Visit Wilderness

Search for a wilderness as the destination for your next outdoor adventure.

Bob Marshall Wilderness Area, Minnesota

Why Visit Wilderness?

While wilderness can be appreciated from afar—through online content, television, or books—nothing compares to experiencing it firsthand. Activities like camping, hiking, or hunting allow you to fully enjoy the recreational, ecological, spiritual, and health benefits that wilderness areas offer. These areas provide “outstanding opportunities for solitude or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation,” chances to observe wildlife, moments to renew and refresh, and the physical benefits of outdoor exercise. In many wilderness areas, you can even bring your well-behaved dog.

Learn more about the diverse ways in which we benefit from wilderness and threats wilderness areas face today.

To the early settlers in South Carolina, the Cherokee Indians lived "over the hills" in eastern Tennessee. People today refer to the region, which includes the southern portion of Cherokee National Forest, as Tennessee Overhill Country. Small Gee Creek Wilderness marks the forest's western border, with the long rise of Starr Mountain to the west and north and Chestnut Mountain to the south.

South-flowing Poplar Springs Branch and Gee Creek drain the Wilderness. From a distance, the two waterways appear to cut a V in the otherwise continuous face of the mountains where the drainage lies. Peaceful trails follow Poplar Springs Branch and Gee Creek through hollows dense with hemlock, buckeye, white pine, beech, and rhododendron. Both creeks teem with native trout, and the fishing can be excellent.

Loggers once devastated the forest, but that was 80 years ago. Lush trees have long since returned, even though some have had to contend with old mining sites (one of which you can still see on Gee Creek) and other abandoned relics of the past.

The semiprimitive Gee Creek Trail starts at a parking lot outside the southwestern corner and follows an old forest road about one-half mile before entering the Wilderness to trace the creek for a total of approximately two miles to a dead end. This is a place where you'll feel isolated from the rest of the world and as immersed in wildness as you can get in Tennessee.

The trail branches at the confluence of Poplar Springs Branch to go a short distance up Gee Creek and a long distance up the branch. The terrain steepens in the northern section.

The Chestnut Mountain Trail follows the slopes of Chestnut Mountain in the south and east for 5.6 miles and is used primarily by horseback riders. The total trail equals about eight miles.

Leave No Trace

How to follow the seven standard Leave No Trace principles differs in different parts of the country (desert vs. Rocky Mountains). Click on any of the principles listed below to learn more about how they apply in the Gee Creek Wilderness.

Plan Ahead and Prepare
Travel and Camp on Durable Surfaces
Dispose of Waste Properly
Leave What You Find
Minimize Campfire Impacts
Respect Wildlife
Be Considerate of Other Visitors

For more information on Leave No Trace, Visit the Leave No Trace, Inc. website.

Location

Maps

Digital and paper maps are critical tools for wilderness visitors. Online maps can help you plan and prepare for your visit ahead of time. You can also carry digital maps with you on your GPS unit or other handheld GPS device. Having a paper map with you in the backcountry, as well as solid orienteering skills, however, ensures that you can still route-find in the event that your electronic device fails.

Online Maps

Interactive Map of the Gee Creek Wilderness
FS Topographic Map
Google Earth

Tennessee Wildernesses

Printed Maps

Fetching MyTopo from Database

USGS Store

Rules & Regulations

Motorized equipment and equipment used for mechanical transport is generally prohibited in all wilderness areas. This includes the use of motor vehicles, motorboats, motorized equipment, bicycles, hang gliders, wagons, carts, portage wheels, and the landing of aircraft including helicopters.

Wilderness-Specific Regulations

Learn more about why regulations may be necessary in wilderness.

Contacts

Applicable Wilderness Law(s)

Public Law 93-622

Date: January 3, 1975
Acreage: 2,570 acres

(Known as the Eastern Wilderness Areas Act) - Public law 93-622 (1/3/1975) To further the purposes of the Wilderness Act by designating certain acquired lands for inclusion in the National Wilderness Preservation System, to provide for study of certain additional lands for such inclusion, and for other purposes

For more information (To download or see all affected wilderness areas) visit our law library for 93-622 or special provisions for 93-622 or legislative history for 93-622.

Want to Volunteer for Wilderness?

People who volunteer their time to steward our wilderness areas are an essential part of wilderness management. Contact the following groups to inquire about volunteer opportunities. Groups are listed alphabetically by the state(s) in which the wilderness is located.