Wish upon a star in Nashville

Let's preface this by saying I'm NOT a country music fan...

But even I can see the attraction of Nashville, Tennessee.

It's a town of about one million people, with a throbbing compact downtown area and is filled to the brim with music and dreams.

Everywhere you go, from the local shopping mall to the biggest clubs and venues, there's someone strumming out a tune and singing their heart out.

And I'm slowly coming around to the idea that a song should tell a story. I still think there's a bit too much personal information for my liking, but I can see how some find the heartfelt nature of this music appealing.

On our first day here we visited the Grand Ole Opry area and had a massive bit of luck.

Firstly, let me explain that we are really mean parents who allow our kids to LOOK in amusement arcades but never give them any coins to put in the machines.

For instance, if our kids see shopping centre rides and hop on board we might wobble the thing back and forth with our hands, but that's as good as it gets.

So perhaps this guy saw our poor deprived children pressing all the buttons in the arcade and getting no love back from the games but he just walked up and gave Indy and Dash free cards for unlimited play as he was leaving.

Okay, so guess where we stayed for the next five hours!

When we finally tore ourselves away, Indy told us (holding back tears) that all his dreams had come true.

Thanks free-card man, wherever you may be!

The next day we caught a shuttle into downtown Nashville and roamed the city streets with Dash unleashing his cool moves and air guitar out the front of every bar.

Sometimes there is so much live music that you can hear the cacophony of four or more performances simultaneously.

We walked the pedestrian bridge to check out the river and took in lunch at the Wild Horse Saloon.

More luck....

Disney on Ice was playing at the Arena. It happened to be the Princesses and Heroes version (which maybe is a bit more oriented to girls) but it was the right place and right time.

Sometimes you forget how awesome it is to watch something live.

The kids were enthralled, and we enjoyed it too - the lighting, the costumes, all of the skating stunts.

It was pretty magical actually.

Maybe Nashville is the place where dreams really do come true.

Wild Woody

We had read about Gatlinburg which sits on the western edge of Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

It was described as "tacky" but we think that's a bit unfair.

It was commercial for sure. But it didn't have a down-market desperate style; more of a confident approach to getting tourists to part with their dollars.

But driving onwards to Pigeon Forge we encountered the true definition of 'tacky'.

With no disrespect to Dolly Parton who created Dollywood here and provided the basis for the town's growth, this place is where bad ideas go to die.

It was Nath's birthday, so we took advantage of one of the multiple gokart tracks in the area and went for a spin on the "Wild Woody", a multi-level wooden racing structure.

Together with a Cracker Barrel dinner, and awesome presents of googly eyes and a Kung Fu Panda kite, what more could a man want?

Now I HAD offered to shout Nath to the Biblical Times Theatre, a dinner show with a difference, but he said he was happy just chilling out with us - go figure!

Blue Ridge and Great Smoky

The Blue Ridge Parkway runs 469 miles from Shenandoah National Park in Virginia through to Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina/Tennessee.

We were lucky enough to make it through the Blue Ridge and to stay in mostly government campsites along the way prior to a massive federal 'shutdown'.

The 'shutdown' is the result of a fight between the President and Congress and until it's resolved, everything federal is closed.

Employees (like parks rangers) won't be paid until the problem is sorted out.

So we were able to enter the Smoky Mountains National Park, because a highway cuts through its centre, but all access to its trails and scenic overlooks was blocked off with traffic cones.

We probably would have explored it over a couple of days had we had the chance to camp in the park and hit the trails, but we get the feeling the territory was pretty similar to what we'd encountered on the Blue Ridge.

There have been fewer more relaxing driving days on this trip than the several days we spent along this Parkway.

There were picturesque overlooks aplenty, a slow speed limit (with no angry drivers riding our tail), lovely campsites and some great trails.

The first one we tried was the Fallingwater Cascades Trail near Peaks of Otter.

It was a two and a half kilometre loop down and along a creek which tumbled into small waterfalls in places.

A bridge crossing the creek had been washed out and so the kids enjoyed the adventure of climbing over rocks to the remaining bridge portion.

Then there was the snake on the trail.

We waited fairly patiently for it to wriggle away (with Nath throwing stones nearby to urge it on).

We didn't bush bash, because we didn't know if his friends might be nearby.

On another day, we hiked to all of the overlooks on the southern side of Linville Falls (about three kilometres walking in total) and they were impressive but very popular.

Just before the Falls area we had driven over the Linn Cove Viaduct and neighbouring bridges - the last section of the Parkway to have been completed.

We also explored Mabry Mill which has a water mill plus the creeks and flumes running to it.

The boys also spent a lot of time investigating the collection of historical buildings and farming equipment.

The town of Cherokee prior to Great Smoky Mountains National Park was beautiful, with creeks running beside the main street through most of the town.

Obviously I can't say much about Great Smoky Mountains.

We only stopped once beside a stream (at the only place we found without traffic cones).

That's where we sang Happy Birthday to Nath and enjoyed some birthday cake together.

Shenandoah and its black bears

As we searched for a campsite in Mathews Arm Campground in the Shenandoah National Park, we had to stop Bessie in her tracks as a black bear sauntered across the road and picked its way through the underbrush from site to site.

After finding our campsite and backing in, we hopped outside and then the kids and I hopped straight back in again as a different, smaller bear came around behind Bessie and crossed the road to a tree on the other side.

He then grabbed a hold of the tree with his front paws and quickly lifted his back paws to gain purchase, then using front, back, front, back, had climbed several metres up into the tree in just seconds.

From his vantage point, Nath managed to capture an image of him as he started his climb.

The boys and I came back outside to watch him tearing at the branches high up and gorging himself on acorns.

We know he was a boy because a ranger passed by and explained he was one of a pair of two-year-old brothers who roamed the area in addition to the mother, father and three new babies.

He stayed up there feasting for the remaining hours of daylight but was gone the next morning when we checked.

Further south in the Park, we hiked the Dark Hollow Falls Trail (2.5km return), a pleasant out-and-back path mostly following a creek, replete with Autumn foliage and with a waterfall reward at the base of the valley.

The bear's climb was definitely a highlight of our two-day drive through Shenandoah which follows a ridgeline offering vistas of valleys and neighbouring mountain ridges and ends at the start of the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Star-spangled history

Leaving the boys behind in Bessie, I caught the bus/train from our campsite for a day exploring Washington D.C. on my own. 

The Mall, arguably home to America's most precious monuments (and the museums we've been visiting), is a bit of a hike in its entirety and not one I think the boys would have enjoyed.

So off I strolled down Pennsylvania Avenue to stop in at the White House and give my best to the Obamas.

Next I visited the Albert Einstein memorial and loved his quote there inscribed:

"Joy and amazement at the beauty and grandeur of this world of which man can just form a faint notion."

The Vietnam Veteran's Memorial was decorated with so many other tokens, photos and memories brought from home that it was a reminder the effects of that war are still being keenly felt in homes across America (and elsewhere).

Being just over 50 years to the day since his famous speech, I felt inspired standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial where Martin Luther King Jr had shared his dream with the world.

The grandeur of Abe Lincoln's statue and the gravity of the inscriptions on either side - his second inaugural address and the gettysburg address - leave you feeling fairly insignificant.

Gazing down the reflecting pool to the World War II Memorial and the Washington Monument which is under repair, I felt quite jealous of Americans and the general majesty and awe their capital inspires. 

I also felt pretty hungry.

So off down the Mall I trotted and thankfully came across an entire street full of food trucks.

With a greek gyro under my belt, I took to the Museum of American History (yes, another completely free Smithsonian institution) and joined an hour-long "highlights tour".

After meeting the original Kermit the Frog, eyeing off Dorothy's ruby red slippers, admiring and criticising the First Lady's choices in inaugural dresses and dinner settings, checking out some of George Washington's personal items, touching part of the Berlin Wall, gazing upon the first copy ever made of the Declaration of Independence and gazing upon the first ever flag to bear the 'stars and stripes' - amongst other things - I decided I simply had to bring the whole family back.

And so I did... 

We revisited the museum together and this time concentrated on the halls "America on the Move" and "On the Water" which explained everything from interstate highway development to on-ship fish processing.

The boys' reactions to exhibits in other halls were amusing.

Indy was not impressed by the grand-daddy of today's Apple iPad but was very happy to have seen Harry Potter's Hogwarts uniform and to have stood at a Presidential podium to give a pretend press conference.

Afterwards, some Hill Country barbecue brisket with all the fixings was just the ticket to fill our hungry tummies. 

Nath had sought it out when he'd spent his own day exploring the capital and had wanted to share the experience with us.

We've stayed for six nights in Washington D.C. - that's the longest we've stayed anywhere. It's an indication of how much we've loved it here!