is fairly new but whatever is in there there's electricity running into it if you look right there you see electrical lb going into it i don't know what happened to josh he was walking around this side and i do not see him just up here by the campground is a cemetery i did not even know it was up here crazy if you look at that headstone it's important or if that's relation it's hubert margaret i'll do some research if that's any relation to to dolly and we got blanche parton and rex william part and i don't know if this is related to dolly or not but i'm real curious to know if they are it's like a little family section right here if you look way back there teaster there's actually an area known as teaster lane and i think that's etched that area is etched on that headstone next to where it looks named for where's valley it's pretty cool over in the corner here is this little pile of rocks with a cross i just can't help but wonder if someone buried maybe a family pet here or something returning look it's just over here in the corner looking down daisy row which we'll go get to in a moment up here it's an old cabin that still stands at least it stood last year and go check that out real quick there's a lot of remnants of old homesteads up there as well now through here was a lot of cabins that are now going you can see these old chimneys and stuff all over the place i hope the one's still standing up here it's not too much farther ahead so we got this dumpster it's a decent little hike up here there is a sign it tells nothing about this house but you can see they've actually boarded this up now where you can't go inside i'm guessing it got too dangerous but i've actually been inside of it i'll link the video where i was up here last time it went in looks like somebody's busted the windows out and stuff probably vandalized it that's it friggin idiots man that's a problem we got here in the park is people are coming in destroying everything this is a cool house at least go pick you in the window yeah look at this look at this all the windows have been busted out freaking jerks man and these are not this is old glass this is all poured glass yeah you can see the waves in it the waves in it and the dipples yeah somebody's come up here and just vandalize this place that's so sad yeah you see the floor is collapsing too yeah it's not in very good shape i know i didn't go anywhere past the living room here yeah this is the last cabin up through here i don't know why if they wanted to save it or what all right it is now boarded up it's sad yeah i wanted to investigate this cabin and you can see all that busted glass right there freaking hooligans up here just destroying stuff no regard for anything there's like writing on the walls and stuff yeah it's going to get to the point bro where all these buildings we can go to they're all going to be closed off because people keep riding on the walls and busting windows we need to preserve history you know hey you got people that don't care they just don't care oh well so now we're here on day zero you see some of these are closed off because they're actually restoring all of these it's really awesome that they're doing that we'll check out what we can of the ones they've restored you see this is one of my favorite ones here they are remodeling it this one's been restored i have not been in it since they restored it and so is this one so we're gonna check these out i've been in that one since i restored it and a couple of those down there all right let's get here and check this place out all right guys we're gonna check this cabin out first i have not been in here since they've restored this [Music] oh wow they did a good job the floors are still uneven they're uneven but they feel a little more solid they do feel they put extra support under this yeah here's the kitchen i remember this kitchen man had all kinds of old stuff in it wow check it out sink out oh look there's a room back here look at that little laundry that's so cool check out this porch they've redone the porch on the back here i don't even think this they had a porch on it last time i was here so neat nope the work continues heck yeah this is awesome let's we're in the front bedroom with this oh yeah they've remodeled the bathroom check it out that's cool you can't get into it which is good because people would vandalize it obviously this one last thing i was here was under construction that's what i'll leave down here so it's so awesome that they've restored these look at the linoleum floor in here wow holy cow this keeps going i don't think i've ever been back here i was always too nervous on the floor a bedroom over here cuts all the way through the kitchen which we'll go to in a moment and then you got is that turlet look at this floor back here they redone wow holy moly this is great you can smell the fish on the floor one point had a view of the river it's a little overgrown back there now that's what i need god i love spitting out in here that floor though looks so good they really did a good job restoring that let's go this way floor is a little soft through here but i think it's okay really awesome kitchen and where the refrigerator stood do that really used to be a cook stove run out that's so cool i don't know if y'all can tell it and those windows get closer you can tell this is old poured glass i don't think you can tell in the camera it's pretty awesome all right so we all know about this little cabin here this is the gift to a young girl but josh informed me about something if it's still here [Music] yeah i never noticed a little yeah a little puppy prints and they said her handprints was here i don't know there looks like a old handprint right there yep they're barely visible yeah it's the little girl's handprints that was in here now this is one i was excited about they really did a good job they pretty much tore this down and rebuilt it and one of the craziest things i ever saw was stand on that porch of that blue house right there and i looked over and i saw a face peering out that window at me you know it's funny you say that because when i came here to investigate like three four years ago there was a face up in that top window staring at me and we tried to see inside of there but it was all closed off so yeah i did i saw that right before they closed it off and i actually went in there and no one was in there really yeah i've never been in there it's i have been in since they remodeled it but i'm about to go in now because it's open oh wow yeah they really they really did a good job on this look at that wow look at the rafters this is so great it was in this room here i saw a face looking out this window at oh that was one of the creepiest things i've ever seen over here looks like they left this the way it was yeah so this here when i was here first time every part of the cabin looked like this yeah it just had wood chunks stuck in and dude the floors were so bad then really yeah but i came in i had to walk in that room make sure nobody was in this house they did a really good job restoring this there this view back in here off this porch so awesome so glad they restored it that is going to do it for this video thank you guys for watching i hope you enjoyed please like share subscribe bring that notification about all that good stuff check out my patreon don't forget to hit the join button to see bonus content i'm really glad they're restoring us we definitely need to come back and investigate since they've been doing what construction that usually stirs up activity guys i thank you for watching don't forget to stay spooky my friends [Music] you

Channel: Exploration Unknown

Views: 72,694

Keywords: exploration unknown, expedition unknown, jon turner, ghost adventures, ghost hunters, travel channel, trvl channel, ghost caught on camera, full body apparition, taps, evp, real ghost, paranormal investigating, paranormal activity, crypto zoology, finding bigfoot, ufo hunters, are aliens real, ancient aliens

Id: nL8g1G9M_X4

Length: 34min 7sec (2047 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 27 2021