ONTO KNOXVILLE

After days of searching we finally found an outdoor pool at the Athens YMCA. No surprise the lanes were empty, as we have come to believe hardly anyone in the south actually exercises, much less swims for fitness. Afterwards and after lunch at one of the many excellent coffeehouses in town (gotta give kudos for that), we decide to leave after ice cream.

And so we drive north towards Knoxville and into the Smokey Mountains, but not without first having to endure the horror of the town of Cherokee which we must pass through before entering the National Park. Imagine whatever respect you had for the tribe that shares the town’s namesake (on their reservation land) pretty much erased by an onslaught of souvenir stands, interactive gold panning, tribal dancing and any other activity reduced to an embarrassing modicum of banality for the masses of inane tourists gobbling this shit up because they can’t be bothered to develop even a smidgen of taste. We sped on into the park itself at dusk, which in its crepuscular glory managed to erase the horror we had previous endured. Our twisty road led us through cathedrals of vernal pleasure, soothing us and bringing on the road fatigue and dreaded white line fever.

But wait, as we exit the park we enter something we’d never even heard of before, much less been prepared for—the horror that is the town of Pigeon Forge, the gateway to the Smokey Mountains, where mile after mile after mile of miniature golf, gargantuan souvenir stands, t-shirt stores, pancake houses, floors shows and thrill rides of every conceivable kind to assault the senses until submission, so removed from the natural beauty we had just left it takes a herculean feat of idiocy to tie the two together. But alas, here was also DollyWood, and since Cara is a Dolly Parton fan we drove up to the entrance of the now-closed park (it was 9p when we go there) and make our way to the entrance through the most acreage of parking ever seen. We could have literally driven into the service gate and walked around since there wasn’t a single person around to bother, much less secure the area.

We sped on bleary eyed and arrived in Knoxville in time for a torrential downpour while eating breakfast foods at Sonic drive in. It took almost an hour to find a motel and were given directions involving a duck pond that seemed to figure prominently in the local landmark.