Back from short trip...sort of

Ok, so we took sort of a vacation. We took the week and went to the Smoky Mountains(Gatlinburg, Newfound Gap); Chattanooga(Tennessee Aquarium, See Rock City, Ruby Falls); Fall Creek Falls; all over Nashville(seeing stars homes, Parthenon, downtown, Opry Mills); and Memphis(Elmwood Cemetery, Nathan Bedford Forrest).

You want more details? Ok, well I will try to give a few. Some family members came in for the week. We wanted to show them Tennessee. And we did. We could have showed them more.

We went to Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge. We walked some of Gatlinburg, but weather chased us away. Ate dinner at Great American Steak Buffet(or something like that), it was good. Next day we drove up to Newfound Gap. Couldn't stay long as the Park Rangers were closing off the parking lot due to about a dozen cars in the lot that had been broken into overnight. Back down the mountain and off to Chattanooga. Shame we saw so little.

Got to Chattanooga, went to Tennessee Aquarium. It was nice, unfortunately the kiddo got sick and by the time we got to a restaurant she had a migraine and threw up her dinner. And I got to spend my dinner time in the car with her. And when they brought my dinner back to the hotel, I had no utensils to eat it with(try eating Cracker Barrel food with no fork!). Oh well. Next day she felt better and we hit See Rock City. It was nice as always, quite cold-which wasn't too bad, and completely empty-which was excellent. But we got through it so quickly. Oh well, we've seen it before. Then to Ruby Falls. I've seen that before too, but it is nice to see again. Then onto Fall Creek Falls, though it looked empty when we arrived, as we walked to the overlook several dozen EXTREMELY RUDE teenagers showed up, hogged the overlook and were general morons and assholes. Shame. Though I always enjoy the ride, the countryside, some just don't and we should have never went here.

Around Nashville, we stopped by the homes of George Jones, Alan Jackson, Ronnie Dunn, Vince Gill, and maybe a few more that I can't remember. Went to Centennial Park to see the Parthenon. Went downtown to show the Arena and Coliseum. I think we did too much driving around though. Then to Opry Mills, which I personally hate-mainly because I hate shopping. But we spent like 2 hours there. Thursday was a bad icy day. We saved Memphis for Friday.

Friday and leaving very early. We got to Memphis and dropped them off at Graceland(no interest in that from me), and we went to Elmwood Cemetery to find Tennessee Governors and Confederate Generals. We managed to run downtown and see the grave of Nathan Bedford Forrest, but we weren't finished when we had to run back to Graceland and pick them up. Oh well, next time. We had planned on hitting Paris, TN and Hurricane Mills on the way back, but we just didn't have time.

And that was the week. They flew out Saturday morning to go to Vegas, I hope they have more fun there than we were able to show them. Oh well.

Photos to come, the ones I was able to get anyway.