COCKE COUNTY, Tenn. — Trip Advisor recently named Smoky Mountain Outdoors whitewater rafting on the Pigeon River one of the top 10 experiences in the United States, and rafting companies in Cocke County are seeing more visitors than in years past.
More people coming to the mountains to raft is a huge splash for Cocke County as a whole.
The Pigeon River takes families on a "just right" rushing ride, according to Daniel Sutton, the CEO of Big Bear rafting in Cocke County.
"It's definitely not boring, but there's no death traps under the water, so we can basically take anyone," Sutton explained.
Big Bear rafting is one of the dozen rafting companies in Hartford. They've been around for seven years and have seen numbers on the Pigeon go up and down much like water levels.
"We've been seeing ours have been gradually going up," Sutton noted. "I've seen river use... it's peaks and valleys. It'll frequent about 30,000 users maybe."
But early numbers from the Cocke County Clerk's office predict this rafting season is off to a good start.
In 2016, the county had 202,871 paying customers on the water... which meant over 400,000 dollars coming in. The number of visitors dropped in 2017 by over 30,000 to 168,934.
But for the past two years, numbers have been trending up.
"I think we are the number one tourism draw here so they get some money off us and it gets something for Cocke County to get the name out there," Sutton said.
But everything really depends on Mother Nature and gas prices.
"This past couple of weeks it's rained about every day so we saw a little dip in numbers then, but the bottom line is if it's 90 degrees outside and it's sunny people wanna go rafting and if it's 70 degrees and raining they probably don't wanna go," Sutton explained.
Big Bear assured they'll go along with the ebbs and flows.
"We hear a lot that this is the highlight of the vacation," Sutton said. "So even though they've got all this cool stuff over here, we still provide one of the best experiences in East Tennessee."
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