Roanoke Rapids Herald

THURSDAY, JUNE 6th, 1946

Travel Tips And Topics

By BILL WRIGHT Carolina Motor Club Travel Editor

If you're determined to venture out of the State for this summer's vacation, the chances are that you will be attracted to one or more of the great national parks. Here again accommodation is the big question.

Newton B. Drury, director of the National Park Service, has announced that the parks will be all facilities and accommodations available this summer for the first time since 1942. A record breaking crowd is expected but a cautionary note, full use of the park facilities is dependent upon the completion of extensive rehabilitation work. In some instances old buildings deteriorated will suffice. Hence, it may be wise not to depend on finding the hotel you select in top condition.

Remember too that the concession facilities have not been expanded during the war, and replacements of such supplies as linens, furniture, and tableware has been a virtual impossibility. Governmental housing restriction will prevent expansion of existing accommodations and inadequate manpower and material will further hamstring efforts to take care of the excessive crowd expected the parks this summer.

The housing situation is likely to be especially critical in Shenandoah, Yellowstone, Crater Lake spots are so remotely located that tourists failing to secure accommodations in them will have little chance of finding a suitable place to stay within reasonable distance. Unless reservations have been made and confirmed well in advance, tourists should by all means take care of this detail early in the day, before their sight-seeing.

Yellowstone, incidentally, opened to motorists this year on May 1, but only informal accommodations will prevail until June 20, when hotels and lodges will be opened.

On the whole, accommodations will be more plentiful in the parks which remain open through the year, such as North Carolina's Great Smoky Mountains, Arkansas Hot Springs National Park, Virginia's Colonial National Historic Park, New Mexico's Carlsbad Caverns Maine's Acadia National Park, Washington's Mount Rainier, and California's Yosemite.

Closest to home, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park will doubtless prove most popular to Carolinians, The Opening of a large recreational center at nearby Fontana Dam, scheduled for some time in June. will be an added incentive to see the Smokies: and the Qualla Reservation, adjoining the park, fits into the vacation pattern.

Most convenient accommodations Government House

for visitors to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park are at the Tennessee entrance, in Gatlinburg. On the North Carolina side Bryson City, Waynesville, City. Waynesville, Balsam, Robbinsville, Sylva, and Tapoco, afford excellent food and lodgings, are all near enough to the park to afford convenient access by automobile Cherokee, the picturesque Indian village at the North Carolina entrance, afford several acceptable tourist courts; and the Indians are planning a deluxe tourist villa of their own, but this project is not likely to be realized in time for the 1946 summer trade.

In the national parks, as practically everywhere else that people will go during the 1946 summer season, success of the tourist's long-awaited vacation will greatly depend on his ability to find a suitable place to sleep and eat.

The prudent vacationist will have made reservations well in advance and have a confirmation in his pocket before he sets out.