Oct 20, 2020

tennessee mushrooms

My first experience exploring American mountains became my first experience becoming a mushroom photographer.

From the end of August to early September of 2020, I went on a Girl's Weekend trip to the Smokey Mountains in Tennessee. My mom, my aunt, my two cousins and I rented a cabin overlooking a small part of the Smokey Mountains nearby Cades Cove / Gatlinburg for an extended weekend. Our hopes were to escape COVID issues in the wilderness.

We planned one day to go see the town, another day to hike the Mount Le Conte trail, another day for going rafting, and more in-between. What we didn't realize was that the timing of our trip would coincide mushroom season in the area!

When we arrived to our little home and wanted to stretch our legs after driving about 10 hours, we realized that our neighborhood was more-or-less overrun with mushrooms. Immediately, this energy surged within us and we became charged mushroom hunters!

We were out enjoying beers and wine while trespassing on our temporary neighbors' properties and scaling the treacherous terrain. Our efforts proved fruitful, and we continued our party on our deck to clean our finds!

The cleaning process involved first rinsing the mushrooms and removing the roots and imperfections with knives and paper towels. Then, we would place them on baking sheets and bake them at a very low heat to dry out the fungi.

We found out later that most of the mushrooms didn't make it... But it didn't stop us looking back at this memory with fondness~!

Our next mushroom experience was while going out on a scenic drive nearby our area. A local antique shop owner recommended that we go and check it out, and she went on to say that this scenic drive is one of the top scenic drives of the whole US. Whether this is true or not, we don't know. What we did know was that everyone was still on their mushroom high and went crazy once more shrooms appeared on the mountain tops!

After returning back to our cabin after a long day out in downtown Gatlinburg, I wanted to go explore our area a little at night. I was a bit spooked because of the possible critters I could encounter while out there, but the critters I did find were so cute with the night-mushroom scene.

On the third day, we planned a whole day of hiking up to Mount Le Conte in the Smokey Mountains National Park. Now this was one of the hardest physical tests I've experienced... Mt. Le Conte is a 5.5 mile hike up to the peak and my quarantine-body was not prepared to endure this venture. My camera, however, had a heyday.

The sheer abundance in fungi-variety is what helped my psyche stay motivated and willing to make it to the top. Every twist and turn contained at least one little mushroom thriving after Hurricane Laura's refreshing rains. I will include all the rest of the photos below as full length pictures to fully showcase each personality properly.

I hope you enjoy~!

This mushroom was such a great model ^^

Thank you for taking the time out of looking at my fun(gi) photos~! I am lowkey proud of my work, but mostly because I never really took the time to stage and tell a cute story with photography.

Below are some extra photos that I felt deserved a little recognition as well. Thanks once more for reading!