can anyone steer me in a good direction with this? Just got a house up there and am trying to get the lay of the land. would also want to figure out some good fly fishing spots that are close to that area. Thank you for any of your responses!

Closest to you would be Glenville Lake and it has some excellent smallmouth in it as well as good largemouth. Not too big a lake that you can't learn it in a day and just about fish the entire lake in a day. Gets really busy during the day in the summer time so I would suggest early morning or late afternoon trips. Since it isn't a big lake, it gets crowded.

Down the mountain towards Cullowhee there is Bear Lake and while it isn't a smallmouth mecca, it is a small lake without a lot of pressure and has good largemouth fishing. Bear Lake can be a lot of fun and has some big largemouth!

On down the road in Bryson City, you have Fontana Lake. While you won't catch trophy smallmouths (my best there is 5 lbs) you can catch a lot of numbers there and average size run from 1.5 lbs to 2.5 lbs. It also has a ton of spots now and largemouth. Fairly big lake for these parts but not hard to navigate around and learn.

As far as fly fishing, not much help there. I know there are alot of trout streams and alot of fly fisherman, but I never got into it.

Anytime you would like to go out, shoot me an IM here and I would be glad to take you out to any of the above lakes and show you around.