Heading Home to Oklahoma

After five days exploring this section of eastern Tennessee, we are on the road heading west toward Oklahoma. We have doctors' appointments to make, Denisa has a girls' trip to go on, and we have a very special 90th birthday celebration awaiting us in our home state. It's a long drive straight west on I-40, so we were so glad to get to make a stop to see a cousin on the way. Bob and Merilee are such wonderful hosts, and we enjoyed a short stop at their home in Spring Hill, Tennessee. They showed us around their growing little city just south of Nashville, and then hosted a delicious dinner at their home. We were so busy enjoying all the food and fellowship that we completely forgot to take pictures! There were ten of us there for the meal, including their daughter and her family. The only picture we remembered to take were of our host, Bob and Merilee, pictured on the right.

We also got to meet Peggy and Bill, pictured above on the left. They are interested in traveling, and started reading our blog when they heard about Bob's crazy cousins that got rid of their house and moved into a motor home. Since Peggy has read every blog entry, she felt like she already knew us. It was such a joy to meet them both!

We were up early the next morning to make the last ten-hour drive to Oklahoma City. It was a long day, watching the miles click off the odometer. We noticed the trees getting shorter and shorter as we drove west on the interstate. Occasionally we were entertained by passing vehicles, like this ghost buster car.

We knew we were getting closer to our destination when the landscape flattened, and the trees became further spaced.

After ten hours on the road, we pulled into Oklahoma City very road weary. We went directly to Denisa's sister's house. Debra had invited her children and grandchildren over, so we got to see lots of family members right away! We're not sure why we keep forgetting to take pictures, but this was the only one from that evening. Denisa is doing one of her favorite things--holding one of the youngest members of our family, Olive.

The next morning Mark would drive another four hours to the Oklahoma panhandle to see his parents. Denisa stayed in Oklahoma City because she is leaving from there on the annual girls' trip. But in the meantime, we spent the day helping Debra get her classroom ready for the new school year. She is moving into a new classroom in the Oklahoma City school system. We should have taken a "before" picture with all the chairs stacked and the desks crowded against the wall. But by the time we took the "after" picture, it looked like she was about ready for the first day of school.

Denisa also got to brush up on her "straight-letter-placement-and- stapling-skills" since she was in charge of putting together this bulletin board.

It was a long drive, but it's good to be back in Oklahoma with family and friends!

The Pleasant Surprises of Norris Lake

We're "enjoying" the heat wave that the rest of the nation has been exposed to, and that heat has made us less ambitious in our hiking and exercise. We are being spoiled to spending the middle part of the day under the air-conditioner. The other option is to head to the water to cool off. So we headed to Norris Lake, about ten miles from our Raccoon Valley campground. It was a pleasant surprise to find that this Tennessee state park had no day use fees.

Because it is up-river from the Tennessee River, it doesn't have the silt that gives a lake the usual muddy color. We were pleasantly surprised to find the prettiest emerald green lake we have seen in a very long time. We couldn't wait to get our kayak inflated to get out on that beautiful water.

The water is perfectly clear, and very deep.

There were some interesting rock structures in the lake, with water marks that show that the water has been higher recently.

It was especially fun to kayak between the rocks.

When it got too hot on top of the water, we took turns going for a swim in that inviting water. It was another pleasant surprise that the water felt as good as it looked.

We took turns getting into the water, as we don't have much practice getting back into the kayak from deep water. It isn't pretty, but with a group effort we could get Denisa back into the kayak without capsizing the entire boat.

We spent several hours paddling around the lake, while the clouds continued to build in the sky.

We have been surprised to see that some tree branches are already sporting their festive fall colors. We're not sure what has caused these few leaves to turn prematurely red, but this is going to be a gorgeous shoreline this fall if the rest of these trees turn colors.

Our only wildlife siting on the water was this heron, balanced on some of the dead wood at the edge of the water.

Our only land mammal was this deer, who darted into the forest as soon as we got too close.

Besides enjoying time on the lake, we were pleasantly surprised with the old preserved buildings in the state park. This is the Rice Grist Mill, built in the 1800's. We were a little confused about the name of this mill, thinking that rice is a crop usually grown in a flatter and wetter area. Then we found out that it was built by the Rice family, and used to mill corn. That made more sense to us now.

The cogs and wheels connected to the water wheel still go round and round inside the mill. But there is one broken piece that keeps the mill stone from being operational. For some reason, it's a little hard to find replacement parts for 200-year-old mills.

Close by is the barn from a similar time period. Now that we are away from the coast, Denisa is finding that she likes pictures of old barns almost as much as old lighthouses. This barn is filled with the farming tools used in the 1800's, open and free for visitors to touch and enjoy.

Not far away is the Lenoir Pioneer Museum. This museum became a reality when Will and Helen Lenoir donated their sizable collection of Appalachian memorabilia they had spent a life-time collecting. There were labels that described the name or purpose of many things. Other times we would just stare at a unique implement, wondering how it was used. 

There were so many things to see that we were on museum over-load. The Lenoirs loved to collect anything odd or old, and they loved the stories that went with them. They spent their life visiting rural homes in East Tennessee with the question, "You have anything old you'd sell?" They loved agricultural items, but there was also a section of glassware, and rooms set up as they would have looked in homes one hundred years ago.

They had an amazing collection of mouse traps that they had purchased over the years. Many were home-made, others were examples of manufacturers trying to build a better mouse trap. We are pleasantly surprised with little museums like this that have so much to see, and are still free to the public.

We stopped by the visitor center, and got a little education on the river systems managed by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). We have seen signs and evidence of this group ever since we spent time in eastern Alabama. There are dams built all along the Tennessee River, with hydro-electric power plants providing much of the energy in this part of the country. This is the tailwaters just down stream from the large dam that forms Norris Lake, and produces electricity.

We thought about putting the kayak in below the dam, but one must know about the water release schedule to avoid a heavy current that would be impossible to row against. When the demand for electricity is low, there is no water released through the hydro-electric plant so there is no water current. This would cause the tailwaters to actually dry up, damaging the water ecosystems that depend on a constant flow.We also learned a new word today--weir. This is an example of a weir--a rock-filled crib of water that can be steadily released down stream to keep a constant flow of water.

As you can see from the darkening skies in the picture above, we were very lucky not to get caught in a rain storm today. It was another pleasant surprise when the forecast rains arrived right after we got back home for the day. What a pleasant ending to another pleasant day around Raccoon Valley.

A County Fair and Rocky Top, Tennessee

We have been pleasantly surprised with the number of things to do while we are staying at Raccoon Valley in eastern Tennessee. We are in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, in the middle of an area rich in agriculture.

So it is fitting that we should make the drive to Clinton, Tennessee--home of the Anderson County Fair.

We found out that this county fair was voted the best in all of Tennessee, so of course we needed to find out why. We also found that Wednesday was senior citizen day, with free admission and special events planned for old folks like us. It started with the 4-H girls baking home-made biscuits, and we were happy to help eat them.

We were greeted with a goody bag filled with snacks and things that senior citizens enjoy. We also had a blue grass concert and free ice cream before the day was over. In between, we were a little sad that we didn't win any of the many door prizes. We were totally out of the running for the oldest female (95) and oldest male (93), and the longest married couple (64 years). But Denisa was sure that Mark could have won the knobby knee contest if he would have just went up on the stage.

After the program was over, we wandered through the exhibits of the Anderson County Fair. There were some beautiful lilies in the flower competition.

We especially liked the animal exhibits. This would be the grand champion rooster of Anderson County, Tennessee

There was a children's petting zoo, with friendly animals that enjoyed the attention from the adoring crowd.

In this section we also found this unusual four-horned sheep. The sign said this guy was a Jacob 4-horn sheep "thought to be described in Genesis as the sheep Jacob raised." Generally the males have 2-4 horns, but they can have as many as 6.

Their trademark is their spotted black and white fleece.

It was a warm day at the fair, and we felt a little like this goat--looking for a way to get to somewhere cooler.

Not far from the fair in Clinton, Tennessee, is a place we have sung about for years. Rocky Top is the fight song for the University of Tennessee, and we have been humming it ever since we crossed the state border.

Even though the song is very old, the city by this name is not. Formerly named Lake City, Tennessee, they wanted to adopt the song's name-sake. There were legal battles concerning the song's copyright, and it wasn't until 2014 that court litigation approved the re-naming to Rocky Top, Tennessee. As we drove through town, we saw several businesses, a dentist's office, and a church that still carried Lake City in their titles.

As we drove around our new home base in the foothills of the Appalachians, we enjoyed the valleys surrounded by wooded hills. Most of the valleys are punctuated by white flower umbrellas that stand about a foot above the thick grass. A close-up of these white umbrellas see that they are made up of hundreds of tiny flowers about the size of a grain of rice. It seems we have wandered into another of God's wonders!

Knoxville, Tennessee

We are always amazed at the interesting cities that we "discover" as we make this journey across the United States. We can't say that Knoxville, Tennessee, was one of our destinations on this journey, but we were pleasantly surprised at how much fun we had here. This mural on the outside wall of the visitor's center helps to sum up some of the fun things to do here.

In the bottom left-hand corner are two bikers, symbolic of the greenways dispersed throughout town that make for some great biking.

We started there along the Tennessee River, another of the symbols painted in the mural above. There are multiple bridges across the river, making for pretty back drops along the ride.

We took the turn north away from the river to enter the section of the greenway that encircles the World's Fair Park. Knoxville hosted the World's Fair in 1982, attended by 11 million people from around the world. The most notable addition to the Knoxville sky line for the fair was the Sunsphere, the 75-foot golden glass globe set atop a 266-foot tower.

The facilities they built for the fair are still available for tourists like us 34 years later. So we rode the free elevator up the tower to the observation deck inside the sphere. From our height above Knoxville, we could look down through the tinted windows towards the river and the University of Tennessee campus far below us. We could see that the football stadium is right on the Tennessee River. We plan to visit there later today.

After the long elevator ride down to the bottom of the platform, we rode our bikes to the north end of the World's Fair Park. In the shadow of the tall Sunsphere is an urban splash park that was very popular on this summer day.

The other popular activity we witnessed today at the park were several groups of people playing the newly released Pokemon Go game. It was good to see so many video game players outside staring at a screen instead of inside staring at a screen.

We biked back down the greenway to our parking lot. Since it was getting warm by now, we did make a little detour through the splash pad for bicyclers.

We had to end our bike ride, because we had an appointment at noon. Every week day at 12:00, the Knoxville Visitor Center hosts an hour-long radio program called "The Blue Plate Special" for station WDVX at 89.9 FM. There is a stage for the live performers that will be heard on the daily show. Our first performer was a young man named Andrew Tufano, who played the guitar and sang songs that he had written himself. He is from Nashville, but was taking a two-week tour with his fiddle-playing friend from Boston.

The show is emceed from a chair right behind us, and we were live and "on air" except for a few commercial messages.

It was during those commercial messages that a band named "Vivants" got set up on stage for the second half of the show. From San Francisco, they were finishing up an east coast tour. Both of the groups played first-rate blue grass music. We felt like we had front row seats at the best show in town.

We have visited enough cities to know that parking is always a head ache. They have free two-hour parking permits at the visitor center, and that gave us a little extra time to walk around downtown while we were there. We saw Market Square and Krutch Park before we left for our next destination--the University of Tennessee. Two weeks ago, this community lost their famous and much-loved girls' basketball coach. They are expecting the 20,000-seat gymnasium to be full for Pat Summitt's memorial that will be held here in two days. We will be sure to avoid the crowds of Knoxville that day, but there are already memorial flowers showing up at her statue on campus.

We love to visit universities, but parking is usually difficult. We found there are a limited number of parking spaces available at the university museum, so we snagged one of those two-hour permits. That was within easy walking distance of the Neyland Stadium where the University of Tennessee Volunteers play football.

We were looking for an opening to see inside the stadium. Instead, we found this larger-than-life statue of the stadium's name sake, General Neyland.

When Mark finds an open door or gate, he is fearless about walking in like he knows what he is doing. Denisa is usually following behind timidly, worried that we are going to get in trouble for being in the wrong place. Here Mark is walking through one of the inside tunnels of the stadium with the lockers and athlete dining areas, etc.

One of the most famous University of Tennessee alumni is Peyton Manning, who the locker complex is named after.

Mark's snooping brought us to the stadium entry that leads right through the goal post entrance onto the field. This football program has seen 5 national championship, with the latest in 1998.

Acting just like he knew what he was doing, Mark marched right into the stadium for this picture.

From that vantage point, we could see the six different players whose numbers have been retired at the University of Tennessee. Of course, one of those was Peyton Manning.

As we walked around campus, we found the Volunteer statue with its ever-burning torch. Considering that temperatures were nearing 100 degrees today, we didn't linger long in this sunny area with its extra hot torch.

Instead, we headed indoors to the nicely air-conditioned McClung Museum. With sections featuring Egyptian history, dinosaurs, and native Americans, it was a nice place to spend an hour on a hot afternoon. Thanks to the University of Tennessee for hosting a great museum with free admission.

As we left downtown Knoxville, we noted the dramatic clouds meeting us on the highway. A cloud structure narrowing to a point like this would give us reason to pause in Oklahoma. But the forecast here was for lots of rain and some straight line winds instead.

We decided to wait out the storm eating dinner at Chick-fil-a. It was their annual "Cow Appreciation Day," and anyone wearing anything cow-like could order an entree of their choice for free. Before we left the motor home this morning, we had an arts and crafts project to build something cow-like from our limited craft resources. Let's just say that it looks like Mark won the cow-like contest, since Denisa's mask turned out looking more like a pig.

It was fun to watch the different cow-like costumes show up at our Chick-fil-a.

Some of the costumes even came with signs.

We really liked our time in the city of Knoxville, and we hope to make another 30-minute drive to the city before we leave the area. If we do, it will surely include another stop for the "Blue Plate Special."