Melissa and I went to Gatlinburg the weekend before last, and had a really good time. Some friends of ours have a cabin out there and they let us stay there for ‘free’ … i say ‘free’ in quotes because Steve has got his money’s worth out of me in ‘free’ computer support since he bought a Mac.

What’s cool is that the cabin we stayed at was right next door to our honeymoon cabin!

We had dinner at ‘The Peddler‘, where they bring the raw meat out to you so that you can choose your cut… and spent some time at ‘Beneath the Smoke‘, which is an awesome photo gallery belonging to Ken Jenkins. We also walked around a bit in downtown Gatlinburg, and stopped at a few of the shops.

We went white water rafting on the pigeon river with these guys: http://www.raftoutdooradventures.com/, which was a lot of fun. The water was pretty low, but there were still quite a few folks out in ‘duckies’ (small 1 man rubber kayaks), and our guide was pretty cool. We’ve been white water rafting on the Ocoee before, and didn’t have anywhere near as much fun. If you go, I would highly recommend going with a smaller company like this one, as they tend to have much more experienced guides than the larger companies who hire 80 at a time at peak season.

On Sunday, we drove (and walked) around Cade’s Cove, an old appalachian settlement from the 1800s. There were bluegrass and folk musicians all around, and absolutely beautiful scenery! I was most impressed with the story of ‘Aunt Betty’, who owned over 250 acres in Cade’s, was single all her life, and wound up taking care of her brother and his kids when his wife died. She apparently didn’t like shoes… and walked barefoot all the time, even when tending to her cows. She was a tough bird… and lived into her 90s! The land around her cabin was amazing, with a working grain mill, and several hand-built barns. There were also a couple of other smaller (older) cabins around the cove, as well as several churches (some still in use!) If you go, make sure you bring a camera with a good lens. As always, I was really dissapointed with our 15-58mm on our Canon D30. Great camera, crappy lens.

More pictures here