Backcountry buzz
Bee Creek Off-Road Adventures kicks up some mud
It might be cliche, but Pikeville’s Travis Smith likes to say he’s living proof of the old adage “find a job you love, and you’ll never work a day in your life.”
A lifelong trail-riding enthusiast, Travis got his first dirt bike at the age of 5. In recent years he graduated to four-wheelers and the current rage, side-by-side all-terrain vehicles. Early last year, Travis, an electrician by trade, took a leap of faith with the support of his wife, Misty, turning his passion into a family business, Bee Creek Off-Road Adventures.
Utilizing his small fleet of ATVs, Travis offers guided tours of the local countryside as well as around the hidden beauty of nearby Fall Creek Falls State Park and Bledsoe State Forest. “People come from all over, a lot from Ohio and Florida for some reason. I had a couple from Hawaii last year. Of course, we get a lot of people from Nashville, Knoxville and Chattanooga,” he says. “They get to see an area they don’t normally get to see.”
Choose your own adventure
Bee Creek Off-Road Adventures operates out of the family farmhouse on Bob Sapp Road where Misty grew up, just 15 minutes north of Pikeville and 15 minutes east of Fall Creek Falls. With Travis serving as their tour guide, customers have a choice of three different route options — the Thrill Seeker Tour, the Bee Creek Tour and the Backroads & Farms Tour.
Each has its own degree of difficulty and intensity. Tours run from three to four hours and are offered Wednesday through Sunday each week.
Like its name implies, the Thrill Seeker Tour is the most intense option and is a ride-along-only tour with Travis at the wheel of the company’s lone four-seat ATV. Winding through rugged terrain and curvy trails, the Thrill Seeker tour is not for the faint of heart. It involves rock crawling, rut navigating and a nerve-wracking bluff-side descent into a hidden hollow, complete with a winding creek under the wooded canopy.
The Bee Creek Tour is the most popular offering and allows customers 18 and older with a valid driver’s license to drive with their party in either the four-seat ATV or one of the company’s two-seat ATVs behind Travis in the lead vehicle. The tour offers a wide variety of experiences, from splashing through several water crossings on trails deep in the Bledsoe State Forest, to crossing a submerged bridge, climbs to several overlooks high above Bee Creek and a pass by a historic sawmill. Customers on the Bee Creek Tour are known to spot wild hogs, deer, turkey and armadillos along the way.
The Backroads & Farms Tour takes customers along some of the most scenic East Tennessee backcountry roads. It passes by Bickerstaff Lake, travels along the old CC Road and loops through the local Mennonite community with a yarn shop, nurseries and a general store featuring fresh baked goods.
A family business
Travis grew up not far down the road in Trenton, Georgia, and moved to the Pikeville area with Misty shortly after they were married 13 years ago. He’s thrilled about turning his favorite hobby into a business, now in its second season. “I’ve always loved motorsports and being outside in the woods, so if I can do that for a living, that is a blessing,” he says. “It’s growing pretty well, so we’re headed in the right direction.”
While Travis focuses on equipment maintenance and upkeep and his responsibilities as tour guide, Misty heads up the sales and marketing effort outside her full-time job as a dental hygienist in Pikeville. She designed and maintains the company’s website. She also keeps Bee Creek Off-Road Adventures’ social media channels fresh and up to date with an ongoing flow of photos and videos of Travis and his customers enjoying their experiences.
The fast, reliable internet service from BTC Fiber has made it all possible, Misty says. “We got BTC Fiber up here about the time we were launching the business, and that has been a tremendous boost in designing the website and actually running the business from here,” Misty says. “Everything actually happens totally online until the customers get here. We rely on our Wi-Fi and fiber to communicate with our customers and serve them the way they need to be served. It’s all about photos and videos when it comes to social media. And we even benefit from the high-speed internet when it comes to sending customers videos and photos from their tour. I don’t know how we could do everything we need to do without it.”