Wednesday
July 29th, 2009
It poured rain all night long and after about 6
hours, the bunk ends were saturated and started leaking.
We got up early, everyone was damp and cold, so we started packing during
a break in the rain. The cleaning up and organizing I did the day before
really paid off, we were hitched and ready to go in 20 minutes.
We left the campground around 9 and did some minor
geocaching on the way to Chattanooga, where we planned to stop to ride the
carousel and maybe see the aquarium.
The rain moved through and the sun came out and proceeded to bake us!
Hunters going off to hunt geocaches
Upon getting out of the van in the parking lot below
the aquarium, Matt heard a hissing noise-it was a screw poking out of the
rear passenger tire. The head had snapped off and it was slowly leaking.
We loaded back in and drove to a gas station and put in a can of fix-a-flat,
filled up on gas and drove around until it sealed. We stopped and topped
off the air to proper tire pressure and went back to the aquarium and parked.
We opted to buy a family pass for the aquarium, as it was $6 less for a year's
pass than it was to visit it one day.
I had some birthday money, so that's what I spent it on. : )
I love the butterfly house!
Penguins!
I will forever imagine this guy checking out my feet in a friendly-yet-too-interested way every time I go swimming from now on.
Snapping turtle claw
We really enjoyed the aquarium, but sort of rushed through the river side
in order to get something to eat, we were all starving and we kept a pass
to the aquarium when we lived in Tennessee, so we had seen that side about
30 times already.
We skipped the carousel as well, too hungry and too hot to worry with it,
we know we will be back!
We stopped and ate on the way home, I developed a nasty headache and ended up in the van while everyone else finished eating. I am going to chalk it up to stress and such for now, but it's getting a little freaky how eating is suddenly either making me sick or making my head hurt. Matt had to drive us the rest of the way home.
In Guntersville, I was deleting some pictures off my camera and hit the 'off' button and heard this horrible grinding sound, which I thought was my camera dying-again. But then something went sailing off behind us and the van started going crazy, so Matt pulled to the side of the road while I looked in the side mirror at the van tire. It looked fine to me! I asked him to pull across the road into a parking lot instead of being on the side of the highway and when we got out, the camper had blown a tire! hahaha!
It was a pain to change out because a couple of the nuts were cross-threaded,
but Matt got it done and we used the second can of stop-leak on the camper's
spare tire because it was not holding up. We stopped after a couple
miles and topped it and the van tire off with more air and got home before
dark. That could have been SO much worse!
So, when Mr. Holmes gets back from HIS vacation, he has some business waiting
for him! I need 2 new tires for the camper-we think it just wore out,
the tires are probably 11 years old, like the camper. So 2 flats was
a coincidence. I need my tire patched or replaced on the van as well.
Hopefully just patched, it's only 6 months old!
In all, it was a good trip. I find myself feeling 'done' with the area
for a while. I LOVE the mountains of Tennessee, Georgia and North Carolina,
but we go there so often. I want to see some new places and new terrain!
Thanks for coming along with us!
See you next time!
Trip Totals:
Miles-845
Gas-$120
Lodging-$100 for 4 nights camping
Food-$75 groceries/$140 dining out 5 meals
$21 in parking fees for Anna Ruby Falls, Ocoee, Brasstown Bald, the state
park, Chattanooga Aquarium
$100 for Aquarium pass
$40 for misc items
Just under $500, in keeping with my theory that it
costs $100 a day to travel.