The Waterstraut Waterspout: Day 4: On the Road Again

Monday August 15, we woke up for our last morning in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Honestly, I wish I was here much more than two nights. I'm hoping maybe we can make another trip here in the future. I mean, who doesn't want to start their morning like this?

We had our coffee out on the front porch. The creek was down below, and while there is a street across the way, the trees block most of the traffic and most of the noise.

We had saved half our breakfast from the day before and heat that up for breakfast.

And then we packed up our stuff, and said good-bye to our cabin.

And we were back on the road again...

...through some forests and tunnels.. and on our way..

We did have a bit of an off-the-beaten-path moment, when a traffic jam on i-75 added on an hour and growing. So, google took us on this crazy route. The exit was called "Stinkin Creek Road" and there were next to no houses or civilivation. But eventually, she took us to this dirt road that went up a side of a mountain. There was even a flashing sign that said "no i-75 access", but Asa trusted the process (at this point we were like 25 minutes into the detour and turning back would have been tough). So we climbed up this side of a mountain on a dirt road, with four cars behind us, obviously taking the same google-inspired detour. And eventually we were going parallel to i-75, and then there was the weirdest enterance ramp to get us back on track. It was basically a u-turn onto i-75 north at the bottom of the mountain. After that, though, we decided to always trust Google's directions. We had made it to Kentucky without getting stuck in any traffic!

I don't think you can really see it in this picture, but in the window behind Asa, there was someone who had their cat on leash like it was a dog just hanging out by the vending machines.

We decided to take another small detour to go to Cumberland Falls for a picnic lunch. The trip back there was again a winding road, with hardly anyone else in sight.

But, we made it!

There is a gift shop and a gem mining area, along with some picnic tables. We pulled out all our picnicy type foods... stuff we brought from home, stuff we had picked up along the way, and enjoyed a nice quiet lunch with only the sounds of the falls behind us.

You can see it from a platform up above the falls..

..or you can take the short walkway down for a better view.

They call it the Niagra Falls of the south or something. It's impressive enough, but not at all on that scale.

Still, it was a nice stop on the long drive, just to get out and stretch our legs and walk around.

But holy geez people, the trash! Maybe a lot collects there from the river, but it could really use a clean up!

It's worth noting at Cumberland Falls, you might be lucky enough to spot a moonbow or a black bear. Obviously, we didn't get to see either.

After our stop, we continued on our way, finally making it to Ohio. (And when did Ohio change it's slogan from "the heart of it all' to "find it here"? Lame.)

When we were headed north, I let people know we might be near them so we could catch up with some friends. Our friend Rachel Baker who worked at Cedar Point with me and Asa is living in Cincinnati these days. We hoped to get dinner with her, but she was subbing in for another teacher for water areboics that night. She said we could come if we wanted, and we're always up for trying something new, so we met her there and took Rachel's water areobics class!

Afterwards, she took us to this crazy store called Jungle Jim's. It had all kinds of stuff (and would have been super helpful for the country project)- but Asa was espceially interested in the jerky, hot sauce, and mustard.

Thanks for the class, and hanging out with us Rachel. We should do it again sometime!

After all that, we headed on over to Cort's house. We got there just as it was getting dark, so we helped take the dogs for a walk, and spotted a few lightning bugs, which Garrett promptly caught for me. It was a little late in the summer to see too many of them, but I am a little sad they don't exist here in Florida, so I always like seeing them.