As we say goodbye to Townsend and the little valley that has been our home for the past several days, we take a final parting shot at the beauty of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

 

And so we began the drive to Chattanooga, TN.  This place still holds a very special place in our hearts as it is where we spent the first 5 years of our married life together!  Needless to say, these two days brought back a lot of memories as we drove around.

Now, it’s been 13 years since we had been here, but as we start getting closer and seeing the signs leading to our old hang-outs something magical seemed to be happening to our mood.  It was very exhilarating!  Since it was on the way, one of the first places we drove by was our old house.  We sure miss this place, nestled in the woods in a quiet subdivision outside of town.  Of course, it is not as far out of town as it was 13 years ago.  As time has moved on, the city of Chattanooga has began to spread throughout the hills as well.  It still looks pretty peaceful out here though.  (hope the current owners don’t mind their house being on the net)  🙂

As we begin our descent into town through the “ridge-cut”, our breath is taken away by the beauty of this “little” city that sits in this quiet little valley.  We entered town at about 4:30 on a Friday afternoon, and I have to say that the “rush-hour” traffic here, even after 13 years of growth, is NOTHING compared to the DFW metroplex!  In fact, about the only traffic jam I saw was when three people were at a four-way stop and they were each motioning for the other to go first!  You don’t see that much these days!

And almost everyone asks, so I’ll just answer, Yes, there is a Chattanooga Choo-Choo and here’s the proof!

They actually took some of the sleeper cars from the old train and converted them into hotel rooms.  It is now ran by Holiday Inn and if you like you too can see in a part of the past.

We had decided that Friday would be our evening to spend with some old friends, so we met up at the “Cancun” Mexican restaurant.  You may ask, “you go from Dallas to Chattanooga to eat Mexican food?”  Yep!  I’ve been craving the nachos from this restaurant for over 13 years and nothing was going to get in my way of going there!  🙂

We met up with our friends Kay and Tom, and Kim at Cancun and talked and laughed for a few hours.  As the karaoke started cranking up (well, that’s new) we decided to call it a night and had a long good-bye in the parking lot.

Day 7 found Karen and I driving all over town, just reminiscing.  We enjoyed the view from Lookout Mountain and the history there with the Civil War memorials.

We watched some hang gliding from the mountain…

And took our own pictures to remind ourselves later that we were really there!

Then we (or rather I) just had to drive by to see if the “space-ship” house was still there on Signal Mountain. (it is!)  I still think it would be cool to live here!  But if you look close, you can see that time is starting to take its toll on this place.  Someone should really buy it and bring it up to date.  (hmmmm)

We drove around so much on these two days that the streets once again became so familiar we felt right at home!  Karen made the comment that when retirement time comes, if we have to live in a city, this one is certainly doable!

We decided to take one last chance and have dinner with our friends again.  We really do miss them and hope that it is not another 11 years before we get to see them again.

Tomorrow begins the drive home back to north Texas.  The land of no color or mountains.  🙁