On our recent trip to the Smokies for hiking, we went a day early. We walked around the shops in Gatlinburg, then drove over to the Boyd's Bear Factory in Pigeon Forge. Since last Christmas, I have a collection of Boyd's Bears, so we went to see what was new at the factory. We meandered through the 3 levels in the huge building, I was halfway looking for a 'hiker' bear, but didn't find one. I did find Quackers:
"Hi! I'm Quackers. Psst!! I'm a Master of Disguise. If you don't recognize me, that's because all of us "Masters" are pretending to be something else. What can I say? It's an identity crisis."
More and more we noticed the discrete signs of 50% off. At first we thought they were just clearing out stuff before putting up the Christmas decorations. When checking out, we asked the clerk about the sale signs, and it seems the store is closing. In this tourist-driven area, it is not unusual to see places come and go, I wonder what will be in this big building on our next trip?
