Road Trip 2012 - Day 5

Thursday, April 19th - Knoxville, TN to Asheville, NC

We both woke at around 7:45 a.m. after a hard sleep. Vacation is work, don't you know! While I was prepping for the day, The Husband so kindly fetched a plate of breakfast for me from the buffet. I ate in the room, while we both were on-line.

With the odometer reading 35,885, we left the hotel at 10:10 a.m. and headed toward Asheville, NC.

We made a quick stop at Memory Lane Antique Mall in Sevierville, TN. Oh my.

If you are a serious collector of specific patterns of crystal, china, pottery, etc., this is the place for you.  It is stuffed to the rafters with wonderful items. For example, this is a table of linens in one booth:

And this is a cabinet full of thimbles. Just thimbles.

If you are ever in the area and are a collector, this mall is well worth a stop. It's a bit pricey, but for a true collector what's a little money?

We drove The Great Smoky Mountains Parkway, through Sevierville, Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg. Think Branson on steriods x 3. Overwhelming! Nerve wracking! Busy! We could only imagine what it would be like in the height of the summer season. CRAH ZY!

Funny thing, we stopped at the last traffic light in Gatlinburg and when we crossed the intersection we were immediately in the calm, cool Great Smoky Mountains National Park. A world away from the commercial, tourist scene.

We stopped at the visitor's center, stamped our NPS Passport, chatted with a park employee who gave us a short hike recommendation and departed with a trusty map.

We were told the hike to Laurel Canyon Waterfalls was 1.3 miles, paved and flat. Okay. We can do that.

People who live in Tennessee have a very different definition of flat than people who live in Oklahoma. Does this look flat to you? It's not. It's an insidious slope upwards.

At this point, I told The Husband to go on without me. He said "No, you can do it." I did, but it took us a while.

Can we say "out of shape?" At least no one passed us on the way up the trail!

About 2/10ths of a mile from the falls, the grade changed to downhill. At this point, I called "Bullsh*t!"

Bullsh*t re-enactment

I can't walk uphill to the falls and then downhill to the falls and then be expected to walk uphill again to go downhill, can I?

I did. And, I made it.
    

We stayed for a while and took photos. Of course, we stayed for a while! I wasn't leaving until I was good and ready!

Here I am after leaving the falls and hiking the 2/10ths of a mile uphill to get to the downhill slope for the rest of the trail. Thumbs up!

On my way down the trail, I met a girl struggling up the trail. I told her I had been her just the hour before and to not give up, she could do it! That's me, motivational speeches at the drop of the hat.

We got to the bottom of the trail, finally. Hike accomplished. Whoo Hoo!

We continued the long and winding drive through the park. We saw a couple of wild turkeys. We saw a lot of beautiful scenery. Unfortunately, we also saw a lot of dying trees.

We stopped here at one point in the drive.

This lookout is one of the places where you can enter The Appalachian Trail. We discussed hiking all the way to Maine, but considering my recent bellyaching about the 1.3 mile hike to the Laurel Canyon Falls, we opted not to at this time.

We did meet "Captain" who started on the trail March 9th in Georgia. He's hoping to hike all the way to Maine. He has until October 5th to make the journey, when the trail is closed for the season.

Good-bye "Captain." Good luck and happy hiking!

We drove on and eventually entered the spectacular Blue Ridge Parkway.

The mountains are beautiful. We would love to return and rent a cabin here for an extended time. Perhaps we can do that in the future.

We eventually made it to Asheville, NC and checked into our Best Western at 5:30 p.m. No, we are not in room 201 this time. That would have been too freaky!

We drove through downtown and it was busy, busy, busy, with no easy parking. We ended up having dinner at Chili's, not far from our hotel.

End of day odometer reading = 36,022.

Road Trip 2012 - Day 3

Tuesday, April 17th - Corinth, MS to Chattanooga, TN

Monday night's sleep was deep and restful. So restful, in fact, I woke up at 6:15 a.m. and popped out of bed at 6:45 a.m. On vacation, mind you!

The Husband and I sat down for breakfast on the front porch at 8:30 a.m. We look eager, don't we?

Breakfast was served and while it was good, it was not what we expected from a B&B that advertises itself as one of the top 10 B&B's in the state of Mississippi. Our breakfast was 2 biscuits, butter, strawberry jelly, scrambled eggs, a preformed sausage patty and orange slices; a solid breakfast to be sure. It was not, however, a breakfast that compares with ones we have enjoyed at top notch B&B's in our previous travels.

After the meal, we took a short walk in the rain to photograph some of the historic houses we saw on our neighborhood stroll the previous evening.

Did I tell you it was raining? It was raining.

I loved this garden, which was one block from the B&B. The symmetry appeals to me.

Me with the B&B in the background.

We packed up our belongings and drove away from the B&B at 9:30 a.m. The odometer reading was 35,510.

Our next stop was the Corinth Civil War Interpretive Center, which is part of the U.S. National Park Service. We enjoyed the center, watching two films and viewing the exhibits. It was a good stop to set the stage before visiting the Shiloh Battlefield. Plus, I got to stamp our National Park Service Passport! Do you have a NPS Passport?

After leaving Corinth, we drove approximately 20 miles to the Shiloh National Military Park.

The park is very, very impressive. One of the park rangers told us that the battlefield is one of the best preserved in the US. They have worked hard to ensure the landscape closely mimics the landscape as it was 150 years ago. The biggest difference is 150 years ago there was less underbrush in the treed areas because the landowners grazed cattle there prior to the war.

This is a picture of a treed area today. Beautiful, isn't it?

We drove the 13 mile battlefield tour during a steady rain. We were simultaneously impressed by the courage and fortitude displayed during the battle and horrified by the resulting carnage that ended with 23,746 killed, wounded or missing over 2 days.

The National Park Service has done an outstanding job of placing signage at key locations on the battlefield to explain what was happening where. This sign explains their system.

We ended the battlefield tour with scenes from the cemetary. Words do not express the appropriate feelings.

We left the battlefield at approximately 1:30 p.m. and headed toward Chattanooga, which involved a winding road, 2 lanes in many places, and rain the entire time.

The Tennessee landscape is beautiful. Lush and treed. Plains and mountains. Beautiful lakes. And, did I mention lush and green?

We entered the Eastern Time Zone at 4:34 p.m Central Time. There was a sign on the highway, but it took us by surprise and we didn't have time to pull over for a photo.

We arrived in Chattanooga at our Best Western at 6:30 p.m. Checked in, settled in the room and started searching for a dinner spot. Luckily, we found great reviews on Yelp for the Fireside Grille/Lounge. Let me just say that the Yelp reviews were spot on! We can absolutely recommend the Fireside if you are ever in Chattanooga.

We are now tucked safe and sound in the hotel room.

End of day odometer reading = 35,753

"See The USA" Roadtrip Recap

I must confess, we were both very happy to see this sign on Wednesday:

We were gone for 21 days.

We went through parts of 9 states (Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas).

I had never been to 4 of the states (Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska).

We saw famous places (national parks and roadside attractions) we'd never seen before and we thoroughly enjoyed playing tourist.

We visited some nice antique shops, which always makes my day!

The Husband drove 3,400 miles. I drove 1 mile. Hey, that's the way we do things on vacation!

We took lots of pictures (some quite dorky) and I tried to write fun blog entries so my readers could enjoy the journey with us.

We had a great trip, but are glad to be home.

I've now got laundry to do, groceries to buy, and blogs to read!

The Rock Head Presidents

The Husband and I finally went to Mount Rushmore on Monday. We got tired of waiting for the rain to stop and we were running out of  time as well.


We had a late breakfast in Rapid City, did a bit of shopping at an antique mall and then headed to Mount Rushmore National Park.

Can you see them? They are up there, above our heads in our fancy self-portrait.

Oh, you want to see a better picture? Okay, here you go...

When I told my sister we were coming here on this trip, she related the story of her oldest daughter (now 7) coming home from school last year talking about the "rock head presidents." It took my sister and her husband asking a few questions to understand she was talking about Mount Rushmore! Funny!


After leaving Rushmore, we drove through Custer State Park. Beautiful, beautiful country. We saw mule, pronghorn and white-tailed deer. Plus, wild burros and buffalo.


You are not supposed to feed the animals in the park, but of course some people do not believe those rules apply to them and do so anyway. We got stuck in a bit of a traffic jam, because the burros know cars = people = food. Here's a shot of one of them trying to get us to feed him:

On the scenic drive through Custer State Park the roads are narrow and extremely winding, with a few very narrow stone tunnels. Here's a shot of a commercial tour bus coming through one of the tunnels. It took him a while to get through and by the time he did, he had a large audience watching him.

Here's a shot of the tunnel as we drove into it:

After we left the park, we headed to Wall, South Dakota. Home of the famous Wall Drug Store.


It was overwhelming. Any type of junky souvenir you could possibly desire is available here. They also have places to order food and opportunites for weird pictures. To wit: 


Me and a large, white rabbit. Harvey, perhaps?

The Husband and the elusive Jackalope.

After walking through Wall Drug (and, I confess, purchasing a tee shirt) we checked into the local Best Western Hotel and got settled. We went out for a quick dinner and I was in my pj's and in bed by 8:30p.m.


I think this road trip is beginning to kick me in the butt!

335 Miles (plus or minus)

The Husband and I had a late, leisurely breakfast at the hotel in Sheridan, WY.

Afterwards, we drove out of town and headed toward the Little Big Horn Battlefield National Monument.

Witness my first arrival in Montana:

Shortly thereafter, we entered the National Park.

It is very difficult to describe the magnificence of the scenery. The land is large, wide open and awe inspiring. It is no wonder the Indians did not want to be restricted to living on reservations. They wanted to continue roaming this large, beautiful land as they had always done. Hence, their logical decision to fight back against the US government. The decision led to many battles, one of which was the Little Big Horn.

Actually being on site at the battlefield gave me a much richer understanding of the battle. It spread over a realatively narrow corrider of land, spanning approximately 3 miles in length. Tombstones are placed over that 3 mile stretch to indicate where US soliders and Indians fell during the battle.

It is very moving.

This picture of The Husband is at the location of "The Last Stand" where Custer died. If you enlarge the photo, the tombstone with the black highlighting is Custer's monument. (I really must invest in a more sophisticated camera!)

Here I am at the Indian Monument on the Battlefield.

Check out my new hat, purchased in the gift shop. Cute, don't you think? The Husband has one that is very similar. We also purchased the National Park Service Passport. Between stopping to take photos of every "Welcome to this state" sign and purchasing the NPS passport, The Husband has officially declared our "dork" quota is at an all time high. But you know what? We don't care!

We spent almost 3 hours at the Little Big Horn Battlefield. Easily, we could have spent another 2 or 3 hours to complete all the walking tours and to view the film at the park center. However, it's not like this battlefield is in the middle of a densely populated area, or even a commercial area, so you have to PLAN to go there. Next time we visit, we will plan a bit differently so we will be in the area for a couple of days.

After leaving the battlefield, we drove to Deadwood, SD.

The obligatory "Welcome to South Dakota" sign.

Deadwood has a long and sordid history. But what US town doesn't? Some towns may not, but this nation was scratched out by "hook or crook" frequently and Deadwood fits that description. The Husband and I were fans of the HBO series, Deadwood. Have you seen it? We are not thinking the actual town was like the HBO series, but who knows?

We walked around downtown tonight, stopped into one of the many casinos to have a cocktail and assess the situation. The Husband lost ONE DOLLAR in a penny slot machine! I cut him off, needless to say. We ate dinner at the Buffalo Saloon, which has a long history in Deadwood.

We have a big day planned for Saturday, visiting a number of local sites. Hopefully the rainy forecast, with highs around 48-50 degrees, won't put too big of a damper on our plans!