Blogging From Howard Johnson

In downtown Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Which in my opinion as a customer is the absolute worst hotel I have experienced in a very long time. It is old, in poor repair, not very clean, and noisy with loud neighbors and evidently a hospital or firehouse just down the street because we have experienced loud sirens on both nights. I knew it wasn’t going to be a good choice the minute we drove up to it , but since we arrived late and I knew they had at least one night’s money we checked-in hoping for the best.

The best never came, but I will talk about that later.

The drive to Gatlinburg wasn’t a bad one. Sure the interstate was crowded with obnoxiously orange University of Tennessee fans and truckers, and yes, I spent the whole trip calling everyone in the left lane idiots, but that is a normal trip for me and not at all indicative of a bad time. We picked my middle son up at school at about the halfway point and continued on arriving at the exit for Sevierville/Pigeon Forge/Gatlinburg a little later than I wanted but still early enough to see some of the sights and get a nice meal. Unfortunately, I forgot that the last 30 or so miles through those first two resort towns and on to the Gatlinburg is a very slow, bumper-to-bumper nightmare which took much longer than I thought.

If you’ve never been there, I should tell you that these three towns, which used to be separate, are now just one big strip lined by hotels, restaurants, go-cart tracks, arcades, laser-tag ranges, bungee-jumping towers, more hotels, more restaurants, the amusement park Dollywood, cheap souvenir shops, Welcome Centers (there are several of them - evidently you cannot over-welcome someone to this place), and new trendier shops for over-priced clothes and souvenirs.

So the drive through that area took us well-over an hour with a brief respite through the rolling hills of the a national park that separates Pigeon Forge from Gatlinburg. But just when you think you’re past the traffic you hit the city limit of Gatlinburg and come to a dead stop. Or at least so close to a dead stop that it takes about another 30 minutes or so to go four miles and arrive at our hotel.

Actually it took a little longer than that, but that was the fault of my Garmin GPS which for some reason seemed to tell us to do the exact opposite of what we needed to do to find the hotel once in Gatlinburg.  It would say “turn right” when we should have gone left and as a result we ended up doing a loop through the city at the absolute worst time of day. (It did the same thing Saturday morning when we tried to find a particular restaurant for breakfast. I am going to have to see what is wrong with the thing.)

Anyway, we found the hotel, checked-in, and left for dinner as fast as we could because, like I said, it is a hotel that is not worth hanging around in any longer than you need too. We ate a cheap meal at Pizza Hut and then walked up and down the main drag in Gatlinburg, which is also lined with cheap souvenir shops, hotels, restaurants, and arcades, but also has candy shops where fudge and taffy is made in front of you and high-priced attractions like Ripley’s Believe It or Not museums, haunted houses, and a really nice aquarium, which is also pricey, but worth it.

After a couple of hours we went back to the hotel for what we hoped would be a good night’s sleep but which turned out to be the night from hell. Or if not hell, the next level up. First, the street noise was loud in general which wasn’t helped by the thin walls and ill-fitting door to the room which literally invited every engine right into the room (the door is on the outside). Then we had the guy from Room 103 who stood outside of our room yelling into his cell phone about how “him and Judy” got here yesterday and how they dropped $75 at the Hard Rock Cafe but that was okay because they gave them some free tickets to some show. And then after he ran out of steam, we noticed a mysterious squeaking noise, much like the beep fire alarm low battery warning from the outside the room. My middle-son tried to find the source and he thinks it was coming from a large air conditioner unit (pictured above) on a level below us, but wherever it was coming from, it would squeak about every minute or so, just about the time you were dozing off and waking us up in the process. And finally, there were the sirens. Several over the course of the night, and much more frequent than one would expect from a small resort town.

So with all that I would say we all got about four hours sleep the first night.

Saturday was fun though. Expensive, but fun. There are dozens of choices for things to do along this long tri-city amusement strip, but we just went to a placed called Nascar Speedpark that had all sorts of go-cart racing tracks, a large arcade, a small restaurant, a putt-putt , and some small carnival rides. We dropped $120 plus tax for four all-day access passes, but they were worth it because we did indeed spend all day there racing the various go-cart tracks (some easy and some harder with more complex tracks and larger carts), playing a good game of putt-putt, and doing all the other stuff a few times over.

Oh yes, before that we had a great breakfast at the Applewood Farms Restaurant in Sevierville. It was a little pricey, but excellent Southern food consisting of bacon, ham, fried chicken, pancakes, grits, eggs, home-fries, gravy, biscuits, apple muffins, apple fritters, apple butter, and an apple julep.

It was delicious and filling. So much so that we all skipped lunch.

Anyway, after the breakfast and before the racing we went through the Apple Barn which has all sorts of apple-related craft type stuff and where we managed only to drop a few bucks on some apple butter and some fudge.

Then we went racing.

Are you keeping up.

So anyway, after the racing we came back to Gatlinburg, but that trip took a bit because we got caught up in the same kind of traffic we had on Friday evening. We expected it though so it didn’t bother us much as we just rolled-down the windows and enjoyed the mountain air.

Once back in Gatlinburg we freshened up a bit at the hotel and left to go find a place for dinner. That was a challenge actually, because the town was packed with people and all the restaurants were full with long lines outside. We tried several, putting our names on the list for a few, and ultimately settled on Calhoun’s which is a great steak and rib place.

The wait? About an hour and a half, but with little choice we waited in the cold air of the night. And cold it was - in the 20s - but invigorating, too, and kind of exciting with all the people walking around talking and shopping and just enjoying the evening. Old people with grand-kids, young couples pushing strollers, well-behaved teens flirting, and families laughing.

It was a great time.

And once inside we had some good food - BBQ ribs, pork sandwiches, hot wings, and all the fixens (cole slaw, corn, fries, biscuits, etc.) along with a dessert of some of the best banana pudding I have ever had in my life.

And then we walked the strip, watching the people, browsing shops, and enjoying the many Christmas lights that light up the area at this time of year. (They call the winter lights actually. Not because they don’t love Christmas here, but because calling them winter allows them to keep them up from early November to late January.)

We bought some more fudge and candy as gifts for our neighbors and my son tried some hot sauce at a shop which resulted in intense pain and surprise on his part. He loves hot sauce and considers himself somewhat of an aficionado, but he wasn’t ready for this stuff and when he tasted just a small bit on a pretzel I could see the pain and shock in his face. We are talking eye-watering, red faced-flushed pain, folks, which resulted in his having to run down the street to buy some milk.

It was hilarious.

He is still hurting this morning.

So after an hour or so of walking we headed back to the hotel and settled in for what I hoped would be a better night’s sleep. And to be honest it was a little better. Only one siren and the guy in Room 103 evidently had checked-out, taking Judy with him I assume. Plus, we were quite exhausted and we fell asleep pretty quickly so even that squeak didn’t bother us.

And that brings us up to the moment. Loving wife is dressed and the kids are working on it and as soon as I finish this I am going to do the same and start packing up.

And then we drive home. Slowly with a couple of stops along the way, but home by this evening for sure.

NOTE:  I am going to brush up this post and add a photo when I get home this evening.  I may even spell check it.  Now I gotta take a shower. Okay, here’s the rest of the story.

We packed the car and started home stopping at a Laser Tag place for the boys and then lunch at Burger King.  Then we started home. The drive from Gatlinburg to the interstate was about an hour since the traffic leaving the stip was as bad on Sunday morning as it had been on Friday night. But we didn’t care much as it was a lovely, sunny day and we were in a good mood from a good weekend.

And now I am home and can’t wait to sleep in our own king-sized bed tonight.