My first view, it was So Pretty!!
At the wild life preserve at the beach
Whew!! We are home sweet home again!! I think Kelly left off with us leaving the ocean!! I fell in LOVE with the ocean!! I just loved it!! I want to live there!! I was so sad to leave on Tuesday morning ....We have pictures of the sunrise coming over the horizon and it is beautiful!
Sunrise at the beach!
We left the beach and drove through Alabama and near Birmingham we had a rock hit the windshield and it caused a rock ding and a small 6 inch crack, we spent about 45 minutes with the rent a car place and got things taken care of and were on are way but not before seeing the iron man statue on top of the mountain with the bare bottom!! On up to a corner of Georgia then into Tennessee and on to the foot hills of the Great Smoky's !!
We went through Pigeon Forge with people sitting out on the side walks in rocking chairs in front of old time cars!! Then over to Gatlinburg. This is when we discovered I had not been out of the minivan enough on the trip up from the beach! My feet were in a horrible mess and I no feeling in them!! The girls put me to bed and we propped them up really high!! By morning I was fine!! of course, this did freak out the kids!!
We went back to Pigeon Forge and took Nancy to the big Christmas shop they have there!! She loved it!! Me too!! I took off with her and the girls lost me!! They asked the clerks have you seen a little lady with a walker go by with another lady!!! Yes they said..... They found their Mom!! It wasn't to much later another lady at the store said I lost my Mother too! Great Store!!
We went to another nature drive in the Smoky's, and drove the 11 miles around the mountains at Cades Cove.... It was just beautiful but I told the girls, lets go... I want to see the Smoky's.. and they said...MOM, what do you think these are?? I meant the views from the tops that you see in all of the stories about the smoky mountains.
After a late lunch we headed up to the Great Smoky Mountain park and the mountains were breath taking!!! it was awesome!
On top of one of them it was almost a mile high and that is when we had to get Nancy portable oxygen out !! We have some good pictures from there!! We continued to drive and drive in these mountains Karen had decided to take the Blue Ridge Mountain Parkway and we were going to Ashville NC but it was getting dark and Karen saw a sign that looked like we could get off the top of the mountains and she was right!! YEAH... the mountain were awesome but after 3 hours of driving through them it was good to see civilization again!! We were very glad that we turned off that curvy, twisty road! Yeah for interstates!!
About a 1/4 mile later and we were on a freeway and stopped in Wayesville NC and then we headed out for Nashville , it was 1:00 AM when we pulled in to our motel and were we ever glad to see a bed!!
Karen took us by the old Ryman's grand ole opery house and down the streets were they record all the country songs.
We took off for home going though Tenn, KY, IL, and into ST. Louis and on to I-70 on to home
Kelly had made CD's that went with all our travels and we sang away part of the trip at the top of our lungs having so much fun!!
My highlight of the trip was seeing the ocean for the first time!! We had a wonderful time and I thank Karen for including us in her plans for a great vacation!!
For Miss Arnold's class we started out in Missouri, into AR,TN,MS,AL. over to LA,back to MS AL, into FL. then up through AL, GA,TN, leaving TN, KY. IL. and MO. Karen can give Miss Arnold all of the highways and towns if you want them.
I've decided I would love to retire to the beach! My son said, but mom you already retired..
I know.. BUT I want to move there!!
Merry Christmas to all my blogging friends! I hope you have a very nice Christmas and wonderful blessed New Year!!
