2013 Big Truck across the Southeast Day 3

Day 2 and Day 3 blended together thanks to a Blackbean Burger from the Mammoth Cave Coffee Shop.  That sentence probably needs a bit more explanation.  Twice during the night I was jarred awake by some strange goings-on, both times it led to Harry Dunn-esque bowl clutching episodes in the Big Truck bathroom.  One such episode was punctuated by me missing my normal foothold getting down from the overhead bunk and nearly swinging through the windshield.  This also caused enough of a ruckus (Could you describe the ruckus, sir?) to startle Kimberly awake, but I had no time to explain.

After all of this worked itself out, we started to pack up and get ready to hit the road.  Jordan was rocking her best CC Deville while she converted her sand toys into wet gravel toys.

 

While we were cleaning up the campsite, a few flying squirrels were apparently battling to the pain above us, dropping walnuts all around us with frightening accuracy.

 

After the normal pre-flight routine, we were just about ready to leave. Yesterday we learned (quick aside - we are not your typical campground family, you have to pretty much barrel into our campsite in order for us to engage, we prefer privacy to community since we are generally transients.)  that our campsite neighbors were also from Michigan, and actually from about 10 miles away from us.  Good luck on your trip, Joe the Mason & family from Robinson township.

 

As we dumped the tanks and made our way out of the park, we bid adieu to Joe & family and got on the road.  At one of our first real roads outside of Mammoth National Park, we ran into more tobacco fields.  I'm sure these are just like cornfields are to us back home, but they were interesting to us.

 

 





 

The backcountry tobacco fields yielded to some good old interstate, and we starting making decent time, working our way toward Bowling Green and seeing signs for the Corvette Museum of America.  Here is brief summary of our time at the museum.

Sorry, I personally don't have a lot against Corvettes, but I am a MOPAR guy first, Ford second, a lot of things in between, and then a Chevy fan.  I asked Kimberly (fully knowing of her hatred for Corvettes) what she thought of the car, and she replied "I just don't like the new ones." Her definition of new ones is anything built in the past 50 years.  All I could think of when driving past the museum was this, a viable candidate for the worst movie & vehicle of all time (unless you count TV shows, in which StreetHawk has the current claim to fame.)

Again we got to cover some beautiful countryside, and our travels brought us 3 hours south rather quickly to this sign.

 

From there things got good in a hurry.  We showed up at the visitors center, nestled in a very picturesque setting.



 

 

Since we had a participant under 21, we could not take the tasting tour (way to go, Jordan) so we took the general free tour.  Our guide was awesome.  I know a lot of people say that on tours, but Ron (more on him later) was genuinely knowledgeable, interesting, and engaged with our group. Here he is kicking things off (no I didn't do anything wrong to earn the point).

 

 

You can't really tell from the photo (or maybe you can, but that would be a frightening level of inference), but Ron was basically a southern combination of John Goodman,

 

Wilford Brimley,

 

and the Dude

 

Having him give the tour made it that much more enjoyable, and he kept everyone into it even though we all knew it was the 5000th time he's told those same jokes.  We were so impressed we asked for a photo afterward.

 

Most of the tour does not allow cameras, but we did get a few shots where appropriate.  After doing a portion of the Bourbon Trail last fall, some of the tour was a recap of the steps to make whiskey, but the charcoal filtering part was new.  Here's a few shots of Jack (in real life he was 5'2") in various forms of tribute.

 

 

 

And a shot of the safe that ultimately led to Jack Daniel's death.  A pretty interesting story if true, look it up sometime.

 

 

When we finished the tour, we took a quick stroll into the town of Lynchburg to check out the souvenirs and grab some lunch. The town is remarkably dependent upon the distillery, and this is the main merchandise outlet for the Jack Daniel's brand.



 

From there it was back on the road toward Chattanooga, and once we arrived at the campground (just after 7pm eastern, long day), of course the first thing we saw was the playground. In this case, it was very different. We've always avoided the KOAs and Jellystones of the world, as they are usually short on site beauty/maintenance/seclusion and long on congestion and Walmart-ness.  That held true in this case, as this was our first KOA due to shortness of stay (12 hours tops) and proximity to destination (<10 min). Here's what we saw.

 

 

Yes, that's Jordan surveying a giant air-filled trampoline, and only after she ran out on it did we realize it had just rained.  She got after it, and after about a half hour of jumping, sliding, and Elaine Benes-like dance routines, she finally had her fill.



 

 

Tomorrow brings the Tennessee Aquarium, and I'm not sure which one of us is more excited. Til then, I present without comment a warning icon that was printed on the side of said air-filled trampoline.

 



 



 

2013 Big Truck across the Southeast, Day 2

Day 2 started with a grand plan, a local mountain bike trail within riding distance of the campsite - until I woke up hearing something we haven't really encountered in 2+ years of doing this. Rain. Since the trail here is basically a red clay base, things were not looking up.  I hoped it was just a sprinkle, so I checked the weather.  Not a sprinkle. We're the blue dot.

 

 

So instead of completely dominating the trail with some Michigan fatbike-ness, I milled around the campsite waiting for the female contingent to wake up.  Even in the rain, the view & setting was great, just a few early morning fishermen and some ducks. I imagined they were Loons just so I could put this link in (just for you, Cliff).

 

 

After some stirring in the Big Truck, we were on our way to Mammoth Cave - normally I can be pretty frantic about getting the maximum possibly efficiency out of a National Park visit (see Kimberly for elaboration), but today we had no agenda other than a reservation for the New Entrance tour in the afternoon.  The way there proved to be adventure enough.

 

We're camped about 15 min away from the park, so we assumed the drive there would be uneventful, especially since we were detached & running with just the Jeep.  At the first intersection, we encountered this.

 

 

 

After reading the sign, I immediately thought of Quagmire's RV.  Read that thing! There are unlimited jokes there.  I can only assume that the store was run by this guy. 

 





 

With the local flair behind us, we made a few comments about the road being similar to yesterday's, then we encountered this sign.

 

 

I can only describe my reaction by this video clip.

 

 

Around the next bend, we saw this scenery enshrouded in mist, and you may be able to predict the next reference...

 

 

 

....no idea if a spoiler alert is necessary for a novella that was written by Stephen King in 1985 and adapted into a crappy movie in 2007, but regardless, this is what I thought of...

 

 

 

Anyway, back to the story at hand. Strange road sign, misty road, then we crest a hill and in unison say "Is that a..."

 



 

while we are both terribly vexed, the nice GPS lady says something a GPS shouldn't know.  She says "In 500 feet, board the ferry".

 

 

So we sit there for what seemed like 5 minutes, until finally I managed a "well, I guess we just board the ferry then."

 

 

The ferry operator was really cool, we asked him if the get much traffic, and he checked the log and said we were the 65th since 6am.  It was 9am. Just a strange experience all around, not something I was prepared for, although now the sign made a lot more sense.

 

Finally we arrived at the park, snapped the obligatory picture (Kimberly hates these, but years from now it will make a cool book that Jordan will look at for 5 seconds), and headed into the vistors center.

 

 

 

We checked out the display/self guided tour inside, and had one of those old age moments.  Jordan picked up this and said, "Dad, what is this?"

 

 

I simply explained that it was an early version of a telephone.  Upon further reflection, I should have told her that it was one of the instruments I used as a 6th grade pasty ginger to arrange a trip to see Rocky IV and Spies Like Us in the theater with the woman I am currently related to via marriage. Not sure if she would have understood.

 

Next up - the New Entrance Tour of the Mammoth Cave system.  I won't bore you with tons of underground cave pictures, but there were a few that stood out.  Jordan started out a bit nervous, as you may be able to pick up on here.

 

 

 

 

 

once we worked our way downward, she got a lot more comfortable and of course wanted to climb on everything. This particular tour takes you 252 feet below the surface, to the point you see here.

 



 

 If you look up from that point, you see a ceiling full of stalactites.  All I really saw was the inside of the mouth of this guy*

 

 

*why yes, huge nerd, that is the Exogorth from The Empire Strikes Back attempting to eat the Millenium Falcon.  "This is no cave!"

 

Our tour guide Terry was an interesting fellow, he stated that he is an original SE Kentucky resident, a 5th generation tour guide of the cave system, and that his Great Grandfather was a part of the Eminent Domain campaign to establish the park's existence.  According to him, the terms of the Eminent Domain were $28 (yes, 28 bucks) for the land and 16 months to vacate it.  His story seemed genuine, and he claimed that the cemetery up on the hill contains most of his lineage.

 

On the way back to the campground, I couldn't resist a pic of this sign.

 



 

Once we returned, I started to battle with some hopelessly waterlogged firewood, then saw a lightning flash so we quick ran down to the lake to see this.

 

 

That pretty much sent us into the Big Truck, and as I type this we are getting pummeled.

 

 

 

Tomorrow brings a visit to the Jack Daniels Distillery in Lynchburg, TN (Kimberly doesn't drink often, but when she does it's Jack & diet), then on to Chattanooga to check out the Tennessee Aquarium on Wednesday.

 

Day 2 is just about enough into the trip to feel like we're really on vacation.  Looking forward to the rest...



 





 

 

 



2013 Big Truck across the Southeast, Day 1

Today marks day 1 of the 2013 excursion.  Things went off pretty smooth, with only 1 trip back into the house needed after we were all ready and locked everything up (forgot the GPS, relatively minor convenience item...).  Here's the setup, all ready to eat miles and collect bugs, and convert Big Oil into gas station receipts.

We didn't get far and Jordan dropped right back into her routine.  If you've followed previous versions of these trips, you know Walter and Giraffe (still has done nothing noteworthy enough to earn a real name - not exactly expecting much effort now) have been her companions on every trip.  Here they are helping her play with Mom's phone.  I'm fully expecting a $15k iTunes bill now.

 

Once we got moving, we started settling into our roles (mine is to never, ever leave the driver's seat) and before we knew it we saw this sign...

 

 

...and immediately thought of this.

 

 

A slight digression (yeah, this whole blog is one of those, bear with this one) - as a Michigan grad I did a horrible job of planning this trip.  Not only did we drive straight through South Bend, but our return trip has us crossing through the worst state ever. As a countermeasure, I may pick one of these up and wear it as we pass through.

 

The next few hours were flat, boring, one of the worst stretches of road around.  US31 to 465 to 65S is a mind-numbing route, but the most efficient for us.  Would it kill the state of Indiana to fill in a pothole every few decades? One suggestion would be to recycle all of the foreclosure signs and use them as a filler (too soon???), but needless to say there wasn't much to see from Michigan to Kentucky.

 

Once in Kentucky, zany hijinks ensued.  We hopped off the highway to start heading toward our Nolin Lake State Park destination, and immediately thought we had made a mistake.  The road was one of the narrowest I have ever driven, and had speed limit signs that made us laugh out loud - I nearly went off the road at the first curve marked '45 mph' when we realized it was actually this.

 

 

 

After meeting a few trucks/trailers nearly head on, we quickly learned that the preferred tactic on this road is to drive down the center until you encounter traffic, then slowly meander toward your lane just prior to breaking each other's driver side mirrors off.  Here's a shot that doesn't do it much justice...

 

 

...but you can probably understand how we picked up a few souvenir branches on the mirror stalks.

 

 

 

 

After this things got weird.  We were following this winding road all through the scenic (hilljack - more on that in a minute) backcountry, when the GPS lady kindly suggested we take a right at the next insection.  This one.

 

What may appear in the photo to be a road felt like a cart path at the local municipal course.  It was about a foot wider than the motorhome, and around 2 more bends there was a STREAM RUNNING ACROSS the road.  Sorry to go all bro-caps shouting, but this made no sense to us.  The pavement on this 'road' was maybe a year old, no lines, and yet here's a stream running across it - it may as well have been a driveway.  Here are a couple of shots - there are no shoulders, so we went about 10mph wondering what was going to happen when Tickle from Moonshiners wandered into the road.

 

 

 

Following one of the hills, we roosted a pack of turkey vultures that looked a little larger than a St. Bernard.  I was only quick enough on the camera to get a pic of the last one*.

 



*why yes, nerd, of course that's the Witch-King of Angmar from the assualt on Minas Tirith, not a turkey vulture.

 

Finally we made it to the campground, and what pleasant surprise.  This place is very well maintained, huge sites backing up to Nolin River Lake (not kidding - they couldn't decide), and perfectly level!! No one wants to screw with leveling a motorhome after battling goat paths and the Nazgul, so little things like a level site are worth mentioning.

 

A quick shot of the site and it was off to the playground.

 

 

 

To top it all off, I found out this park has a mountain bike trail right near the entrance of the campground, so if anyone else is dumb enough to be riding the trail at 7am on a Monday, they're going to get this move (hyperlinked for the mobile crowd) pulled on them. Or not.

 



 

Then we're off to Mammoth Cave, or as Jordan said, "are we going to the mancave tomorrow?"

 

More to come, hopefully the humidity tomorrow is less than the current 100.1%.

 

2013 Big Truck across the Southeast, Day 0

It's finally here - can't wait to get on the road again. The 2013 version of our annual Griswold vacation is going to cover some territory in the southeast, or mid-Atlantic, or SEC country, however you want to look at it.

Trip planning is complete, save for a few details on the final day or two. Some upgrades to the rig from last year, most notably in the A/V system.  We finally ditched the sweet VHS/DVD/TV combo, featuring tube technology (sorry, if you don't get the Tenacious D reference there I can't help you).  Other organizational updates have helped us be much more efficient on the road & during setup/takedown.  Kinda feels like this now.

A few other things are different this year, Jordan's a year older and now has her 'white tire bike' for big girl rides in the campground.  She is also tall enough to touch the floor when she's swinging on the loft, I'm positive you'll see pics of this once we get on the road.  I've also added the Fat Bike to the stable, so we'll be swinging through the Dupont State Forest area for some trail rides as well as a lot of beach riding along the ocean.

Final prep is happening as I type, we're saying goodbye to Reggie for 2 weeks (Thanks Takas family!), giving everything a once over, and reading up on details for some off-the-beaten-path adventures along the way.

Here's the rough trip route, as always subject to change.

I've also been informed that while we pack the final items, we're going to break in the A/V system watching this, which has become a staple in our household lately.

 

 

Tomorrow's post should be far more interesting, as we should be at Nolin Lake State Park and may even get a sneak peek at Mammoth Cave National Park before sundown.  Til then, root for this guy tomorrow in the PGA Championship. Finely tuned athlete.