Friday more getting ready to do our Washington side trip, doing a load of laundry, and booking our first Choice hotel stay, and getting everything ready for an early departure to the RV service shop.
Saturday, we dropped the trailer at Hanner RV, then headed east toward Dallas. At a rest stop about halfway to Dallas, we saw a cute note about a horned toad being put into a time capsule when the Eastland County Courthouse was being built 1897. When that courthouse had to be replaced in 1928, they opened the time capsule. The horned toad was still alive. Nearly a year later, it died of pneumonia. In Dallas, we had to do a bit of a side trip there, as I-30 was closed for a section, so we followed an Englander Transport truck who was also doing the detour. This took us past the stadium where the Dallas Cowboys play. There were a bunch of marching bands in the parking lot, presumably practicing for Sunday's game. From Dallas we headed north-east to stay in Texarkana, on the border with Arkansas. We got a picture of a 'thief' in the parking lot of the hotel. The only other raccoons we have seen have been dead on the roads.
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Sunday we continued northeast on I-30 to Little Rock. We were surprised that the Arkansas River is large enough here that it has barge traffic on it, similar to the Mississippi.
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| Arkansas River |
There we picked up a few groceries before carrying on I-40 to Memphis. This was one of our stopping points on the Mississippi on our 2015 trip, so we just stopped at the Welcome Center to pick up a Tennessee map and some info on Nashville, our destination for the night. The highway message boards were interesting here. The message was that 'game day drinking and then driving is not a smart play'. We're not sure whether there was a game here today, or just a general Sunday football day message. Definitely a different message than Texas's one about 2872 deaths on Texas roads in 2018 so drive safely.
About 150 miles east of Memphis we started going through hills in the Tennessee River valley. These were the first significant ones we have driven through since we got to the US on this trip. We have been getting hints of colorful fall foliage all the way from Dallas, but no bright yellows, and only a few dark reds.
About 4:00, we arrived at our hotel in Nashville where we are staying two nights and started looking at things to do. One thing Joan had seen was the Bluebird Cafe, which frequently has famous songwriters performing. However, when we looked at details, we found they only had evening events, too late for us old-timers.
Monday was a rainy day, but it was our day to spend time in downtown
Nashville. As we entered the area, there were a lot of police
vehicles. We had planned on going to the visitor center downtown, but
couldn't find parking near it. We found a lot a few blocks away, only
$10 for 6 hours (cheap compared to downtown Calgary). From there we
went to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. It is a bit pricy,
just under $50 for the two of us for a self-guided, non-audio visit to
the museum. They have a lot of displays on the history of country music
from its roots in 'hillbilly' music in northeast Tennessee, to its
spread all over the south, to current artists. It does bring back
memories of a lot of artists we have enjoyed over the years.
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From
there, we walked up 4 St. toward the capitol building. Along the way
we encountered a lot of people heading toward Broadway. It turned out
that there was a Memorial Day parade coming down Broadway. We actually
crossed just a couple of blocks ahead of the advance police motorcycle
squad leading the parade.
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| Veterans' Day Parade |
We continued up to the capitol, to take a
few pictures, then down through the military square below the capitol
building.
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| Tennessee Capitol Building |
We headed to Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville Restaurant to dry
out, and enjoy a lunch of ribs and fishless tacos, which the waitress
tailored from their menu to accommodate Joan's meatless diet. The
margarita and beer were quite good too. Huge amounts of food. We had
enough food to take home for two more meals each. Like most of
Nashville's venues, there was live entertainment. In this case it was a
duet called
Stone Silo
. They were good background music.
After lunch, we headed to Best
Buy to get Joan a new computer. A few days ago, her current one decided
that it didn't have a bootable disk anymore. Weird. That is both our
computers with hard drive issues in the last month or so. We got Joan's computer
up and going after we got back to the hotel.
On Tuesday, we headed east to Gatlinburg. The fall colors are nice along the way.
When we got to Knoxville, we found, with some difficulty, a GMC dealer to see if they could check the transmission fluid, and top it up if necessary (the mechanic in Vulcan said the transmission plug was leaking, and John had seen some fluid under the truck a few times). They were too busy, so we continued to Sevierville where the Chev dealer couldn't do anything because the diesel mechanic was off for a while since his daughter was in the hospital. We continued to Gatlinburg, where we are staying for 3 nights. It is on the edge of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The traffic in Sevierville and Pigeon Forge, north of Gatlinburg was incredible. Apparently, this time of year is busy here. Dollywood is in Sevierville, and Thanksgiving is just a week away. And, the national park is the most visited park in the USA.
On Wednesday, we went to the visitors center in the park, and decided to do the Grotto Falls hike, a moderate 2.6 mile hike. The route follows the Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail, a narrow winding road that one way only for the second half. There were tons of cars at the main trialheads along the way, but we were lucky to find an empty spot at the trailhead for the Grotto Falls trail. There was a lama trailer parked there. The lamas are used to carry supplies up to a back country lodge. We headed up the trail
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| Tree roots on the trail |
until we got to a creek crossing. It was a tricky spot, with lots of water, so Joan couldn't make it across the creek safely.
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| crossing | |
We returned back to the trailhead by a different route. The walk through the forest here is quite beautiful despite not being able to get to the falls. There were warnings about bears in the area, but we figure it was too busy for bears to hang around the popular trails. From the trailhead down, we stopped at a couple of points of interest. When the park was created in 1934, there were quite a few people living in it. They kept the buildings and structures intact when they moved the people out. We stopped at one site which was an old two room cabin, with barn and pigsty. The farm had 30 acres of cleared land, and about 42 of woods.
We passed another stop with what looked like a mill on the creek. Further on we came to a beautiful waterfall.
When we got back to the hotel, we called the Chev dealer and booked an appointment to check the transmission fluid on Thursday afternoon.
On Thursday, after breakfast and a session using the fitness center equipment, we walked along the main shopping area of Gatlinburg. Close to the hotel is a neat little church.
The shopping area has an amazing number of shops in about a mile stretch. They are dominated by candy and fudge shops, wine and moonshine shops, restaurants. There are also a lot of activities available such as Ripley's, mini-golf, a ski hill
and the space needle. It is an extreme tourist area. They also have many little pumpkin head figures along the street.
We figured out why the creek crossing was a problem. The water levels in the creeks look a lot higher than normal.
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| high water |
In the afternoon, we headed into Sevierville, where they determined our transmission fluid levels are good, comforting to know.
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