Friday March 30, 2007

This was our first trip towing the car and we had planned Friday to be a very long driving day.  The longest mileage day we have ever done in the motorhome.  We left Kingston at 7 a.m. and arrived at the KOA Campground at Auburn, Indiana at about 6:30 p.m. It was a long day, we got hung up at the border for a bit, they did a food search in the RV, we had to wait inside while they did it.  Not sure why but in any case they took the potatoes and all the dog food (it contained beef and the potatoes were bulk so they didn't know where they came from and you can't bring potatoes from Quebec). So the dogs had no food when we got here.  We had to go to the grocery store and stock up. It was nice to have the car, and absolutely no trouble to tow it.  We relaxed and got a good nights sleep so we could get away early the following morning.

We got to Nashville about 4:30 p.m. after a good ride down. We left Indiana in the rain but it cleared and was a beautiful drive. The further we went the greener it got, Kentucky and Tennessee have all their trees in blossom and the leaves almost out. There is a tree that we saw all the way that was completely purple with blossoms, very pretty. When we got here it was 26C, it was still quite warm even after the sun had gone down, I think there was a storm in the air.  We got settled in at the Two Rivers Campground and then.. went to the Grand Old Opry our first night in town.  We could only get tickets for the late show but we really wanted to go since Terri Clark and Martina McBride were singing and they are a couple of my favorites.  The Opry show was great, just terrific!

Well we didn't do too much today, mostly drove around picking up a few groceries and stuff for the RV. We spent some time at the Opry Mills Mall and  looked at the other campgrounds in the area.  We ended up moving to the one next door. Zoe was getting too upset at the first one, it was quite noisy and too close to the highway, she was making herself sick. The campground that we moved to,  the Jellystone Park Camp, was much bigger with lots of area for the dogs to walk and was further back from the highway.  It was nice and quiet.  This was a very hot day, in the high 80's.

Another very hot day.  In the morning we drove over the the Grand Ole Opry House to take some pictures of the place and then came back to the park. Gary hired a couple of guys to wash and wax the RV so he stayed while they did that and I went over to the mall for a bit. We ate out tonight at a great Italian place and then came back to the RV. It was a pretty lazy day.

Today was another really hot day but it was forecast to be the last. There were severe storm warnings in the area and the temperature was supposed to drop down to the 50’s. There were tornado warnings earlier but they passed, and only thunderstorm warnings remained.  Zoë was not happy, she sensed the distant rumbling. We went to tour Belmont Mansion and it was quite interesting.  

We had a nice lunch at the Loveless Cafe and then picked up the dogs and went to the Bicentennial Mall.  This time were able to hear the Carillon Tower play.  Then it was time to head back to the campground and batten down in case the storm hit.  We took the awning down and secured everything we could.  We weathered the storm with no damage, it was a little scary at the beginning but then it settled down to just rain and lightning.

This morning we drove out to The Hermitage (home of President Andrew Jackson) and spent a few hours there.  It was a very interesting place and quite remarkable how it has been preserved. This was probably the best historic site I have gone through.  

We sailed on the General Jackson paddle wheeler, where we enjoyed a nice lunch and a show. It was about 3 hours long and we really enjoyed it.  

After that we spent some time with the dogs then went to the Nashville Palace which is a country bar with live entertainment, it was okay but not all that exciting.  Does this mean we're getting old?

This was a cold day!  Records have been set, quite a change from the hot weather we had just a few days ago.   Today we went over to the Opryland Hotel and wandered around through the gardens and then had lunch, it is quite an amazing place. We also went to see the new Disney movie Meet the Robinson’s in 3D, it was pretty good. At night we just stayed in and watched TV.

Saturday April 7, 2007

We had a busy day yesterday and got everything done on our "to-do" list so we decided to get up early this morning and head home a day early. We have lots to do this week before we go away again and really didn't have anything left in Nashville we wanted to do. We spent the whole day on the road and pulled into the Bear Creek KOA campground in East Sparta, OH about 5:30 p.m.  We went out for dinner and watched some TV before bed. In the morning we will winterize the motorhome before we leave since it's still freezing out there. We should be home early Sunday evening.