Chattanooga/Smoky Mountain Trip Day 1

Chattanooga/Smoky Mountain Trip     Day 1

Saturday

I was so eager to set out!!  I’ve been looking forward to and planning this trip since last fall.  The night before I left I was nervous and second guessing myself but I was at the point of no return.    

After I dropped the dogs off at the vet I stopped for gas and breakfast at McDonalds.  Properly fortified with a breakfast sandwich and my favorite Mocha Frappe, I hit the road.  I hooked up my I pad to my sound system, started my 1970's music soundtrack and within 15 minutes all my worries slipped away and I realized how excited I was!   Being on the road was so freeing and exhilarating and I kept thinking to myself how lucky I was to be doing this.   I made good time until I hit Nashville, which was bumper to bumper with traffic due to a semi-truck accident that was sprawled out across 2 lanes.   It didn't look good.   Here I am as traffic was coming to a stop...

After a 45 minute back up I made it thru the pile up and sped on my way.  I stopped in Tennessee and did 2 geocaches, one of which was near this horse statue.  I love when I see crazy stuff like this....

As I approached Chattanooga I decided to make a quick detour into Alabama..... 

I’ve never been to Alabama and it's my goal to eventually hit every state.  Although I didn’t have any time for sightseeing that day, my main goal was to grab 2 geocaches, one of them at a Trail of Tears historical marker.  That was very interesting!  

The other one was at this cute little statue.  See, I told you that you see crazy stuff geocaching....

 

I was thrilled to have visited a new state, also get credit for my geocaching state map, and add another state to my travel map.  Woo hoo!!  

After a brief delay in Chattanooga due to road construction - is there road construction everywhere???  I arrived at Holiday Travel Park where I would be spending the next 3 nights.  The Travel Park is located on a Civil War Battlefield, so that in itself was pretty cool.  They even have an historical marker there which I went and visited, and then quickly found the nearby geocache.  

Set up went quick and I liked my camp site.  It was a beautiful afternoon with temperatures in the low 80’s and a nice breeze.  Initially I was worried that it was going to be too hot in my tent, but once the sun started going down it began to cool off.  

Dinner was hot dogs and potato chips, and for dessert I had a piece of chocolate cake.  Did you notice how I improvised and used a hamburger bun for my hot dog???  LOL!

 

After much debate and hemming and hawing between a rooftop carrier or a rear mount carrier, I took the plunge and got the roof top one.  I was exceptionally pleased with my JEGS rooftop carrier.  

It was the first time I’d gotten to use it and I was thrilled with how much stuff I was able to put it in.  It took me about an hour to stop worrying that it was going to blow open on the highway and toss my belongings all over the place.  But once I settled down and stopped worrying, it was great.  I didn't even notice it was up there.  It doesn't make any noise or anything.  If you're short like me tho, reaching the roof is an issue so I had to do some searching before I found a good solution.  This car door step comes in really handy.  You just hook it on the inside of the back door and it holds up to 400 pounds.  It makes reaching my JEGS carrier a breeze.

Two more new items that I used for the first time were my SetPower freezer/refrigerator and my Jackery generator.   

I'm going to go more in depth on these in a future post but for now, let me just say - OMG – how did I ever live without these before??   No more messing around with ice cubes or ice blocks.   Hip, hip hooray!!  The SetPower is really nice.  I kept it plugged into the outlet in the rear of my car while driving and then once I reached camp I plugged it into the Jackery.  The Jackery can charge your USB items with the 2 provided USB plugs and it has 1 AC outlet and 1 dc car port.  It came in so handy for everything!

All in all my first day was a success!  I didn't get lost on the drive and I felt so self-sufficient as I set up my camp all by myself.  I was really looking forward to the rest of my trip now.

Come on back for the next post - I'll be covering downtown Chattanooga and Lookout Mountain.

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases...

DeerFamy Tent: Link 

Coleman Camp Stove:  Link

JEGS Rooftop  Carrier: Link  

Car Door Step:  Link

SetPower Freezer/Fridge:  Link

Jackery:  Link