Gatlinburg, TENNESSEE Day # 2

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It was nice to wake up and no that we were not hitting the road again. This was our first three night stop so time to relax a little bit more. The room here is really nice it has been recently renovated with hardwood floors and a brand new bathroom with a shower that is not inside a bathtub which is cool. The balcony outside is really nice to get some fresh air.

It was a pretty wet start to the day and we were glad we did Dollywood yesterday. I looked at the radar on Accuweather website which has been really accurate at predicting the storms we have seen lately and it looked like we might have a few windows where the weather was going to be OK but it was going to be on and off with storms all day. Temperature was still warm around 28 degrees.

We decided to avoid the dodgy free breakfast here and went to a place on main street called Crockett’s Breakfast Camp. This looked impressive from the outside being built like an old Timber Cabin and I had read reviews about how people waited here for up to an hour to get a table ! We were so lucky we walked right and it and this place had great ambience. Kerry ordered Dave’s Iron Horse Omelette which had egg whites and vegetables and she said it was really nice. Elise had Aretha’s Pecan Waffle which had slices of banana and caramel sauce on top and she said it was amazing. I had the 2 egg breakfast with eggs sunny side and delightful camp hash brown potatoes which were amazing. Much better than having breakfast in the hotel.

After breakfast we went back to get in the car and headed into the smoky mountains on the Roaring Fork Nature Trail drive. We made some coffee in the lobby with our new travel mugs we bought at the travel centre of america gas station in Greenville a few days ago. These are Coleman branded with good handles and will keep our drinks hot or cold and only cost $7.99 each. Our mission today was hunting for wildlife and in particular black bears. This place is renowned for bear sightings and they have been spotted in downtown area quite often. The rain started on our drive and it was a one way road with slow speed of 10 mph and whilst the scenery was nice we failed to see any wildlife at all (maybe they go and hide when it’s raining). It was amazing to see how many people would park their cars and go hiking in the bushed on trails in bear country (not me !).

As we drove back to town my song of choice was another tune called Gatlinburg by Rebecca B Kiernan although it sounds like a male voice but a cute little song. When we got back to Gatlinburg we could see everyone walking the streets in matching Poncho’s which looked really weird. You see could all the shops had these poncho’s hanging up outside their shop fronts so it was clearly and organised approach to make sure a little rain does not slow business down !

We decided to have an early dinner tonight at a Mexican Restaurant No Way Jose’s Cantina. It was at the other end of town and if the weather held we could walk around the shops at that end which we had not seen yet. We drove down to the restaurant and there was no car spaces and people were waiting out the front. Kerry jumped out to check how long the wait would be whilst I tried to get a car park space, and then luckily a guy was leaving right out the front. As I parked the car Kerry came back and said the wait was 25 minutes, but as I had just parked the car we agreed we would wait as it was early anyway. We walked back inside and they said our table was ready straight away (really, there was 20 people waiting outside !). The waitress put out some home made tortilla chips and salsa to dive into, I ordered a Dos Equis Amber and Kerry had a Pina Colada and we all ordered Enchiladas. They were lovely and very filling to eat.

The rain had stopped so it looked OK for a walk to look at the shops which stay open very late here in Gatlinburg. Elise bought some cute socks for her friend for her birthday. We had thought about going on the Skylift Chairlift for some great views but Kerry was wearing a white skirt and with all the rain around and lightning combined with the seats being quite damp I thought best not to do this. Let’s hope tomorrow we get some better weather as today has been the worst day although we still got a bit done.

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