The Smokies

Andrew and I went on our 4th annual Labor Day trip this past weekend. It seems like we have been doing this every year, because we have grown so close to our group of friends. Each year we try to go somewhere different, but we like to keep the cabin/woods/antler chandelier theme consistent. This year we went to Gatlinburg, which I like to refer to as "the Smokies." There were nine of us this year, and we both agree that this was the best cabin trip ever. Andrew and I arrived at about one in the morning on Friday. We dropped Max off at my parents house and headed south, stopping for only one detour at a Yelp-recommended Taco Tico establishment in Lexington. The first day, I third-wheeled it on a hike with Peter and Emily and we saw a BEAR! I chatted it up and watched the bear with another hiker who happened to be holding a bag of Captain D's food. Peter compared it to holding out a raw piece of salmon and saying, "do you think the bear can smell my food?" The next day we went white water rafting, and only lost two of our members overboard. Sunday brought about more hiking and a trip into Gatlinburg proper, which is as trashy as I remembered it. The pictures included in this post typify Gatlinburg to me; swords, dolls, sex shops, and angels a-plenty folks, but what a great place to be! Everywhere we went someone wanted to take our picture and then sell it to us for an astronomical rate. I talked Andrew into riding a sky-lift and it was cheesy and touristy but you couldn't really argue with the view. We met new people and smelled mountain air and ate lots of good foods. We formed a blue-grass band with two guitars, a mandolin, a banjo, a harmonica, and a WASHBOARD and stayed up late and laughed until it hurt. Best cabin trip ever!