The Weekend

Saturday we decided on a slower day. We slept in a bit and made grilled cheese at home before heading out. Surprisingly, this did hold us (me) over for a while. We headed right toward Hall Mountain Road which is about an hour and a half away. It was a beautiful day. 80*-90* weather all day, sunny, and a little breeze. I ended up with a sunburn on just my right arm from letting it hang out the window all day. We took in the scenery and made our way to our personal lookout location and started up the mountain road. About half way up we came upon 2 cars - one covered in mud with words and pictures drawn on it and 2 people. Now when I say covered in mud I think I know what you are picturing, mud on the tires, some splatter up the sides, maybe some spray on the windows and wind shield. What I mean is, I could not tell the color of this car because there was only mud to be seen. Every window had something drawn into the caked on mud. The guy we met was working on getting a tire off the muddy car and a girl sat in the seemingly working car. I could hear her talking but don’t know if she was talking to the guy or on the phone. They were on James’ side of the car. Anyway, we stop and ask if they need any help knowing full well we have nothing along in the car that would be helpful. James hits it off with the guy as he does and I sit there getting some work texts and generally trying to stay out of the conversation. I know I can’t help without any car knowledge so the only thing I would contribute is further conversation with someone I’m not entirely sure isn’t going to rob us. It’s just who I am. Any who, after rummaging in the trunk to further confirm our uselessness in this situation, we get on the road and let them know we will check back in on the way down.

For those curious, the guy’s cousin had just purchased this car 2 days prior and went up the mountain for some off roading and the brakes locked up. The guy there was trying to get some sort of nut off the car. His cousin was on the way back. He had left the car there overnight and someone else came by, stole the radio out of the car, and wrote all over the thing.

We drive up another few switchbacks and ended up backing down a small section. It looked a little rough ahead and we do still need to drive back home in this same car. I walked back up the hill (James stayed with the car) and took a few scenic pictures. It was lovely. Walking back up I came across 2 men in a side by side who checked to make sure I wasn’t stuck. I assured them I was just out taking pictures. They kept on going. When I got back down I walked a little down another path and checked things out. James had his drone out and got some video of the area. It was pretty hot walking around.

We come back down and check on the guy. We never did get his name. At this point the girl from the car had set up a chair along the path. I guess she realized it would be a while. The car owner (cousin) was no where to be seen but the guy said he was on his way. Nice guy. Turns out he was not interested in robbing us or really anything to do with us. He was just a nice cousin trying to help out. He had gotten 1 nut loose but hurt his wrist in the process. People are nice here.

We went from here back to the Foothills Parkway. This was back toward home. On the way we decided to stop for ice cream. We went to Mad Dogz or something like that. Not far from Dollywood - we passed the sign. I have never had the option of peanut butter cookies and cream ice cream before but I have now and it was delicious. James had a hot fudge sundae. The people were friendly and they had an indoor seating area which was nice because it was about 2pm at this time and it was hot.

Kacie “People are going to be jealous of this peanut butter chunk”

James “Did you just take a picture?”

Kacie: “Yes, people will be jealous”

Once we got to the Foothills Parkway James realized that is this Tail of the Dragon road people love to drive on. We passed some sort of car he was really excited to see but I can’t remember what it was. He will have to fill that part in. J- it was a 2015 Ford GT… along with a couple new McLarens, one was a 720S. I guess there aren’t many in the world and he hadn’t seen one in person before today. There were some pull offs and a lot of motorcycles on this road. It had pretty views and we had a lot of opportunity to use our cameras.

Like I said, it was a beautiful day. There are other pictures and I’m sure James will add his photos too. Maybe we’ll make a gallery for the rest at some point…

There seems to be a pretty severe drought going on here right now. All of the water I have seen looks super low. But that little waterfall was still cute and worth photographing.

We headed back toward home but had to stop at the store again…after our egg fail yesterday we still needed some to make French toast in the morning. We went to a different Food City and grabbed a few items then got home around 7pm. I set to making steak right away - of course I was hungry. We had bought fillets at Walmart and they were surprisingly good. I found some seasonings here at the place and used copious amounts of butter so how could they be bad? I also made some mac and cheese because it’s vacation so forget vegetables. We had an after dinner drink out on the deck and I have to say sitting there after our day exploring and a delicious meal, I felt very content. We cleaned up from dinner, looked at our pictures and checked the weather. The storms are supposed to roll in around where we are on Sunday. James, ever vigilant, stayed on top of the forecast and it looks like it will not be too bad here.

Sunday we planned on a stay at home day. Nothing too much to report here so I’m tacking it onto Saturday’s blog. We made French toast for breakfast and watched some TV. It has rained on and off all day but we did not get any of the terrible weather that is happening in western TN or any of the surrounding states. I was seeing a lot of destruction in the areas around us and we are very lucky to have missed out on that action. We heard one big clap of thunder and just some rain otherwise. I read a little on the deck listening to the rain, we played some pool, and sat in the hot tub for a while. It was a little cooler today with the rain so it was nice in the hot tub. We did some laundry and made cheese burgers at home for dinner. We are planning to find a movie to watch later. Tomorrow is our last full day in TN and we are planning to go back into the Smokey Mountain park for some more exploring and picture taking.

Getting to TN, Gatlinburg, & Pigeon Forge

April 2, 2025 we took off on our next adventure. This is our shortest road trip we have taken yet - 9 hours door to door and we are in Tennessee. We are staying on the eastern side of the state between Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. We left at 9am on Wednesday morning and got to our cabin at about 8pm that same night. We made a few stops along the way but only needed to get gas once! On the way into town we stopped at the closest grocery store, Food City. We grabbed some frozen pizza for dinner and a few snacks/drinks then unloaded when we got here.

Our place has a bridge from the car to the house and it is lit up with torch lights at night. There is a giant foundation under the car area and the house with steel beams running the length of the bridge. There is a porch out front with a small gas fireplace and a hot tub. Inside we have 2 floors - the kitchen and a living room on the main floor with a little eating nook. The second floor has 2 bedrooms - 1 with a sofa and TV to hang out and the other has a pool table.

The rest of Wednesday was uneventful. After a day of driving we were pretty tired. We booked our off roading trip for Friday and got some sleep.

Day one of TN we thought we would check out the towns around us. We started off getting breakfast and tried to go to a place called “Morning Mist Restaurant and Cafe” but when we got there they weren’t open. You know us, we didn’t get there too early…. We ran into 2 shop owners next to the place and they said the cafe was usually open by 10am when we got there and they weren’t sure what happened. I hope everyone there is OK. We walked across the street to “Timbers Log Cabin”. The address is Gatlinburg but it is outside of the downtown area. They were very nice and had a deck outside where we ate. You go in and order at the counter and then can sit anywhere you want to. We both ended up ordering lunch because it looked delicious. I’m sure you can guess what James had…I had a BLT with a fried egg. It was delicious.

There was a little area to walk around outside the restaurant. There was a small bookstore, some soaps, jewelry, and a glass blower. We went to the glass blowing shop and bought this beautiful glass flower. I almost went with a pumpkin but this flower was something I hadn’t seen before and I can’t wait to put it on my mantel at home.

I also got a necklace from the jeweler. She was very nice and had beautiful stones made into jewelry. She said she only chooses stones that speak to her for her shop. The shop is called Wire Wonders and my necklace is made out of green moonstone. I wore it the rest of the day.

I swear, we see the Amish everywhere we go.

After checking out this little craft community we drove into downtown Gatlinburg. My first impression was there were a lot of people there for a Thursday. People were everywhere and even the parking garage we parked in only had 30 spaces left. It was on the edge of town. There is a ski lift that will take you up to the top of the mountain for some birds eye views. We declined to wait in the line to go up. It looked like a ride at Disney with the number of people waiting in line.

We went to the Mountain Mall which is a 6 story mall with anywhere from 2-6 stores per floor. On the bottom level is a record store and I got a Dolly Parton greatest hits that I can’t wait to play when I get home! She was my first favorite singer that I can remember from when I was a kid. The rest of the stores were a little disappointing. But the bathrooms were clean and accessible.

We continued down the main street and found “The Village Shops” with an assortment of things to look at. Here we ate the very best doughnut I have had. The shop is called “The Doughnut Friar” and I highly recommend it. We got 1 to share because I was still full from breakfast. I still regret not getting another one. It was a hot day so we knew getting extra they would only melt and didn’t want to waste something so good.

By the way, there are bees everywhere!

After walking through the little village we decided to move on to Pigeon Forge and the Island. If anyone knows how to get to the valet parking here, let me know. We couldn’t figure it out. Anyway, we get to the Island - these 2 towns are really only like 10 minutes apart. There is a large parking lot and a free trolley taking you into the shops area. We followed a trolley into the parking lot, took a quick turn to get ahead of it, parked and hopped onto the tram in a few minutes. I don’t know how long it usually takes between trains but we got lucky and got right on.

There is a water fountain right when you walk in that goes off with music every half hour. We didn’t watch that until we were on the way out. We wondered around for a while. This place has a lot going on. With the fountain, shops, restaurants, food trucks, arcades, fair game stalls, a movie theater, and hotels it seems like this place doesn’t know what it wants to be when it grows up. There was a lot to look at and do though. We went to the “SkyFly: Soar America” experience. That was cool. Basically, going in they have a video with 2 steam punk actors going on about something. They end up saying they have a machine that will fly over the earth. You go into the main room and strap into a seat with your belongings under your seat. They get started and the floor drops out from under you and there is a giant video screen in front of you. There is a bunch of different scenes and they have speakers and mist coming down from above each seat. It was cool and I absolutely felt like I was moving.

We had dinner at Dick’s. I didn’t realize this was the place where the severs yell at you but it turned out to be fun. James had another cheeseburger and I had pulled pork with Carolina BBQ sauce and coleslaw. We each had a giant fishbowl drink after being in the sun all day. It was delicious. James was very happy when he found out we could take the cups home.

After dinner we popped over to Ole Smokey Tennessee Moonshine place and I tried 5 different flavors. The first one they gave - Blue Flame - was disgusting. It burned my tongue, my throat, and my cheeks. It was so bad. Then they gave out a pineapple which I don’t usually like those but after that blue flame it was actually really good. I tried a few others but the Blueberry Lavender was the best one. After we purchased a few flavors, we watched a little of the fountain show and then caught the trolley back to the car. We went all the way to the back of the bus because the lady driving said we should. That turned out to be a challenge when we tried to exit at our stop. We had to climb past a lot of people standing in the isles to get out. But we did, and made our way home.

Tomorrow we going to get up and leave around 8am to get over to Bryson City NC for our off roading adventure.