Jennifer and I were living under a considerable amount of stress during this chapter of our lives. I had recently commissioned a career consultant to help me network my way from Paintsville to Lexington and was fumbling my way through an intimidating job search. Jennifer too was dissatisfied with her position as a sales consultant and she was putting out feelers for a position that was more congruent with her training as a journalist. Both of us were getting worn down from keeping our relationship going for better than a year across 120 miles, and neither of us had had a vacation since our short burst of activity in Washington, D.C. in July of the previous year. Lacking the finances and confronted by the ongoing difficult logistics of living in separate locations, we decided on another short weekend get-away to celebrate my 27th birthday.
Friday, May 26, 2000: Assembling the Cast of Characters
This time around, we decided on Gatlinburg, Tenessee. This was a destination that could be reached and enjoyed over a weekend, albeit with at least one overnight stay. Since we like the rare opportunities to share travel with friends, we settled on our good friend Paris (known affectionately as Big P or simply “P”). We had a history together as a Creative Team, because we had collectively built and launched a web page dedicated to our college experiences about a year or so earlier.
What's up, P!? Doctoral student, Paris, joins the pre-Thornberries on this weekend excursion.So it was that I traveled to Lexington that Thursday night, while Big P joined us the next day. Jennifer worked a half-day and then came home in time for us to get our cooler packed, the car fueled and our buttcheeks vibrating as the car moved on down the road.
Miles and Miles of…Miles and Miles
The details of the car trip are vague, though we remember it being a fun time of socializing with Big P, whom we hadn’t seen in several months. P lived in Columbus and was working on his Ph.D. in chemistry, but despite the distance and time crunch factors, he still managed to maintain pretty frequent e-mail contact. It was sufficient enough, in fact, that 90 percent of the coordination for the trip was done by e-mail. But it was always nice catching up with P, who shared at least some of my genre interests in music, if not specific artists, and we all had a personal history together from college. The trip was long, as would be expected, but it passed faster with good conversation and good company.
Highway to He-, Uh Sevierville
The Great Smoky Mountains have been a tourist attraction for people from rural areas for at least three generations. Over time, it has gotten quite overgrown with travel and tourism, to the point that traffic there is a worst beast than any of the legendary black bears populating the area in the days of yore. The space between Sevierville and Gatlinburg practically required the Creative Team to get out and butter the car so we could squeeze it between the rest of the coagulated traffic. I swear now that the speed limit there must have been “stop.” If it had gone much slower, we’d have been driving backwards. We eventually heaved a collective sigh of relief as our greased car flopped its way past the blockages and grunted onward to our motel in Pigeon Forge.
Arrival in Pigeon Forge - Where Tastelessness, Tourism and Tobacco Vie
Pigeon Forge almost appears to be the Hillbilly Hamlet of the world. It rejoices in rural redneckism, exalting the Appalachian culture to such a degree that the streets are covered with gigantic garish barns that have neon lights, huge hillbilly heads with straw hats, buckboard wagons that advertise tater tots or industrially mass-produced handmade leather goods. Flashing, beeping, fluttering manifestations of high technology to advertise how humble, rustic and simple it was. You have to appreciate the paradox of this obvious tourist attraction.
We found our motel and checked into our room. Because of cost, Big P had asked if he could split a room with us and use the extra bed. It turned out not to be that big a deal and did offer a more economical way to arrange things. It even allowed us to have a pillow fight somewhere in the course of our adventure, during which time, Big P pounced on top of Jennifer and me and almost flattened us into smears of pre-Thornberry pie.
After unpacking and stretching out the accordion-like damage wrought on our legs by the car trip, we went abroad for a walk through the crowded isolation of Pigeon Forge.In preparation for the trip, Jennifer and I had planned a rare treat for ourselves…cigars! Yes, despite my disdain for smoking as a habit, I’ve learned to appreciate the infrequent indulgence in tobacco as a treat only. In fact, since I am not a smoker, I actually have to time how long I partake of a cigar. Any more than about eight minutes and I develop dizziness and nausea. I think I’d like to keep that tender reaction! Well, Jennifer and I had some delicious cigars from Liquor Barn prepared for the trip, which we lovingly packaged, affectionately placed with our luggage and then confidently walked out the door of her apartment and forgot. As a result, we had to stop on the journey to pick up a consolation prize…a couple of $.50 el cheapo cigars at a gas station.
So it was with cigars in hand that we partook of the hamlet. Cigars, even cheap ones, should never be lit with a lighter. No, they are considered Sirloin steak compared to the fast food burger that is the rancid cigarette and should never have lighter fluid mixed with the flavor of the tobacco. Unfortunately, since we also forgot our matches with those refreshing, scintillating cigars back at Jennifer’s apartment, lighting those cigars ended up being another obstacle course. Few people know it, but for non-smokers, matches and lighters have gone out of style. They are virtually nonexistent. No one has ever heard of them. For some reason, the smokers can always find a way to light up and belch out a billowing cloud for the rest of us to involuntarily chomp and line our lungs like a chimney flue. For us, we couldn’t have traded our left feet for a light. Maybe it’s because we were trying to indulge a treat, while smokers are only feeding a habit. Cosmically, it seems to make a difference in the nature of the universe and the goals one is trying to achieve.
Anyway, after stopping at multiple shops along the way, I think we finally found some cheap-ass long matches. We stopped at a street side bench and struck a match that broke and did nothing. Not to be deterred, we struck another match that broke and did nothing. After about three to four unsuccessful attempts, we finally coaxed fire from wood and stood proudly like old Neanderthals, enjoying our astronomically humble achievement. Ironically, it turned out to be one of the most flavorful, if cloying, cigars in our experience, to the point that Jennifer enjoyed it even more than the fancier, more expensive ones.
The rest of the evening wasn’t that impressive. Just walking around, smoking, talking and in general, unwinding from the ravages of our lives back home.
Our Friend, Big P[izza]
At some point, we decided to order a pizza for dinner. Ever the big-hearted softie, Big P agreed to be the one to go pick them up for us, since the establishment was only a few blocks away. We secretly suspect that he did it to give both himself and us some space. He would repeat that a few times throughout the trip.
Saturday, May 27, 2000: The Gatlinburg Excursion
We rose the next day, had a meal and left Pigeon Forge for our visit to Gatlinburg. The day was cloudy and looked like rain, but otherwise, the trip was basically uneventful. Our strongest impression is based on our more extensive look at many of the tacky shops set up alongside the roadway between the two cities.
Parking in Gatlinburg was about as much fun as we expected, and I believe we eventually settled on a pay-to-park lot that was a multitude of blocks from…well, everything. Nonetheless, I gained some certain degree of bearing by looking up at the gigantic skyneedle that punched a hole in the overarching Smoky Mountain blue.
A long-lived landmark, this image of the Skyneedle was taken by Thomas' father in 1984.That was a landmark I well remember from childhood.
Press Turbo Boost!As young men in the new millennium who were younger boys in the 1980s, Big P and I immediately recognized one of the prominent street side attractions, the Knight Industries Two Thousand, or K.I.T.T. from the action series Knight Rider (1982-1986). This simulacrum was every bit as cool as the old sports car we remembered “turboboosting” over canyons, bikers, lookalike evil twins and giant diesel trucks mounted with super lasers. Naturally, the two of us had to have a picture of it for posterity.
Coming Right Down to the Wire Over the Green Chasm of Death
Jennifer had lobbied in advance for a chance to do one of the other memorable events in the Smoky Mountains: the Skywire! Yes, this was one of those rides that takes you up the side of one of the mountains. It gives a great view, but hangs the riders down from a little bench much like a ski lift. One’s feet dangle over a plunge that ranges from 50 to probably 300 feet. She and I climbed into one cart, while Big P rode the one immediately behind us. I was reasonably sure it was safe, but that steel cable started to seem feebler as it dawned on me that it had become our lifeline. Even steel is too thin when held to that standard! It didn’t help when the cart bounced every so often. I was obsessed with the worry that I’d lose a shoe…with one’s feet dangling over empty space, it seemed a legitimate worry at the time! At one point, as Jennifer and I chattered about nothing, I started to feel like we were leaving Big P out of the conversation. After all, he was back there in his own cart, bobbling up and down and possibly losing a shoe, and he was all alone! So I turned around and one point and just said, “How’re ya doin’ P?” He was fine. No worries. No evidence that he was heading for a death-inducing plunge into the green, hard ground below. All was good.
At the top of the mountain, we had a wonderful view of the city of Gatlinburg. As the cart trundled up to the stopping point, we noted a cleverly placed tourist trap…a camera that snapped a picture of everyone coming up the mountainside. Jennifer took the opportunity to give me one of those cute little smooches that only people in the early days of a relationship can confidently pull off.
Aw-w-w-w, look at the young couple, engaging in an act of PDA!The rest of the experience basically involved avoiding a rampaging swarm of greedy bees that was chasing us around, and warding away the intense sucking of our will and money by the little shop of overpriced goods. I think we may have purchased a lackluster drink and maybe a pretzel or something. Either way, getting there was most of the fun.
The Mysterious Mansion of Cheez
I had been to the Mysterious Mansion as a youth. My brother and I both loved it and had yearned for years to return to it. It was one of the attractions that I had insisted on finding for this trip; my hopes were to introduce Jennifer and Big P to its mysteries. When we found it at last, it even had the old hearse sitting in the driveway, just as I remembered.
ABOVE: The Haunted Mansion, taken by Thomas' father, 1986.BELOW: The Haunted Mansion, taken by the pre-Thornberries, 2000.
My excitement mounted. The cost was still about the same price as it was back then, about $6 per person. Big P opted out of this little excursion, probably because it would punch a hole into our finances, and because frankly, he had a better sense of it than I did. He ended up deciding to walk around the city, with the intent of rendezvousing with us later in the afternoon. Jennifer and I paid our ticket prices and scurried inside.
[Sigh]
The magic was gone. Yes, seen through the eyes of an adult, the Mysterious Mansion was just plain cheezy. Sure, the little gimmick at the beginning was still neat, though I already knew the answer…basically, you walk into a den or study with a fireplace and you’re invited by the resident “spirit” to find the “secret passage” out of the room. So I stood smugly by, letting Jennifer have the challenge and hearkening back to the late 1980s, when I had been the one to find the answer the first time. Eventually, she tried the same thing my young, teenaged self had; she pushed around, testing the old “loose brick” trick that has been the cornerstone cliché of many a cheezy ghost story or whodunit. While there was no “hidden mechanism,” the tactic worked, because the whole fireplace swung inward, exposing a cheezy tunnel, filled with cheezy dark light and cheezy plastic spirits representing the cheezy damned.
Even the creepy “graveyard scene” just looked like bony, desiccated piles of cheeze, sitting around cheezy tombstones. I did enjoy watching Jennifer look startled at the “collapsing balcony,” where you walk out to look down all the floors of the house, only to have the balcony drop about six inches and scare you into thinking you’re plunging to your death.Overall, I still look back fondly on the Mysterious Mansion, but as an entertaining venue for children. I’d still recommend that any parent take their child to it, because it really was quite fun in childhood, at least for a Generation X-er like me. For a Millenial? Well, I dunno….
The Pepper Palace-So Many Ways to Blast Out a Colon
We met back up with Big P, not long after we left the hallowed halls of cheez behind, and spent the
rest of the day walking around and looking at all the souvenir shops around downtown Gatlinburg. They had the usual stuff that said, “Made by the Cherokee Indians” on the top, and “Made in Korea” on the bottom. Of course, no trip could be complete without seeing the taffy-pulling machines in the display windows of the candy shops. Our day would end in one of the little mini-malls, where we found a place called the Pepper Palace. A quaint little shop, it specialized exclusively in hot sauces from around the world. They had some of the tried-and-true brands that one could find in any large-chain grocery store, but they also stocked ones with exotic names we’d never encountered, like Scorned Woman, or Ass Blaster.
At the counter, they had some sauces poured out next to a bag of chips, the intent being for customers to experiment with the flavors and then buy the ones they liked. All of us tried them, though Jennifer naturally chose to keep her tongue from becoming a gelatinous lump that cleaved to her upper palette by restricting herself only to the milder (sic: wimpier) sauces. Big P and I tried one of the most challenging brands, a salsa with the title of Dave’s Insanity. I put a piddly amount on the end of a chip, ate it slowly and tried not to scream. It was delicious, but definitely evidenced a googolplex of Scoville units. True to himself, Big P ate a mouthful on a salty corn chip and tried not to die. He gagged. He hiccuped. He cinched up his pants to keep his internal organs in place. He sloshed from water fountain to water fountain, trying to suck down salvation that just wasn’t to be had. Ultimately, he gave up and just let the affected layers of epithelial tissue blacken, peel and flake away. His misery would be the final cap on the day, as he had to return to the motel room to address the issue in more private circumstances.Jean Claude Spreads His Legs Before Jennifer
Yes, once we were back at our room, we didn’t plan much, so we ended up watching the movie Time Cop (1994) on HBO. It’s a decent action flick, with ol’ Jean-Claude Van Damme having to do a gratuitous stunt-related leg split somewhere in the plot. His leg choreography is almost as necessary to his pictures as the unmotivated bare butt-shots he always manages to sniggle in.
An example of Jean-Claude's gratuitous crotch athletics.Not long after that, we were ready for the oblivion of sleep.
Sunday, May 28, 2000: The Smoky Mountain Park
The next day, we decided to find entertainment in the natural world, before heading home in the later part of the evening. Along the way, we stopped to take a few pictures of the various and sundry landscape scenery.
ABOVE: Thomas and his brother in 1984, stand before the "Chimneys," a geologic feature of the Smokey Mountains.BELOW: Paris stands before the same feature 16 years later; what's 1.5 decades to the mountains?
Jennifer drove us back toward the Smoky Mountain attractions, while I thumbed through the AAA tour book and Big P gave feedback from the back seat.
When Trail “A” is Just Too Wussy
I was the one who struck upon the idea of going out to one of the hiking trails, since my parents had taken my brother and I to the Cades Cove trail back in 1984 and it had been a memorable (if wet) experience. That's me on the left in the picture, by the way.In the book I located documentation about a set of trails that was nearby. They were arranged into categories by level of difficulty, whose descriptions I read aloud to my fellow hikers-in-potentia. Roughly paraphrased:
• Trail A: “This mild trail is one of our most popular, accommodating people of all ages—”
Boring! What’s more, “popular” really means “crowded.” What I envisioned from this trail was a hike with no challenge, except perhaps avoiding the throngs of other people ambling along in a weeble-like manner, along with their noisy children. Moving on:
• Trail B: “This mildly rigorous trail is two miles, and offers a variety of challenging—”
Hm…this one had promise, as we did want a little challenge and at “mildly rigorous,” it would most likely weed out the lazier people or most of the children, while still being well within our abilities to master it. Still, I wanted a point of reference, so I turned the page to the last trail:
• Trail C: “This trail is for the experienced hiker and climber. It requires special equipment and—”
All right, enough of that. We wanted a challenge, not a stroke. So I flipped back to Trail B and pitched my case to the other two members of the Creative Team. And by “pitched my case,” I mean that I wheedled and whined. Regardless of my methods, a consensus was reached and to Trail B we journeyed.
As with the previous day, this one was cloudy and overcast, so I decided to carry my “mighty lance” umbrella, even though I knew it would get quite awkward and tedious to keep a hold of it for the two to three hours we anticipated this hike to take. Other than the camera, we took few other supplies, figuring we’d just be more grateful for them when we got back to the car. We entered the woodsy area where the trail began and started our adventure.
“I Can't Believe We're Not Even Close!”
Remember that description in the tour book, the one that said Trail B was “mildly rigorous?” My ass! It was a 1,700-foot elevation and a two-mile walk. That means we spent most of the time walking at a 20- degree angle and wearing ourselves out. Poor Big P almost collapsed into a boneless mass, but I kept encouraging him not to give up until we reached the top. By “encouraging,” of course, what I mean is “heckling.” He responded by giving me the finger and assuring me that he was most definitely not teasing me. We learned later that he had pulled an abdominal muscle along the way, so it really did give him grief.
After an interminable time period of slogging our way through mud, slippery rocks, lively creeks and so on, we encountered a group of hikers coming back from the other direction. We thought we’d get some idea of how far we had yet to travel, so we asked one of them. His response? “Oh, you’ve got a LONG way to go yet!” That was when a sub-aural groan reverberated off of the boles of the surrounding trees and downward through the continental shelf. Whales rose up off the coast of Maine to investigate. Big P must have put every bit of misery he had into it. I can still remember his statement as he brought up the rear of our little group: “I can’t believe we’re not even close!”
To the credit of the demonic Trail B, it did hold true on its promise of good scenery and adventure. Several times, we veered off to some sight or interesting tidbit, pausing to regain our breath and rest our pulled abdominal muscles and splinted bones. During those spells, we pulled out the trusty camera and took a few memorable images. At one point, we stopped to walk on some rocks in the middle of a rapidly running, shallow stream.
Big P got a treat at that point, because getting back out of that area required a short climb that gave Jennifer trouble; so he got to put his hand on her backside to help push her back up the slope.
Not Jennifer's, but this was a good opportunity to put a gratuitous image of a woman's backside into the story!Bony Tree Roots-The Better Way to Break an Ankle
After walking uphill for virtually the entire hike thus far, Trail B added insult to injury by putting a string of trees right in our path. Apparently, the trail had been subjected to some pretty severe water erosion in the past, perhaps a flood that ran down the mountainside. It had washed away the soil at the bases of said trees, so that they sat atop an above-ground root system that looked like nature’s own perverse jungle gym. There was no going around them, so we had to climb on top of the roots, our legs already fatigued by all the previous climbing. If we had placed a foot in the wrong place, we could have fallen through the roots and gotten badly scraped at best, or a broken ankle at worst. By the time we got past the hellacious roots, our legs had gone from fatigued to jellied. If I stood still, I could feel my knees quivering against my will and my attempts to still them. But the end of the trail beckoned us ever upward…
Spiderman We are Not
After about two and a half hours, we reached the last 30 feet of Trail B. Surprise, surprise, it turned out to be solid rock! Yes, it was essentially a steeply sloped wall that had to be scaled before one could get to the top of the mountain. One of the other returning hikers told us it wasn’t as difficult to traverse as it looked, that if we were careful, “slow and steady wins the race.” At this point, Big P opted out. His muscle injury and the sheer toll the trip had taken on him made it more likely he would just injure himself further if he attempted to go any higher. So we left some supplies with him, taking only the camera and my ever-present umbrella and tackled the last challenge Trail B could give us. Jennifer and I had to climb the wall by fitting our fingers into little cracks and crevices, grabbing small roots when possible and praying that we didn't slip and slide to a painful stop at the bottom.
The Awe Inspiring 360-Degree Panorama of GloomWhen we got to the top of the mountain, it was worth it!! Talk about a panoramic view! In all directions, we could see the undulating trees, the striations of sunlight that broke through the gloomy cloud cover in patterns that were not observable beneath the gloom down on the ground. Jennifer and I just basked in the first bit of sun we’d seen all day and took a few pictures for posterity.
Clunk! The Camera Crashes
At one point, a friendly fellow hiker who had made the final climb noticed me taking an inspiring image of Jennifer as Queen of the Mountain.
That person helpfully offered to take a picture of the two of us together, which we thought would be nice to have in our home, when we someday succeeded in moving in together. We posed in what must have been an angelic scene fit for the heavens…only to have our altruistic benefactor try the camera and then give us a confused look. Thanking them for their help, we took the camera back and found that it had crashed and quit working completely. There would be no way to get any more memorable images of the scene we'd practically killed ourselves to see. Such was the ongoing story of our lives.
Our Legs; Please Amputate Them
The trip back down the rocky slope was even more trying than the one going up, simply because gravity and inertia contributed their ham-handed assistance. At one point, I had to lay my umbrella down on the stone and let it slide back down to Big P, who also helped both of us get to the bottom without smacking the ground with our teeth. Then it was back down, down, down the mountainside, taking exactly as much time as it did to go up. Our poor feet were so tired! By the end, anything below the knee was free game for amputation…honestly, it couldn’t have hurt any more.
Trail B had one last slug to the gut for us. Approximately halfway back, the gloomy clouds that had hung their vaporous butts over our heads all day long finally let loose with a watery diarrhea that threatened to wash us off the mountainside. It was the only part of the day that I didn’t look like an idiot with the “mighty lance” umbrella I had lugged all the way up and back down again, though it was still a pain to hold onto. Coming back down the hiking trail was almost as big a chore as going up had been, because the constant downward slope always threatened dangerous falls…adding rainwater to the mix just made everything so much happier and mirthful. Note the sarcasm.
Finally, we saw the most beautiful sight imaginable:
No, it wasn't this scene of the Smokey Mountains...it was----our car! Yes, wet, sopping, dirty and sweaty, we clambered inside and found our cooler of refreshments. That Pepsi I quaffed was like carbonated heaven! It even helped to take my mind off of my throbbing calves and burning feet.
Although I received much ribbing and heckling for daring to suggest that we take the “mildly rigorous” trail, that kind of climb was truly a test of character and resolve for us all. We were proud we went and held no regrets for it afterward.
Summary and Conclusions
This was an excellent little weekend getaway, one that proved yet again that one can have a good time on a shoestring budget and without taking excessive amounts of time away from work. We shared an experience with Big P, who had remained a steadfast connection long after college and we gained much to add to our ongoing narrative of travel experiences. Thanks for sharing it with us!
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