St. Augustine, Orlando, SeaWorld, and the Nashville Floods of 2010

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Tuesday, a resort day

Yeah, did I say we’d do Walmart in the morning? In my vernacular, “getting going in the morning” – especially when we have to buy stuff to make lunch! – means “get out the door prior to 10:00 a.m.” In hubby’s vocabulary it means, “walk out the door before 11:59.” This was morning by hubby’s definition.

A friend of mine who hits Disney at least once a year particularly recommended the Walmart on Vineland as having lots of cool Disney stuff for cheaps. It doesn’t look that far away from the Fountains on the map, and it’s actually closer than the other one he went to, but hubby was grumbling about the distance long before we got there. I think hubby really needed to have lunch before we went to get the groceries for lunch, if you know what I mean.

We walked in and there was a big beach towel display and I said, “You know, the kids really need new beach towels.” And he had to admit that was true, but now we were right off the list, first thing. They had Disney towels, but middle daugher picked out one dolphin towel and, after much waffling between the other dolphin towel and a shark towel, youngest daughter went for the dolphins as well. Second son was sad, because he had gotten a new beach towel from his godmother recently (also sea-themed, but admittedly not as cool as the ones we were looking at), meaning his dad wasn’t going to pony up for his towel, and he already had plans for spending every cent he had at SeaWorld. So no new towel for Second son.

While the girls picked out their towels, I got my glasses fixed at the little optometrist shop there. They found me a screw that fit and got me all set and didn’t charge me a thing, so that was nice. Then we went looking for the Disney section, and while there was a nice selection of clothes, I kinda think it was less that it had the biggest Disney selection in town, and more that it had the biggest Disney selection of stuff she liked to get. But we managed to find a few things.

I got a Tinkerbell mug. Aside from pins, I hardly ever get Disney stuff for myself because I’m so picky and can never find anything I want bad enough to justify finding the space for it, but I do collect mugs and use them, and I like nice big ones if I can get them; this one's 16 oz.



If you can look past the startlingly pink bear, you may be able to see the Tinkerbell t-shirt middle daughter got.


(Taken at Knotts Berry Farm by my SIL)

She also got two t-shirts based on the Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland – this one with the cat:


(Taken at the Impressions 5 Museum in Lansing, MI - which used to have the best deal everl for memberships; you got into both ASTC and the Association of Children's Museum. Now you just get ASTC, but the kids are older so still a good deal for us.)

She wore the third one, which remained her favorite, the next day to SeaWorld. Although the color’s been faded so you can see her face.



His Disney Duty done for the moment, hubby happily left his least favorite Walmart in the world and we went back to the condo and had pizza. Then, after hubby had rested from his labors (shopping with the family is hard!), we headed out to Downtown Disney

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Another Exciting Shopping Post

Hubby was actually looking forward to Downtown Disney, because there’a a Lego store. Shortly after he set up his house with all his junk, someone broke into it. :sad1: When a friend heard about it and asked, “So, did they get away with much?”, hubby replied, “Just a couple of cameras. Fortunately, they didn’t find the Lego.” So that tells you what he thinks of Lego.

However, while doing this write up, I remembered I had him take bunches of pictures of Downtown Disney, only I couldn’t find them, and since he can’t find them either, he’s starting to think the card may have been in a camera that was stolen. ARGH. He doesn't really care because he was only taking pictures at my direction and there were none of the kids, but I was kind of disappointed.

So we parked down by Disney Quest and then took the boat to the other end. I love Disney boats. I like riding in boats and actually quite like canoeing, however I hate being in the sun. I'm not even that happy being out on a cloudy day; I want shade. OTOH, I don't like to be down in the middle on the lower deck on one of those touristy boats where the upper deck is open and the lower shaded, so I just don't go on boats much. But Disney shuttle boats are a great size and there's a shade but you're right by a window and, I dunno, they're just one of my favorite things and this was my first ride on one. So I was happy.

Hubby either likes boat rides or is smart enough to just smile and nod at my enthusiasm, but certain children are all, "Okay, so we parked down there when we wanted to be up here because you wanted that boat ride? Whatever, mom."

We actually didn't wander Downtown Disney much, but we did spend a fair while at the Lego store and area. We had to check out the Lego Sea Monster (whose name is "Brickley", btw), of course. He was really faded but we enjoyed him anyhow:


from here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/3518251...n/photostream/

And of course I forgot to ask hubby to take pics of it again in 2011, but I can at least report it is now all bright and colorful again.

I loved the “windows” in the Lego store, which I think are gone now, but of course I can’t find my favorite in a format I may put in the thread, however here is a link to a lovely big copy of Sydney:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/1stwave...7624704939784/

It’s the dog sled, I don’t know why that cracks me up, but it does.

If you care to click through to the larger copies, he’s got all of them here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/1stwave...939784/detail/

And we hit the World of Disney store because I was in search of Disney earrings. But really, what I wanted is essentially Disney pins for the ears -- I wanted bright, dangly enameled Disney characters. What I found on the Internet for the longest time was just silver this and cubic zircona that -- I like gold better than silver, but even so, the only "plain" gold earrings I have are black hills gold, meaning they're gold and green and red. I like colors, but Disney was not serving me well.

Finally, I found exactly what I wanted on E-Bay. This guy:



Okay, so admittedly we're not talking bright colors like blue or green or purple, but Thumper's personality is colorful enough his coat can be a little plain, IMHO. I was so excited to find these! I think the same seller had another set of someone I was less enamored of, which I didn't buy, but the next time I went looking, back to nothing again. Nothing direct from Disney, nothing on e-Bay, nothing. So I hoped I'd have better luck at the store, but, even though I pointed to Thumper and asked, the clerk was no help at all.

That's because my Thumper is actually Disney charms someone strung into earrings on their own. Took me over two years to figure that out! Finally someone said something on the Dis that got me looking in the right direction, and I tracked a bunch of charms down. Now I'm eying the Marie charms on Your WDW Store, and thinking about taking up jewelry making. I keep searching e-Bay, hoping that same seller will come back, but all I ever find are a bunch of people selling earrings made with cheap Disney knock offs. So I'm thinking either I make my own, or I'm not going to get any. *sigh*

Actually, I think we all left without buying anything. Hubby drooled over the Lego, but he only gets his on sale, and the kids were saving their cash for SeaWorld. So we took the boat back, watched a janitor draw a Mickey Mouse on the side walk, and headed home. Middle daughter and I had to rest up, because Wednesday, we were going to the Magic Kingdom. And hubby had to rest up, because he was going to have to entertain the rest of the troops. Heh. Although actually I think they hit the pool before bed, which was pretty busy so not what I call restful but they found it refreshing.

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Disney Day

Only middle daughter and I were going to the Magic Kingdom. I’d originally planned to do just SeaWorld this trip, since we were only going to be there in Orlando for four full days, but then they came out with the Give a Day, Get a Day promotion, and we couldn’t resist. While there were a couple of possibilities at places we’ve volunteered with before, they were in the summer, and I was afraid the tickets would be gone much sooner, so we signed up to help tutor kids after school. Geek dad couldn’t work those hours, and no one else was interested – er, well, actually it was more than that. Eldest son, who does probably more volunteer work than any of us, adamantly refused to volunteer where we were right up until I told him that the Give a Day promotion was over – once there was no “danger” of getting a ticket to WDW, then he started coming along to help.

Hubby was going to drop us off, so middle daughter and I decided to forego the monorail or boat ride from the Magic Kingdom parking lot and have him drop us off at the Contemporary Resort and walk over. And a lovely walk it was, quiet and cool, with the monorail overhead. Went to the ticket window with my driver’s license and middle daughter’s birth certificate; the guy behind the counter handed us to “Honorary Volunteer” buttons while he processed the info. Why “honorary”? If we weren’t actual volunteers, one assumes we couldn’t have gotten those tickets. But whatever, he handed us the tickets and we went through the turnstile.

Correction. I went through the turnstile. Middle daughter’s ticket didn’t work. What I saw on the digital read out was something about “special Shell ticket,” but whatever it was, it was also “rejected.” The lady CM who came over to help us said it was coded for the day before, opened a gate and told me to come out through it, then took us back to another ticket window. After ten minutes or so of futzing around, they gave middle daughter a different, flimsy, entry ticket (the first one was hard, like a credit card). This one worked just fine, so we were finally both in the waiting area.

We were plenty early. I got us our “First Time” buttons at the kiosk, and got a muffin or cookie or something as well; waiting always goes better with food, right? People were lining up at the gates but we stayed out front and center for the opening show. The gates open during the show, and we were off season enough the crowds had thinned considerable by the time the show was over. Before we got there, I’d been all wound up about the scaffolding at the entrance (they were setting up the new meeting places for Mickey and the Princesses), but didn’t even notice them until we were past it and looking for Lady and the Tramp’s footprints in front of Tony’s – facing straight back out, I could hardly miss the big blank wall! But not a big deal, really.

So we wandered down Main Street, got our first view of the Castle, not noticing the scaffolding in front of Casey’s Corner, either. We were walking through the queue area for Pirates of the Caribbean, and I remembered how middle daughter hated the flume ride at SeaWorld, so I thought I’d warn her about the drop in PotC, and reassure her that it was tiny, tiny (since as I recall you can’t see the whole thing when it starts). She stopped dead and I had to talk pretty fast to keep her from backing right out of there! But I got her on it and she loved it, of course.

Then we did the Jungle Cruise, which I love, and she thought that was terrific as well. She liked the corny monologue; I really like having a live human narrator for some reason, but I also like the waterfalls:


from here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/is0b31/...n/photostream/

Plus it's shady and a boat (on a rail, but still...). What's not to like?

And we did the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse, which she liked (she’s since seen the Tarzan one at DL and thinks the Swiss Family Robinson treehouse is best by far). I think we hit the pin kiosk, then hung around until the Pirate Tutorial.

This is where I’m kicking myself. I’d seen pictures and movies of the Pirate Tutorial, and all I’d ever seen, it was always younger kids – usually three little ones, then a kid of nine or so. Middle daughter was twelve, and people say she looks older, so I didn’t think her odds were too good. I wasn’t too worried about it – she’s been auditioning for ballet for years, so she get the whole “only so many kids get to do it” thing.

But I was totally wrong.. Not only was she picked, but she got to fence with Jack himself! And I have no pictures. *sigh* She wasn’t upset, though. She says she has her membership paper to remember it with. Which, yeah, true. But, man, I wish I’d brought my camera. :sad2:

The tutorial over, we went on to Tom Sawyer Island. The Old Mill was one of my most favorite-ist Disney shorts as a kid - it was their first experiment working with the multi-plane camera, but I love it for itself. It's like a really long music video, all mood and pretty and appealing characters.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYEmL0d0lZE

I still like it as an adult, and the mill on Tom Sawyer Island has a bit inspired by one of the iconic images from that movie, although they’ve change the angle of the gears, so we had to go track that down first thing, then we wandered the island and explored the caves and all. Although apparently there's a waterfall there we missed.

Middle daughter had a great time on Tom Sawyer Island, however this is where she most missed having her siblings along. She was playing in the Fort and I went down to sit on the rocking chairs below, so I could watch the runaway trains on Big Thunder Mountain, but that didn’t last very long, I think because the kids she was playing with wandered off on her. So we headed back to land and had an early lunch at Columbia Harbor House. The food was good but our choices were kind of boring – I had the shrimp and middle daughter the chicken tenders I think. We ate upstairs by the window and our lunch was quiet and peaceable, but we stopped in shortly after noon to use the bathroom and it was a mob scene! The bathrooms in the passageway from Adventureland were closed off, though (which is why we were there), so I’m sure that was part of it.

We headed through Adventureland to get some Dole Whip for dessert, then wandered off to Main Street in hopes of finding a glass blower at Crystal Arts. They didn’t have anyone blowing glass, but there was a guy using a blow torch on a glass rod to create blobs of glass and constructing Cinderella carriages with them. I am not a fan of the lacy blobby stuff he was making but it was interesting to watch.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28495936@N03/6521367667/

Got to chatting with the guy doing the etching but had to confess I really like Chihuly and brightly colored stuff, so not likely to buy any of the stuff he was working on. It was pretty, though. Maybe I should have tried harder to visualize it with a bright red or purple drink in it!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/2849593...n/photostream/

About that point middle daughter heard the music for the trolley “parade”, so we ran out to watch that. It’s really just a brief song and dance thing, but I’m a total sap for that kind of thing, while middle daughter’s always up for watching group dancing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEmdCl3YAME

We wanted to hang around the hub because the Move It, Shake It parade was due soon, and that was one of middle daughter’s top five, so since I wanted to check out the historical stuff in the waiting area for the Hall of Presidents but didn’t do the show, I thought we’d do that right quick. I wandered the rotunda while middle daughter crashed on a nice padded bench; barely noon and she was wiping out on me! This may be an unexpected side effect of the fact that I’d planned four of her top five in the morning; my “Absolute Must Dos” were all things around the castle that are available pretty much any time, so I hadn’t prioritized then very highly.

Anyhow, she rested while I checked out the paintings and displays around the rotunda. We must have just missed a showing because there was nobody in there, but since we weren’t interested in seeing a show we weren’t bothered by that. In this next picture the photographer has fiddled with the coloring a bit, but I think this picture still gives a nice feel for how quiet and peaceful it was:


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/unclegregrocks/5371641698/

There weren’t even as many people as in the picture there. It was just us and the CMs, and one of the CMs wandered over to talk to me. As this photographer notes, the Hall of Presidents in the MK is the only place allowed to have the big Presidential seal displayed like that – it’s part of the rug, but of course you don’t get to walk there!


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wyscan/14229387/

I must have been really distracted by middle daughter’s exhaustion or the conversation with the CM, since I barely remember what I saw. I was most interested in the First Lady Dresses, but looking at the pictures I don’t even remember them. Need to get back! Although I do remember the picnic basket, I think:


from: http://www.disunplugged.com/2009/06/...magic-kingdom/

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Disney Day Continued

Finally hauled middle daughter to her feet and we went out for the Move It! Shake It! Parade. I only walked far enough to sat on a bench with her back pack and she went out and danced and had a good time while I talked to someone sitting nearby. I thought she’d revived but when she got back to my bench she was ready to go home! I convinced her we needed to do the castle area first. We were heading for the rose garden when middle daughter realized she’d lost the backing for one of her pins (fortunately one with two spikes). I’d planned on picking up locking backs while we were there anyhow, but now she was in a panic to get that done.

So we were up to the stuff I'd most wanted to do, but buzzed through the rose garden much faster than I’d wanted to go. Middle daughter thought it much too hot out there in the sun, and I would have preferred it cooler as well. Afternoon is definitely not the best time to be there; next time I'm scheduling it for the early morning.




both from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/shootsnikon/504014884/
LOTS of pretty rose garden pics there

It has Angel Face, which is like my favorite rose ever:


from here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bigbria...n/photostream/
Which has a lot of great rose garden pics, too…

Despite our speed, I managed to see a waterfall I didn’t know about:


from here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stephan...n/photostream/

And these topiaries are intimidatingly tall – see the adult person walking through?


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bigbrian-nc/3121763464/

Middle daughter was holding her pin so I dragged her off to see the wishing well – which unfortunately meant passing the smokers’ area. :sick: Lot of smokers at that hour for some reason, so they were kind of spread out: yet another reason I want to do this part of the park first next time.


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vanessa...hy/2313238955/


from:http://www.flickr.com/photos/3278137...n/photostream/

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Disney Day Ends

We stopped in at a store behind the castle and asked after locking backs for pins, and were directed to a cart over against the Great Wall where the new Fantasayland stuff is being prepared. First we ducked into the castle passageway to check out the mosaics – something about Cinderella in this one always makes me think of a Disney coloring book I had as a kid:


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/1822126...n/photostream/

And here’s an artsy shot of one of the mosaics I particularly like:


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/32006938@N04/4018231104/

Another reason I want to go to Fantasyland first next time is so we can walk through the castle “proper” -- they shut the passageway for the shows during most of the day.

Then we went over to crown Cinderella at the water fountain:


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/harshlight/5310783049/


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/allegra...n/photostream/

And finally we headed for the pin trader cart, middle daughter moaning and groaning about having to go into the sun the whole way. Usually I'm the one whining about the sun, but she took the prize that day. I think she'd forgotten her sunglasses and hat, but it's also kind of a shock coming from the shaded areas in Adventureland and even Liberty Square into that expanse of concrete which is Fantasyland.

We got our pin locking doodads, neither one of us could see to work them in the sun so we ducked into Pinnochio Village Haus and finally got her pin locked in there. So she was happier – right until I proposed we head over to Tomorrowland and do the Buzz Lightyear ride. She looked at that expanse of concrete and sunshine and completely balked. She wanted to GO, now. I suggested we head back to Liberty Square and get a snack, since sometimes she stalls out like this just because she’s hungry and doesn’t know it.

We stopped at Sleepy Hollow and got a funnel cake, and she even talked me into getting the strawberries and whipping cream. I don’t usually like the goo strawberries are in when you get that kind of thing but we both liked this one fine. Tried to find a picture of one like it but couldn’t – I don’t know if we paid for extra whipping cream or if middle daughter charmed the CM or what, but, unlike the pics I can find, you could barely see the strawberries for the covering of whipped cream. It was great, and middle daughter did revive considerable, however it was still hot and she was still ready to go, so we headed for the gate.

First we got a ride on the train, of course, which we both enjoyed. She was fine with anything that kept her in the shade, let her sit for a while, and was RIGHT THERE. Then we took the monorail to the TTC, out to Epcot and back, and then the rest of the way around the Magic Kingdom loop, finally getting off at the Contemporary. I love the Contemporary all kinda lots – back when they built the MK, I thought the Contemporary the coolest thing ever. The Poly was so thoroughly off my radar, I was surprised as an adult to discover it had been built at the same time. I like the Poly, but the Contemporary remains “the” Disney hotel in my mind. So I was just as excited getting off the monorail at the Contemporary as I had been walking into the MK. :cloud9:


from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7411850@N04/5382238898/

We had a snack at the Contempo Café – I thought middle daughter’s gummi worm cake much too dry, but she was happy with it. I can’t remember what I had; it was fine, but unexciting. I was just happy to be sitting there, sipping my milk and looking up at the Mary Blair mural. Ballet Girl wasn’t interested in going back to the park and I was fine with heading home at that point, as well.

I meant to come back that evening for the fireworks but when it came to it middle daughter wasn't enthused. I should have just dragged her off and we probably would have had a great time, but OTOH I wanted to get going early the next day, which would be easier if we didn't go for the fireworks and all, so whatever. Middle daughter is the most extroverted of the lot, but we all do better when there's a resort day in between our park days.

[lawren2 Malibu Beach Barbie & A Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close lawren2]

Thank you so much for this fabulous report. Even though I personally would rather have splinters inserted under my fingernails than go to Orlando, it was a delight to read and the pictures added a lot of interest. Good job!

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Thanks so much for your your report! The photos were so nice to see. Orlando does have some wonderful timeshares.

Dori

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Thank you for your kind words, ladies.

Even though I personally would rather have splinters inserted under my fingernails than go to Orlando

That's how I thought I felt about Wisconsin Dells. Then hubby's boss gave us a free week there, and I managed to find plenty I enjoyed. Might even take one of the boat tours someday. :wink But I confess part of the reason I so enjoyed it is that CMV is well outside town; not sure I would have been as easily pleased with a smaller unit on the strip (or whatever they call that area).

The one thing I really wanted to do in Orlando that trip, that we didn't get to do, as the Morse Museum for the Tiffany chapel. But I got to do that next time, so it's all good. My grandparents spent their winters in Florida, and between that and the fact that I've been dreaming about going to Disney World since they built the place, I'm okay with Orlando, as long as it isn't summer. Don't think I ever want to go in the summer; I thought it was hot the two times we went, and we went in April and May!
I don't even want to think about what that place must be like in the summer.

Orlando does have some wonderful timeshares.

It does! For this northerner, some of the timeshares look worth doing even if I lose interest in any of the other stuff to do there. I'm expecting to be hauling grandkids around once my own kids get older, and there are a lot of TSs with great pools and the like in Orlando area that are pretty easy to get into off season. And of course there are the DVC resorts, which are not so easy to get into and pricier to boot, but some of those look stunner!

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Second seaworld day

Thursday was out last day in Orlando. Eldest daughter wanted to stay home while the other kids went to SeaWorld – she values the chance to have a unit to herself – but I decided to go to SeaWorld for a half day, although I did want the afternoon for doing laundry and getting packed and all. But I wanted to pick up the shows I’d missed.

We did Pets Ahoy, which I quite liked – some people wonder why there’s a pet show at SeaWorld but it makes perfect sense to me in light of their efforts to rescue critters and raise people’s awareness to the plight of animals at the mercy of man. Sea creatures suffer for our acts, but for the most part live their own lives. Domesticated critters are totally dependent on us, so suffer even more when people don’t treat them well.

And we did Clyde and Seamore, or, as middle daughter calls it, The Show with the OTTER.



And there are some seals and walruses and humans in it too:



I would have liked it better if it hadn’t been WAY TOO LOUD. The sea otter, of course, was well behaved and quiet.

As we were leaving the stadium, a lady just ahead of us was talking to her kids about the show, and repeatedly called the otter a weasel. Middle daughter made a visible effort not to correct her, and later, when I commended her for her restraint, she burst out, “I can’t believe she got it so wrong! It says right on the map 'Sea Lion and Otter Stadium'!” The only thing middle daughter doesn’t like about SeaWorld is their grave lack of an otter exhibit. Our local zoo put in a river otter exhibit this past year or so, which does make it easier to take.

Before I left SeaWorld for good, I went shopping, picked up a couple of mugs. One with an otter on one side, and some orcas on the other.





And this yellow guy, which was on sale:



While my Seaworld-obsessed son was debating his purchases, I got to see The Groove Chefs, who I enjoyed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYvUx_FPeeo

There’s apparently a comedy team wandering around as well, but of our family, only eldest son has seen them, and he was woefully vague on when or where. According to this article, they are in the Waterfront Area too:

http://www.insideseaworld.com/laught...aworld-orlando

SEAWORLD TIP: The Groove Chefs and the Longshoremen perform in the Waterfront area periodically.

Shopping done, we all went home for lunch, then hubby took most of the kids back to SeaWorld while I stayed home with my eldest, did laundry, and sat out on the porch watching Lake Eve until the cigarette smoke from next door drove me back in.

Hubby and the kids did Blue Horizons again. This time, both younger daughters sat in the splash zone. They were surrounded by Red Shirts...



but survived somehow.



Although the false killer whale did laugh at them.

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Second Seaworld day BLUE HORIZONS CONTINUED

The dolphins were suitably lively:





And the parrots hit all their marks:







Dunno what all they did after Blue Horizons (I'm guessing the watched the orca show again but, if so, hubby has no pictures of it), but hubby made a point of taking lots of pics of the carousel because, right before I left, I realized I hadn't seen it yet and decided I didn't care enough to traipse across the pond to check it out. Turns out he cared enough to take pictures of it for me.

Considering her dislike of cartoon-ized animals, I expect younger daughter had to steel herself in order to ride one of the goofy SeaWorld Carousel critters – it’s a dolphin, so she made the effort.



She avoided this one, even though it’s at pretty purple:



because she knows full well what it really looks like:


from here: http://www.animals-zone.com/7-unusua...-sea-creatures

Some kids got their pics on the orca statues:





Second son demanded a few in front of the “lighthouse” by the entrance:



And that was the end of SeaWorld for this trip. And the next morning, we were leaving Orlando. But we did have a few more things planned -- a museum in Georgia, and Mammoth Cave our last day. Although we had not yet picked up the fact that we somehow never get to whatever we planned for our last day...

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THE DRIVE BACK and THE NASHVILLE FLOOD

Friday we got packed and got going, but not much else happened. Well, except the fact that we all agreed we loved Orlando and were coming back next year and staying longer. Technically, the kids and I agreed. Hubby agreed he’d had a good time, but was less enthused about the “coming right back next year” part. Saturday we were going to do the Tellus museum in Cartersville, Georgia and maybe something in Nashville, then Sunday we were going to do Mammoth Cave in Kentucky. The kids and I watched Ken Burns’ series on the National Parks, and, for all the moaning and groaning I got during it, it ended up having a fair impression on the troops, and youngest daughter, especially, wanted to hit a National Park, and since we were driving right by one, why not?

I could not stay on focus for this post, so I finally just let myself wander off and made note when I got back to the trip.

NASHVILLE RAMBLING...

Nashville is one of our favorite cities. My parents moved to Tennessee shortly after eldest son was born – they came to his baptism service, then headed out to Tennessee after church. My sister was living in Chicago back then, and she decided to run my two eldest and I down to see the parents that winter. We stopped at the Grand Old Opry Hotel, and walked through some of the atriums – well, eldest daughter, my sister and I walked; eldest son was still a babe in my arms. We didn’t see all the atriums, but the one we did walk through was lush and green and warm and wonderful. Eldest daughter was initially a bit wary of a waterfall over one of the pathways, then she decided that was cooler than cool. (These are someone else’s pics.)




From here:http://www.flickr.com/photos/ambrosi...n/photostream/

Since then we’ve stopped in Nashville many a time, although we haven’t done a whole lot there except drive around, eat, and point out pretty rocks and views and stuff. We did do Cheekwood Gardens when they had a dinosaur exhibit – I loved the gardens and art part, the kids liked the dinosaurs – and for a while we did the Parthenon and its surrounding park just about every time, because we did that one of the first times and certain of my children were Stern Traditionalists when young (i.e., if you did it once, you are obligated to do it every time ).

The Parthenon is a reproduction of the original in its prime; on the lower levels are a gift shop and art galleries and then upstairs they’ve got a statue of Athena based on the original, along with casts of statuary from the pediments. Greece may have the real thing, but the Parthenon in Nashville is intact. To give some perspective on the size of this statue of Athena: Nike, the goddess of Victory, who is standing in Athena’s hand, is six feet, four inches tall. It’s not surprising that Athena intimidated some of my chillins some years!



Not crazy about hubby's pic there, but then again, that’s not my favorite statue of Athena. While historians have a good idea of what the Parthenon looked like, all we know about the original statue of Athena is from written descriptions, so this is the artist’s best guess of what the original really looked like. I think he took the ancient critics too literally in making her so made up, but whatever. I do appreciate the artist's attention to details, for instance his work on the shield.



Athena was the goddess of wisdom; since owls were also associated with wisdom, Athena was associated with owls, but I am guessing it’s specifically the owl Glaucus in that painting.



All of which is hopelessly off topic, but we do love Nashville and hope to get back soon. If everything works out well with hubby finding a new job and all, Nashville and Mammoth Cave will be our other 2013 trip.

BACK TO TRIP

Anyhow, I can’t remember exactly where we stopped Friday night, but it was a Quality Inn and Suites somewhere between Atlanta and Cartersville, maybe Marietta.

Saturday morning, we hit the Tellus Museum in Cartersville, which is right off the highway, and, if you’ve got an ASTC membership, it’s free! It’s pretty reasonable otherwise, IIRC. It’s bigger than you’d think, being as how it’s kind of the middle of nowhere, with a small collection of dinosaur fossil stuff, and a big, beautiful collection of rocks. Including lots of pretty, sparkly rocks, like this one:


from here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alan_cr...n/photostream/

The guy who took that has a fair number of Tellus pics, mostly the fossil stuff and rocks, but he didn’t take pics of the whole museum. There are some displays in the middle there we really didn’t get to. Well, okay, that eldest daughter and I didn't get to -- we spent about twice as long looking at pretty rocks as everyone else did. She has a Major Thing about sparklies. The photographer also didn’t take pictures of the parts my kids probably liked best, going on their joy once the Hermit and I caught up to them; a couple of rooms in the back where you can dig for fossils or pan for gems, and then take home what you find. It’s the only elevated fossil dig we’ve run across, and of course my back loved that part. I like to dig them up, but I don’t take any (although the kids sometimes raid my stash if I run across something particularly cool). So that was a nice morning break.

It was a little rainy at Tellus, but as we drove through Tennessee the rain got steadier and heavier – by the time we passed Murfreesboro, much, MUCH heavier. We have a bad habit of listening to discs and tapes and Ipods on the road, when sometimes we maybe should be checking in with the local radio stations. This was one of those times we should have been a tad more tuned in to the local news. As we approached Nashville, the traffic rapidly changed from heavy to horrific to stop-and-go to Just Plain Stopped. The only traffic moving was people working their way through to the shoulder and then down to the next exit to get off the highway.

We decided to join those taking the next exit, but of course we were a few lanes over, so it was still a long while working our way across. But we finally got to an exit – we got off on exit 60: Hickory Hollow Road, which parallels the highway and bit and then you hit Bell Road.. And this is what was happening on the highway at Bell Road:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5gYhLKwSp4

MORE RAMBLING...

The beginning of that clip was on the national news, but this one also shows a floating car cut the side of that building and the building kind of folds into itself, which wasn’t shown much but is kind of cool in a depressing sort of way. However, even when that footage was shown on TV, what no one ever mentioned is that the building got creamed on Saturday afternoon, then it kept raining. It rained pretty much the rest of Saturday and then, off and on, most of Saturday night, and it was still sprinkling off and on for most of Sunday. And it rained above Nashville – there were areas that didn’t get flooded until Monday, after the rain was over. I think flooding with sunshine is in some ways more eerie than flooding in a rainstorm – feels more unnatural, and yet more inevitable.

Nashville didn’t get the worst of it -- the Cumberland River was 62.58 feet high at Clarkesville; at Nashville it “only” reached 51.86 feet.

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/ohx/?n=may2010epicfloodevent

I call it the Nashville Flood because that’s where we were, but really it was a huge event – 48 Tennessee counties were declared disaster areas on a Federal level. If anything, the western part of Tennessee got it worse, because it’s lower and flatter. Nashville is hilly, and a lot of the housing is built up in the hills. Here’s some aerial footage of the Dyersburg area, which is about a three hours drive west of Nashville:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBr29...eature=related

Even in local news, you mostly heard about Nashville and the Interstates being closed. Few people realized that chunks of I-40 were down due to flooding from Nashville all the way to the state border at Memphis, over 200 miles, and a bit of Mississippi got socked as well. Memphis had flooded streets, and a levee broke, flooding Millington Naval Base, but admittedly the flooding in Memphis wasn’t as extensive as it was in Nashville. There’s also the fact that no one filmed anything as visually interesting as a temporary school room floating down the road, so Memphis got ignored along with the rest of Tennessee.

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Still heading home and More Nashville Flood

So even in Nashville, where there was a fair bit of coverage, initially the locals still didn’t realize how big an area was affected – this guy in Nashville went out that Sunday thinking he wouldn’t see much flooding:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mob7y...eature=related

Admittedly it's not too bad where he was, but although I-24 got the most press, I'm pretty sure that wasn't the worst of it in Nashville, either. I'm linking to these pictures because they showed up so huge when I posted them here. But in this one, see that little pyramid to the right, just barely above the water?

http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/exhibi...0_flood_05.jpg

That’s the top of this rain gauge (which, as you can see here, measures floods up to 50 feet):

http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/exhibi...0_flood_10.jpg

And here’s a long shot (the flood gauge is in front of the stairs):

http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/exhibi...0_flood_06.jpg
(All from this page http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/exhibi...rs/floods2.htm)

The first picture was taken on Tuesday, May 4, the second two on May 11 – we were driving through on Saturday May 1. So after more than a week, the water was still 20 feet above flood level. Nashville got pretty clobbered.

BACK TO OUR STORY...

Once we got off the highway, we still didn’t realize what we’d stumbled into, and the route I’m going to report looks right but we weren’t paying a whole lot of attention at the time, so who knows?.

We couldn’t get much of anywhere Bell Road (the cops had it blocked off in both directions), and ended up taking this tiny two-lane off into nowhere. We thought we were making progress because, although it was more stop than go, someone would come along from the other direction once in a while, and we figured that meant people could get through. Especially since there were semis coming through – no way could they be turning around, therefore they had to be coming from the other side, right?

In reality there was a cop blocking the way and sending people back; what made the process so slow that you only had a trickle getting through was that the road was so narrow; two lanes and no real margins. Even in our little mini-van we had to work around in stages. We never did figure out how they got the semis turned around; best guess is the cop made people behind the semi turn around until the semi could back into a driveway or something. Sooo, we were back on Bell Road after another agonizingly long time in a row of cars going nowhere. Since we couldn’t go anywhere on Bell Road, we took Hickory Hollow back onto I-24, backtracking to the last exit. Everyone was turning left (I’m guessing their GPSs were heading them over to Murfreesboro Pike, which wasn’t going to get them anywhere I suspect but they – and we – didn’t know that at the time), however we’d had it with following the crowd and went right.

Which didn’t do us a whole lot of good, since we soon hit a good wad of traffic again and, after a while, realized the road was also dipping down. Which, we’d figured out by now, meant the odds were good it was flooded. Argh! But, surprisingly enough, when we got to the light at the bottom the road was fairly clear, and we went left on Nolansville Road, I think on the theory that if we could get out of the Nashville area it’d be easier to cut across to 65. If I remember rightly, this is where we saw lots of cars and trucks that had been abandoned – you had to drive around them to get through.

The road was intermittently under water, and it was very flooded to the right of it, with houses that were clearly done in and things. Those of us with out-of-state license places proceeded very cautiously; Tennesseans would often pass us and plow through a puddle that covered the road, letting us know how deep it really was. Sometimes we followed them, but at one point we were debating it, one of us thinking that area was just plain too deep and too huge and the other exasperated enough at that point to just go for it. And I honestly can’t remember which one was me!

We’d barely started the debate when a cop car passed us and pulled across the road, so that decision was made for us, and we turned around and headed back. When we got back to where we’d entered Nolansville Road we just kept going, since we didn’t want to join the people presumably still getting forced out of the Bell road area (there were still tons of people wandering around back there hoping to find a better way when we’d decided to backtrack on the highway).

Going northwest the road started to rise again, and now we could see unmistakable evidence that the water had been much higher earlier. Since it had continued to rain pretty steadily the whole time we’d been in the area, either someone had opened a dam or something downstream had given way, because you could tell by the debris washed up on side roads or driveways that the water had been considerably higher earlier on, a couple of feet I would think (although it can be hard to guess that sort of thing with a slow and gradual rise). The traffic here was much lighter, and we’d been stuck in traffic for something like four hours at this point (and the amount of ground we’d covered was pitiful), so we stopped at Taco Bell for a late dinner.

It was kind of busy for that late hour but not horribly busy, and a fair percentage of the people there were locals, so hubby got to talking to them and they worked out what would be the best route for us to take and told us how to get onto I-65 on high ground where it was likely high enough we could keep going, and we did exactly that. Our philosophy is that, if we’re not going to hang around and help, our job is to get out of the way. We didn’t even try to get rooms in the Nashville area; we just drove up to Bowling Green, KY and crashed.

Not surprisingly, we didn’t get going at all early the next day, and no one but my youngest was at all interested in going to Mammoth Cave National Park. Plus, it was still raining – the main appeal may be the cave, but it’s a pretty park up top. Hubby gave in and said we were definitely going back to Orlando next year, and that we’d budget a trip to Mammoth Cave in there, and youngest decided she could live with that. So we headed home… and it rained the whole way. :sad1: