Angie awoke with a sore wrist. It was the one she had fallen on while cycling at Cade's Cove in the Great Smoky Mountains. She decided she had better get an x-ray and treatment. While she was out, Hank and the dogs went paddleboarding on the reservoir.
When Angie returned with a brace for her sprained wrist, we eschewed more paddleboarding in favor of a nap before another night on the town. In the meantime, we had a hard rain, which gave us a chance to check whether our window repair was effective. Our ugly caulking repair turned out to be effective and we stayed dry. Whew! We drove to town and started at Kid Rock's Honky Tonk where we found a packed room around the main stage on the first floor. There were four floors with three bands. We quickly understood why the crowd was so big. There was a kick-ass band playing behind lead man John Stone (#johnstonecountry). Requests and tips were rolling in their 5 gallon bucket. People didn't hesitate to fill the bucket because these guys were so good. The couple behind us paid $100 for them to play "I'm in a Hurry" by Alabama. The lead singer John Stone was charasmatic and had a great voice. His brother on lead guitar, totally nailed a Stevie Ray Vaughn number later. They also had an excellent sax player. We stayed quite a while until Hank got sort of claustrophobic from the growing crowd, which kept nudging us on our bar stools. For a change if pace, we explored a few clubs on a quiet side street off Broadway. We found a sparsely populated bar with an excellent cowboy singer, Kyle Austin (kyleaustinmusic.com) with a mediocre band behind him. He did a very nice version of "Dixieland Delight" for Angie. Back on Broadway, we discovered a trio (Kelley's Heros) at Robert's Western World that knocked our socks off. The lead guitarist was a prodigy whose facial expression implied that he as in a trance like the banjo player in the film "Deliverance". He burned it up! He even played the guitar behind his head and with with his teeth during their finale. There was a stand-up acoustic bass player who was an incredible showman. At one point he played while standing on the side of his bass, which was tilted 45 degrees from the floor. We had never seen anything like these guys. They play there four nights a week and we resolved to return to catch more of their show.
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Our route took on us a couple of remote two-lane, hilly, curvy roads between sections of four-lane state highway. It was about 50-50, which made for a tiring drive. But the scenery was bucolic.
The landscape that we saw was remote and rural. At one point, a car in front of us stopped on a hill behind a tractor that was mowing the shoulder on a steep bank. We waited a minute for him to pass the tractor, which was several feet from the road. When he didn't, we passed him - nevermind that we were pulling a trailer. No one followed us. Perhaps we broke a cardinal Kentucky law, because none of the cars behind us followed suit. We may get a ticket in the mail. But it sure felt good! After setting up the trailer at the Corps of Engineers campground on the shores of J. Percy Priest Reservoir 25 minutes east of downtown Nashville, we exercised and fed the dogs and set off for Broadway. We found a barbecue restaurant/bar with live music (Ripleys) and got a table next to the stage where a trio (two guitars and a piano) was playing country music. The food was great! The band was fun. The band leader noted our enthusiasm right away. He asked where we were from and whether we had a song request. Hank asked for one of his favorites - an Alabama song, "If You're Gonna Play in Texas You gotta Have a Fiddle in the Band". Which was of course, improbable since they didn't have a fiddle player. Doh! (Pause to wipe egg off face.) They graciously played another Alabama song for us - "Dixieland Delight". The band leader was personable and fun. He told us he had visited a friend in Bremerton and saw a nuclear submarine transiting an inland waterway. Later, from the stage, he told a story about attending a recent live concert by the 89-year-old Willie Nelson. He said Willie announced his age and noted that he had recently released his 80th album. After dinner we walked from club to club on Broadway sampling the different live acts - all free of cover charge. We found a band at Legends with a good lead guitarist and a very entertaining female vocalist. They mostly played rock classics. She had a great voice and a charasmatic and charming stage presence. She interacted unselfconsciously with people in the crowd. We watched them a long time and really enjoyed the show. We returned to her act later in the evening after sampling several other clubs. We found out that she was scheduled to play Kid Rock's Honky Tonk on Thursday with a different back-up band. We made a mental note to drop in. Due to a combination of her lack of self-promotion and our own inattentiveness - we failed to note her name. We both regretted that. At another club, we found a band with a fiddle. Their lead singer looked like Walker - the guitar playing cowboy from the "Yellowstone" TV series. We asked them to play "If You Wanna Play in Texas". They demanded $20. We balked and "Walker" - whose real name is "Nick Cross" - said, "How about we play it for you and you decide what it's worth?" The band pointed out that they have to split their tips five ways between the members of the band. Apparently, the clubs don't pay them. I don't think the clubs even give them free drinks because a couple of bands told the crowds what they were drinking, in hopes of finding patrons to wet their whistles. The fiddle player did play our song and he tore a horsehair on his bow while performing our request. Nick had a good voice. He was also quite a character. He came and sat at our table to chat for a bit. He was from Georgia - not the West. He learned our names, and later, addressed Hank personally from the stage several times. Nick was also trying to chat up a couple of girls at another table in the bar, as he publicly noted from stage. When they left later, he looked at us and shrugged. This was his sixth performance in five days, so maybe he was a bit worn. Cathy met us at our campsite for a hike at Laurel Lake with our dogs. We found a really cool boat-in campsite with about 30 sites of which only about 10 were occupied. There was a big, sandy beach where the dogs enjoyed some swimming before the humans decided to seek respite in the coolness of the shady forest.
We returned to our campsite for a cool drink before meeting Todd for lunch at Cracker Barrell. We continued our visit at Todd and Cathy's home, where they graciously offered us access to their laundry room. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit. Todd and Cathy are interesting and gracious people and we were all eager to learn more about each other and our respective nuclear family's history. We hung out at a coffee shop in Ashville, where the dogs were treated by the staff to small cups of whipped cream. Their parents took the opportunity to catch up on updates to the blog.
A pleasant drive along the old Wilderness Road brought us through Eastern Kentucky to the home of Hank's niece Cathy Stokes and her husband, Todd. Cathy and Todd met us for lunch at DuPont Lodge (yes, those DuPonts) at Cumberland Falls. After a buffet lunch we took a short drive to the falls and walked along a trail to the bottom of the falls, where we got some great pictures. We stopped at a hardware store to pick up some clear caulk to repair the leak in our front window. Unfortunately, Hank bought the tube that is intended to be used with a caulking gun, which we don't have. So he had to push on the plunger with his thumb to get the caulk out. That was kind of tricky, given that he was standing on top of the propane tank on the hitch in order to reach the top of the window. He called for Angie's help to spot him. The best she could do was to sort of prop up his butt while he worked. That provided at least an illusion of security. We completed the job, which ended up looking pretty sloppy. But at least no one can see it from street-level. Fingers crossed that it stops the leak! Then we headed back to our campsite to feed and exercise the dogs. We drove to a marina on Laurel Lake, where the dogs got to swim in a little cove. We learned from the camp host that a fireworks show was planned that evening at the Marina, so we took the dogs home and played our audio book "Follow the River" loudly. Between the book and the air conditioner noise, we didn't even hear the fireworks. We stayed up until 1:30 a.m., entranced by the rugged journey of Mary Ingalls through the New River Valley as she walked through the wilderness to return to her family near Radford. We got up early to start a day of hiking at this amazing, historical spot. The Cumberland Gap was the passage through the Allegheny Mountains, first blazed by buffalo seeking salt and grazing, then by Indians for hunting and trading, later by long hunters like Daniel Boone, who finally blazed a trail that would become the Wilderness Road, connecting North Carolina through Virginia to Kentucky.
We drove up to a Pinnacle Overlook at 2,440 feet elevation. We hiked north a bit on the Ridge Trail before backtracking to the parking lot where we found a trailhead to the Cumberland Gap historical marker some 800 feet below. From there we saw the Daniel Boone Trail monument a few feet away and signs to the Tri State Marker where Tennessee, Kentucky and Virginia all meet at one point. It's a 1.6-mile up and back trail, climbing 400 feet. Our cumulative walking distance was about 7 miles and about 2,000 feet of elevation. It started raining about 20 minutes before we finished. It was really pouring by the time we returned to the trailer. We put the dogs inside and headed down to the quaint town of Cumberland Gap, TN, founded in 1890. A ranger had recommended an excellent restaurant called "Nineteen 19", where we enjoyed tasty IPAs and street tacos, followed by espresso drinks. We had a rude surprise upon returning to the trailer - our front window had sprung a leak and soaked on edge of our queen-sized bed. We had a few hours of sun following the shower, which allowed us to dry out the linens. Angie used a hair dryer to dry the mattress. We used ever handy duct tape to temporarily seal the outside of the window. When we have a stretch of dry weather, Hank can run a bead of silicon sealant over the top of the window. We got an early start. We picked up the dogs in Sieverville and drove back roads much of the way to I-25E near Morristown. We stopped in Morristown for lunch, before driving up to our campsite at the Cumberland Gap National Historical Park. It was a large, shaded camp site with an electrical connection, but no water and sewer.
We exercised the dogs, enjoyed an arrival celebration cocktail and turned on our audio book "Follow the River" - one account of the true story of Mary Draper Ingalls capture by Shawnee Indians at Radford, VA. The Indians took her to a village at the confluence of the Ohio and Scioto Rivers - 250-miles away. She eventually escaped and found her way home. We were able to sleep in because there were no dogs to wake us at 6 am. What a luxury! We did a steep, one-mile round-trip hike up a paved trail to the top of Clingman's Dome, the third highest peak east of the Mississippi at 6,643 feet. The view was great, but apparently it was much better 40 years ago before smog filled the valley.
Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg are very congested tourists areas. There are a ton of family-friendly activities. We experienced some nasty traffic and parking challenges. After Clingman's Dome, we did a 3.6-mile forest hike to Andrew's Bald, without having to move our car. Angie had found this hike while reading reviews of the park. At this elevation, there were a lot of Fraser Firs, just like in Washington State. We felt right at home. We also enjoyed the thornless blackberry and Flame Azaleas blooming along the trail. We dropped the dogs off at a boarding facility in Sevierville. Then we drove to Cade's Cove, one of the most popular destinations in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The drive took us up the Lauren Creek Road, named after the mountain laurel bushes which line nearly the entire road from the entrance of the park. It was a sweet reminder of the site where Hank proposed to Angie.
There is an 11-mile loop that people drive around six days a week, frequently complaining about bumper to bumper traffic and "bear jams". But on Wednesdays in the Summer, the Park Service reserves the road for cyclists and walkers. As many as 700 people once lived in the verdant valley, from about 1830. The US government began buying the land in 1927 for the formation of the park. Today there are many historic structures still standing, including cabins, churches and a mill. It is also one of the best places for viewing wildlife. Bear and deer are often sited during visits there. We saw only three turkey, a young elk and a snake. The elk was very close, though. On the way home, we stopped for a meal in Gatlinburg and then dropped into Ol' Red, a chain owned by Blake Shelton, for some live music. A 17-year-old singer songwriter from North Carolina, Presley Barker, performed. He had a deep voice and fast guitar fingerings. Presley had appeared on American Idol, where he advanced to the Hollywood Round before being eliminated in January. He has already recorded a couple of original songs in Nashville, as he continues work on an album. He was a delightful performer, polite and appreciative of the audience. He played a wide variety of songs, including songs by The Black Crowes and Eric Clapton in addition to country classics and original songs. We hung out at a coffee shop in Ashville, where the dogs were treated by the staff to cups of whipped cream. Bonus! We updated our blog before heading back to our campsite to hook up and travel.
We were delighted to find that we had another riverside camp site at our private campground in Pigeon Forge (Camp River's Landing). The camp also featured a great pool and laundry room, which we enjoyed in late afternoon. While playing with dogs in the river, Angie discovered a robin trapped in a fishing line, which was wrapped around one foot. We cut him loose and he flew away. The camp also had awesome Wi-Fi, which we used to watch the film "Blue Miracle", an inspiring film about orphan boys in Cabo who win a marlin fishing tournament. The Orphanage featured in the film is Casa Hogar, which was one of charities supported by Angie's friends, the Hurter twins, who recently died of COVID. After morning flow class at the Ashville Yoga Center, we bought tickets for a tour of the Biltmore Estate - a 250-room French Renaissance chateau built between 1889 and 1895 by George Vanderbilt. It is the largest private home in the US - with more than four acres of floor space, including 35 bedrooms, 43 bathrooms, and 65 fireplaces. The architect was Richard Morris Hunt, who helped shape New York City with his designs for the 1902 entrance façade and Great Hall of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. The landscaping of the 8,000-acre estate was designed by Frederick Law Olmstead, the father of landscape architecture in America, who is best known for his design of New York’s Central Park.
Hank was initially not interested in touring an ostentatious display of the excesses of America's Gilded Age, but after viewing a short video at the visitor center and talking with some of the staff there, he was won over. George Vanderbilt's grandfather was a self-made man who started a ferry business with a modest $100 investment. He grew that business into a shipping and railroad empire. George inherited about $5 million and grew his wealth to more than $50 million by the time of his death in 1914. The house and grounds are amazing tributes to architecture, but George was quite a collector of art and he hired the sculptor Karl Bitter to create new works for the home, including "Boy Stealing Geese", the bronze centerpiece in the atrium. The house if filled with paintings, etchings and tapestry. Here is a link where you can see much of the art. We capped off the day with dinner at a sidewalk Cajun restaurant downtown. |