Between the Lakes

Land Between the Lakes (LBL) National Recreation Area is 170,000 acres of camping, fishing, boating, hunting, hiking, biking, ATV-riding, bison-and-antelope-and-bird-watching and just about every other outdoorsy activity you can think of.  Plus a planetarium. 

LBL runs about 45 miles between Lake Kentucky and Lake Barkley, which were were created when the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) dammed the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers for hydroelectric power and flood control.  The TVA also built a canal to connect the two lakes, making LBL a large inland peninsula.  The rivers -- and now the lakes -- flow north, empty into the Ohio River, and run through both Kentucky and Tennessee.

Before LBL, this area was known as the Land Between the Rivers and was home to over 4,000 homes and small businesses.   At the visitors center, we read an account of how the land was acquired.  It included this paragraph:

“They came through with their spyglasses and their measuring rods and marked it off all up and down the cove. On rocks and trees.  On barns and corn cribs.  Three hundred and eighty-seven.  Three hundred-eighty-seven.”

After the dams were built, everything up to that 387 feet was under water.  If your land was not underwater, you still had to move for the creation of the park. 

Before that, Land between the Rivers was the home of the Cherokee Indians, who were forced to move to Oklahoma during the Trail of Tears.

Sad beginnings for a beautiful park. 

We’re staying at Hillman Ferry Campground at the north end of LBL.  Hillman has hundreds of campsites but keeps a few dozen for people who just show up; since we got here on Thursday ahead of the weekend crowd, we got one of those spots near the water. There are two other developed campgrounds, plus primitive camping areas.

Yesterday (Friday) we took a 5-mile hike dotted with historical signs. (Well, in all honesty, about a mile of the hike included an extra trip to and  from our rig after the ranger told us to spray down with tick spray.) Most signs point out remnants of homes and businesses abandoned when the TVA built dams or the park was created.  Here, Jim and Coop look at what’s left of the home of Louis Vogle. Vogle's ancestors started the Star Lime Works which produced high quality lime. Louis Vogle became the first postmaster of the Star Lime Works post office in 1872. 

There are also 240 small family cemeteries throughout LBL National Recreation Area, including this one belonging to the Bohanon family.  Julian Bohanon operated a ferry across the Tennessee River before the dam was built.