Chattanooga/Smoky Mountain Trip Day 2

SUNDAY DAY 2

(Photo of me on top of Lookout Mountain)

Sunday got off to a slow start.   Travel Park is a nice campgrounds but be warned….   There’s a raceway nearby and on Saturday night I kept hearing loud, revving engines from the races.  It kind of took away from the tranquility of being on a former battleground.   I slept in until 8:30 and made myself a nice breakfast of biscuits and gravy.  Ok, I know it looks kind of gross but it was delicious!

For my first full day in Chattanooga, I had a packed schedule so I headed out to downtown Chattanooga to visit the Chattanooga National Cemetery.   

I always like to visit cemeteries and there were 2 caches there, so it was a win-win.   National cemeteries are always so impressive and stately.  I enjoy seeing the rows of headstones and the monuments...

The thing I like about doing geocaches at cemeteries is that, first of all, they are always respectful, and second, you usually have to locate a certain gravesite or marker and learn some history about it to claim the cache.  So it’s a learning experience and is often combined with history, which I always enjoy.  

I had to use information from this headstone for the geocache...

After that I stopped at a nearby college and found this geocache that was hidden in plain sight.  Those are always fun!  This one was quick and easy.  Most people would walk on by and not give it a second thought... 

After that I drove over to Lookout Mountain, which was the biggest reason I wanted to visit Chattanooga in the first place.   I have a keen interest in Civil War history and “The Battle of Lookout Mountain” was a key battle in the Civil War in November of 1863.   I’ve always been fascinated at the thought of the 2 armies engaging in combat on a mountain top 1800 feet above the river.   There’s an Incline Railway that you can take to the top but seats were sold out until 4:00 pm and I didn’t want to wait, so I just drove up the steep and winding road by myself.  It was pretty cool!  Parking is minimal at the top but I got lucky and scored a parking space in the (non advertised) small free lot behind the visitor’s center.   It was really interesting to walk around the ridge and read about the Battles for Chattanooga. 

 The views from up top are phenomenal.   I can’t imagine how they dragged all the cannons up there or how the soldiers even managed to scramble up themselves.    It must have been a sight to behold.   I actually spent a couple hours there, roaming around the trails, checking out the monuments and cannons, wandering through the visitor’s center, and enjoying the views looking out over Chattanooga.   

I still had a couple of hours left before dark so I drove over to Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park.  Wow - It’s a huge place!  I sat and watched a very informative 25 minute film about the battle and then looked at some of the display cabinets...

 

I spent quite a bit of time driving around the battlefield looking at all the monuments and getting out to walk around and take pictures.  There’s a lot of trails through the woods that lead to monuments and strategic battle locations. 

 This monument had some information on it that you had to read and write down to get credit for a geocache at the battlefield... 

But my favorite Monument was the Wilder Brigade Monument that looks like a castle.   

It was open and you could go inside and climb the winding staircase  to the top, which I did – all 136 steps.   I know because I counted them.  The views of the grounds below were quite impressive. 

 It was a gorgeous afternoon and there were lots of people visiting the battlefield.  I wished I had brought along my E-bike.  It would have been a great place to ride it.   

By then it was after 4:00 and I realized that I hadn’t eaten since lunch so I headed back to the campground and heated up some sloppy joes.  I cheated and just crumbled my bun up in the pan on top of the sloppy joe meat and ate from the pan.  You can roll that way when you’re by yourself.   LOL.  I had very little clean up so I was happy...

The forecast was for some rain that night and the next day so I cleaned up my campsite and put away as much as I could so everything wouldn’t get soaked.  Then I took a shower and relaxed with a book for a while.   I am re-reading “Gone with the Wind” which seemed like an appropriate choice given my interest in Civil War battlefields.  I also picked up an interesting sounding book at the Lookout Mountain visitors center so I browsed through that as well.   All in all it was a fun day.

Next post will be all about Rock City!

Ft. Jefferson, Ky.

Yesterday we went on a geocaching excursion and one of the places we stopped was at the former site of Ft. Jefferson in Ky.   Today a commemorative cross stands at the site.  This impressive cross now serves as a beacon to the ships that sail these waters.  Fort Jefferson and its site was steeped in historic events.  Come with me to visit Wickliffe, Ky.

Ft. Jefferson Memorial Cross is located at the confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers.

The cross is 90 ft. high.

Ft. Jefferson was originally built in 1780 by Revolutionary War veteran George Rogers Clark.

After an Indian massacre in 1781, the fort was abandoned.

George  Rogers Clark's brother, William Clark, visited the fort site in 1803 with Capt. Lewis when they were beginning their journey to the Pacific. 

Then during the Civil War, General Grant and Union forces occupied the site...

This is the wall at the base of the cross...

And the donor wall along the walkway...

The views were breathtaking....and extremely windy...

This is Lou and my parents.  Oh yeah, we also found the cache here.  So a history lesson and a cache made for a great stop - See you tomorrow!

The Civil War

My sister is in visiting from Denver, so yesterday we took a ride out to Lake County and went to The Lake County Discovery Museum.  http://www.lcfpd.org/discovery_museum/

One of the things I like about this museum is that they have some very interesting exhibits.  Right now they have one on The Civil War.  I am fascinated by The Civil War.  I have ancestors who fought on both sides (again with that recurring north/south theme of my life...)  and I enjoy visiting battlefields such at Gettysburg and Ft. Donelson.  My favorite book of all time is "Gone With the Wind."  If you have never read it, I urge you to do so.  It is delicious  - it's a love story, a fight for survival and American history centered around the war and is all rolled up into one epic book.  The movie is also really good with Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh.  Clark Gable as Rhett will forever be the man of my dreams - That debounair, devil may care, dashing and mysterious, charming and handsome, elegant man of the south .  Ok, enough about Clark Gable.  "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn!"  Don't even get me started - just go read the book.

There was a brief history...

A genuine cast taken of President Lincoln's face and his hand....  I was amazed at how large his hands were.

A drummers drum.  It was just beautiful actually and very well preserved.

The telegraph and Morse Code played an important part in the Civil War.  The dots and dashes of Morse Code are a mystery to me.  Imagine using that instead of e-mail today?

This was my favorite piece - it was a pipe that belonged to a Rebel spy.

A Commodore's Naval Uniform.....

A Union Soldier's uniform....

Several different kinds of firearms....

A Gatlin gun....

Some period rooms......

Hot Air Balloons were used during the Civil War to gain a unique perspective on the battle fields.  Commanders would go up in the balloons to survey the action taking place far below.  Here's my mom standing in a replica of one of the hot air balloons.

And here's me, being a nut and pretending I am dangling from the rope...

All in all, it was an interesting exhibit and a nice way to spend a cold and rainy morning.  If you've ever visited a Civil War battlefield and enjoyed it, please let me know where you went.  In the meantime, excuse me while I go pop "Gone With the Wind" into my DVD player.