Our Summer Trip ~ Some Final Thoughts

🚗 8,250 miles later……in no particular order…….🚗

 

• We wanted to stay somewhere for a month(ish) to see what it was like. So our month in PEI was a bit of an experiment and we liked it a lot ~ and plan to spend a longer time next time we head there. 

 

• We made no prior hotel reservations (except the Airbnb in PEI) along the way until we knew where we were going, and we also wondered how that would work out. It worked out great! 
• We learned that we need to make sure that when we are traveling to a different place every 2-4 days, that we factor in some down time.
• Brad doesn’t need to pack so many T-shirts!😁
• We did not try our vodka infusions until we got home ~ we both agree that Suzanne’s is better (no recipe!), though the butterfly pea powder gave it a yucky color – next time she will use the same ingredients, sans the pea powder.

• Our Goo Goo candy bars were great! We also did not eat these until we got home. We disagree on which is better ~ Brad likes his better; Suzanne likes hers better. Good thing we had two! 

 

•  We were surprised that we drove over 8,000 miles ~ we never felt like it was “too much.” Maybe because (except for a couple days heading north) we broke up super-long travel days with stops at a new town and we always found a cool place to stop and have lunch.

💛Already looking forward to our next travels!💛

 

 

 

 

Nashville, Tennessee ~ Day 3

Today was a fairly quiet day as it was still pretty hot outside. We drove around for a while (after another late start) and ended up at the Gaylord Opryland Resort, since we read that there were indoor botanical gardens. Yup - there are......

 One can even take a little "cruise" on their river (it looked like this was mostly for kids).....

 It is a huge hotel and convention center and we were surprised how much we walked their gardens - they have many levels of walks and it was charming.

 

Since we were just a few minutes from the Grand 'Ole Opry (we discussed going to one of the shows, but decided that it just isn't our cup-o-tea), we popped by and checked out their grounds (for about five minutes) and their store.

 We then drove through some of the Nashville neighborhoods checking-out the architecture and stuff, then back to the air-conditioned hotel for the afternoon to get ready to turn south once again and head home. 🏡 

Nashville, Tennessee ~ Day 2

It was another slow morning at the hotel and we finally left around 10am and walked to Nashville's full-scale replica of The Parthenon. Why does Nashville have a full-scale replica of The Parthenon? Who knows/cares.....it is odd, to say the least. 

 

 

One item of interest was the Women's Suffrage Statue......

 ...erected to acknowledge that Tennessee was the last state to ratify the 19th amendment - giving women the right to vote. (That being said, the Equal Right's Amendment has yet to pass and at this time, women's - and other's - rights are being decimated by the current administration.)

We also wandered around the Vanderbilt University campus for a while - it was quite lovely.....

 

 

It was hot, so we decided to relax for a while in the hotel (and watch the U.S. Open), eventually heading out for dinner at Martin's BBQ, which was unfortunately disappointing as the food was just okay and the service terrible.

 

We then went Bourbon Street Blues and Boogie Bar on Printer Street to hear some blues(ish) music......

 It was a fun time ~ even had drinks bought for us from some guy since we moved over so he and his wife could sit. We were done drinking, but when ya get free drinks, ya keep drinking! 😂

The band........

 

At some point a black marker was passed around and Brad graffitied the wall......😏

 A couple hours later it was back to the hotel for the night. 

 

 

 

Nashville, Tennessee ~ Day 1

We woke without an alarm today, enjoyed a great breakfast at the hotel, and finally got ourselves our the door around 10:30am grabbing a Lyft to the Broadway area ~ AKA Honky Tonk Highway. 

 

It wasn't even 11am (on a Monday morning, no less) and there was music everywhere......

 

 

 

It was a bit like downtown Las Vegas - lots of neon signs.....

 

 

...and a putrid odor that was a cross between vomit, urine, and stale beer. 😵 The area definitely needed a good rain to wash away all the funk.......

Unlike Vegas, the stores were more country (which makes sense).  Here one can buy one pair of cowboy boots and get two for free! 

 

We happened upon the Goo Goo Cluster Candy Store (we had never heard of them before) and decided to sign up for their "Design Your Own Candy Bar" class that afternoon! 

 

(Side note about Goo Goo Cluster Candy - they were the first one to make the first combined  - think Snickers - candy bar in 1912.)

 

We had an hour or so to kill before our candy class, so walked over the John Seigenthaler Pedestrian Bridge towards Nissan Stadium, the home of the Tennessee Titans.......Go Seahawks! (Brad is a Seattle fan.😉)

 

The bridge offered some of the best views of Nashville (and no rank odor here! 😊) 

 

 

It was time for our candy bar design class and we ended up sitting with some great people at our table, which made the time even more enjoyable!  We were given sample of their candy, watched a video, and were given instructions along the way about designing our candy bar. 

 

The first decision was which type of chocolate ~ white, milk, or dark. Suzanne chose white and Brad chose milk, and we were given the (what ended up being) the top shell......

 

Then we had to decide on the fillings - we had to choose two softer fillings (such as caramel, hazelnut, Biscoff spread, peanut butter), as well as three "add ins" (such as sprinkles, pretzels, pecans, toffee). Then the assembly began.....

First, one of the soft fillings.......

 Then the "add ins".....

 

Then the top filling......

 

We then watched as the (what would end up being the bottom layer) rest of the chocolate was poured by an employee......

 Our finished products!

 

Without talking about it, we ended up with very similar candies:

• Suzanne's recipe: white chocolate, bourbon caramel, graham crackers, vanilla wafers, sprinkles, Biscoff spread 
• Brad's recipe: milk chocolate, bourbon caramel, graham crackers, vanilla wafers,  potato chips, Biscoff spread

 We were given boxes to store our candy creations......

 

..and aprons too!

 

(Which look nothing like this now that Suzanne washed them - the red in the straps bled everywhere and they are now pink tie-dye...along with a few other items! 😄)

 

By now it was time for lunch, so we were off to Prince's Hot Chicken......which was great!

After we were nourished, we went to the National Museum of African American Music ......

 

 ..... small but very interesting museum with lots of interactive exhibits.......

 By then we were hot (it was a very warm day) and tired, so another Lyft back to the hotel where we chilled for the rest of the night. 

Driving to Nashville, Tennessee

We were up at 6:10 and out the door by 7am ~ saw many deer on our way out of the park. 

 

We enjoyed a nice breakfast along the way in a neighboring town and an okay lunch in another one.  Lots of heavy rain along the way – at one point, traffic on the highway really slowed down and people pulled over.  While we were driving, we reflected on our time in Shenandoah National Park – we are glad that we went, but it is not a park we need to go back to. We both enjoyed the waterfall/creek hike the best, as the views were pretty much the same on the other hikes. Food was super expensive in the park and the staff just okay. Again, all that being said, and we said this before, we are still happy that we staying IN the park – especially since it took us 30 minutes to drive to the closest town on our way out.

We arrived at our hotel in Nashville at 5pm-ish ~  a very nice hotel where we used our Chase Sapphire Reserve hotel credit to cover some of the cost (along with free breakfasts and hotel credits). We had dinner at the bar while watching the U.S.Open and went to bed. 

A long driving day of 567 miles and about 11 hours. (Nashville is an hour behind Shenandoah time.)  

 

Shenandoah National Park Day 2 ~ More Hiking!

The day started like yesterday - same wake-up time, same breakfast time, same breakfast. We decided to take the Rose River Loop Hike, a 4-mile circuit with a 910ft elevation change. We were on the trail by about 8:45am.....an easy start taking us along the gravel road.....

 

 Past the Cave Cemetery....

 

We then were on the trail, which started with some steps....

 

....eventually leading to a waterfall....

 

It was a lovely hike along a creek bed (we kept saying how nice it was that it poured so much yesterday so the water was flowing nicely)....and we enjoyed hearing the water as we hiked.....

 

Though there was some hiking in open forest too.....

 

Then at 10:20am, it started to drizzle.....okay, no biggie, it wasn't even enough of a rain to put on our rain jackets. Not that we had any other choice, we kept hiking.....

 

Then about 10 minutes later it POURED. POURED! POURED!! Thunder. Lightening. The works. 

Onward we hiked and were drenched - even in our rain jackets - drenched. By the time we made it to our car (11:30am) we were soaked and our waterproof boots were basically keeping the gallons (okay, maybe not gallons, but it felt like it) IN our boots, since waterproofing works both ways. 

By the way, notice how nice this trail sign is...clearly showing a hiker where to go.....

 However except for that one sign, all of the tail markers (on all three hikes we did) looked like this.....

 

 ...and at times the small embossing was quite difficult to read. (This happens to be a good/new one, but some of the older trail markers ones were very difficult to read - especially in that pouring rain!) 

(We also intended to do this hike clockwise, but once again missed a turn at the beginning and ended up going counter-clockwise, which while the views would have been better clock-wise, the hiking aspect was better clockwise.  So basically the only hike we did as intended was the linear in-and-out one! 😂)

 

By now we were cold and looking forward to hot showers,  but when we got to our room, the electricity was out and had been for a while (we found out later it went out at 10:15am)  - so no hot water - bummer. We put on dry clothes (hair still wet) and went to the lodge hoping/thinking that they would have back-up generators - nope. But they were still open for lunch (almost all items were still available as their grills ran on propane), so we had lunch (and hot tea!) and decide to drive south in the park for a while (with our heated seats turned on ....and weren't we complaining about the heat just the day before?????? 😂). 

 

Even though it had stopped raining, the clouds were still around.....

 

...and the fog rolled in......

 

Eventually we turned around and were happy to find that the electricity was back on - yay!  We showered and eventually went back to the lodge for dinner and to decide on our next destination - we had lots of thoughts about where to go next - and finally decided on Nashville - a place that Brad has mentioned in the past a few times. We hung out at the lodge using their WiFi and found a hotel in Nashville, eventually heading back to our room to pack as much as possible as we had a long day of driving the next day.