A little surprise today as the snow report for January 5th 2012 comes from the Smokey Mountains, Gatlinburg, Tennessee. To be honest, we didn’t know too much about the area, so thought it was an opportune time to let you know a little more about it as well.

Rated second behind Breckenridge in Trip Advisor’s list of the “Top 10 Winter Ski Vacation Rental Destinations in the U.S.”, this area really is a bit of a hidden gem and boasts a four season resort with amusement park and ski hill.

Unfortunately though, snow this season has been hard to come by in both the natural and man made varieties. The resort even getting open at all is thanks to the trail crew and mountain operations team.

The forecast is for temperatures to rise and sunshine to dominate, though this will make it tough to make more snow and there is no natural snow in the immediate forecast either.

A huge thanks to another first time snow reporter Andy Hopper for this report! Andy is currently on vacation in the Gatlinburg area, though was wonderful enough to let us know what conditions were like there.

Remember to click the facebook “like” button for Snow Report TV and we’ll see you on the mountain, maybe even at Ober Gatlinburg, Tennessee!