Mountains, Zombies & Disney Roadtrip - Day 2 - Steepest Railway in the World in Chattanooga

[miss_mouse]

Trip Report Index

US ROADTRIP – TENNESEE – ALABAMA – GEORGIA & FLORIDA

‘’The Magic Bands Arrive’’

Day 2 – Saturday 7th July
The Steepest Passenger Railway in the World, a World Cup Party and Dad Arrives



Just to start, I'm Lisa - the planner and reporter. Ade is my hubby and he's our driver and there's Hollie who turns 19 on this trip and Louis is 16.


My day started at 4am.
Despite our scary start to this stay here in the cabin, we slept well. The bed was super comfy.
I think the super long travel day did me a favour as not once did I wake in the night worried that someone may be stood looking over me whilst I slept (those cheesy American horrors really play with my over active imagination! )
I was however having a bad dream that I’d lost Louis. I drifted back off to sleep but the dream continued.
4.30am I decided to get up. (this happens a lot with me and scary dreams….too many horror movies maybe? )



I got up, showered, fake tanned. Had a cuppa out on the deck and we watched the sun rise.



Looking out to the Smokey Mountains.
It’s for these moments where all the crazy hard 7 days a week that we work, it all seems worth while.



Stood here, with a cuppa, watching the sunrise with my hubby. Kids fast asleep, knowing that my Dad was arriving later today and that we had 4 weeks ahead of us…. I felt so unbelievably happy and so lucky.





And so in love….trips do wonders for a happy marriage I think!

We decided to have a wander around once it was light outside as so far we’d only seen the cabin on google maps…and as we all know from reading last nights events…it looked nothing like that on google maps.

Looking down from the decking from our room it looked like this.



You can see how steep this mountain is.



This was the fire pit.
We’d taken all the stuff to do s’mores, but we had a lot of rain and it was actually very boggey down there. You kind of sunk in to the ground. So we never ended up doing that.



I took this from where we parked the car.
Where Hollie is standing is just around from our room, and the door there on the left is where we entered the cabin from.



And this is the beautiful cabin.
You can walk all the way around on the decking.



Here’s the monster car.



He loves it!



It was interesting seeing the horrible driveway in the day light.



Ade asked me to stand here to work out how steep the drop was on to the drive.
I’m 4ft 10, so it’s like a 5ft drop as soon as you enter the drive, but also at an angle.



The main problem as the initial bit. My Dad has a 7 seater car and really struggled as the bottom underneath the car scraped as he entered and left.
But the other problem was trying to get up the driveway and on to the road as it’s on a bed and you need the speed to get up but people drove around so fast.



So here’s the bend and because the car is so big it was scary pulling out at speed as the road was also very narrow.
The little store is down there were we pulled in last night to ‘assess’.



And this blurry photo shows the road from the left.
When we arrived last night someone was dragging something across the road in the dark wearing black. You can catch it on the video if you visit my YouTube channel. All these videos are on there. (the channel is lollipop box club). We captured a few of the area.



We got the kids up, grabbed breakie and we’d left by 8.30am.
We were going to the Incline Railway early. The first train was at 9am, apparently it gets really busy in the day.
Plus England were playing in the World Cup at 10am. Louis was desperate to be back for that.
Dad was bringing his dog Ollie later in the day so we needed to go before he arrived as doggies aren’t allowed on the attraction.



We were right around the corner from Ruby Falls. It was already busy around here.
It was the weekend after the 4th July though.
We were going to visit Ruby Falls, it’s an underground waterfall. But we couldn’t take the dog and you are down there on a tour for quite some time, you can’t just go down and come up, Some of the areas you have to bend and you have people coming through in both directions. We decided not to do it. Louis wasn’t overly up for it and we figured we’d rather do the railway.



The Incline Railway is the steepest passenger train in the world. It’s a 72.7% grade.



It was $15 each. The mountain was being swallowed by cloud so we knew there wouldn’t be a view from the top. But the sweet old lady did prewarn us as she was selling us the tickets.









It only takes about 10 mins to get to the top and there is commentary the whole time telling you about the history, how it works and all that. It was really interesting.
It was so so steep going up the last bit.



There are 2 decks for you to look out.
We laughed running up the steps knowing that the view would look like this.



So then we thought it would be funny to run up to the upper deck…. And the view from there looked like this.



There’s a little shop and café inside. It smelt very popcorny when we walked in.



The gift shop had the usual gift shop tat, but we love them!

Hollie bought a magnet and I bought this tree dec.
We wandered out the back and saw that you could park there so we said about coming back with Dad if the weather improved.

We took the train back down, there was one waiting.
We were very conscious of the time and needing to get back for the quarter final of the world cup.

We’d seen a big grocery store when we drove in. So we thought we’d go there and quickly grab some food as we didn’t have much in and we wanted a little party whilst watching the footy.
The store was called ‘Food City’ and looked a little ‘pounland-esque’ from the outside but it was actually more ‘Publix-esque’ inside and we were pleasantly surprised.

We dashed around the aisles with the trolley in proper Supermarket Sweep style (Dale would have been proud…RIP Dale).

They were super super friendly the staff there. I get the feeling they don’t get many brits.
We got asked about the royal wedding….of course.
And we got asked if we had a loyalty card. Obviously we didn’t so she swiped something for us and we got 20% off the whole bill! How kind was that? !



They did this cool thing with the bottles!
We bought so much crap it was embarrassing. I did buy one very expensive box of cut up water melon though…. Almost $10!



We could see the railway track right infront of us whilst we were stood in the carpark.
I zoomed in and you could see the trains.



It was now 10.10am so we had to get a move on as footy had just started.
The boys rushed in, got their shirts on and we watched and ate rubbish.



Hollie and I decided to go for a little walk and cross the road to see the little store.
We only did that once during the trip and decided not to do it again. There’s no path and the cars drive far too fast on that bend.



The sign outside made us laugh every time.



All good there thanks!





It was very much a local store. I’d wondered if they’d stock milk or anything like that, but no….it was full to the brim of tat, but quite sweet. I did really like the handmade quilts that were hanging outside.



Out the front you can watch the incline railway that we’d just been on go up and down.






The trains were full now. It was also very hot out.

England won 2-0. The boys were very happy.
After the footy, we got ready and headed out to AT&T.
It was about 15 mins drive away.



We did this last year too. As we were away for 4 weeks, we decided that we’d all get sim cards again. It’s $80 for the month unlimited.



And they had a repeat of the football on, so we got to watch the game again.

We’d arranged to meet up with my friend Steph. So after our phones were sorted we drove back to the Incline Railway to Clumpies a local Ice Cream place to meet her.



Driving back towards our Lookout Mountain.



I’ve known Steph for years and we’d last seen each other back in LA in 2013, so it was really good to see each other again.
Steph was one of the main reasons that we were coming to Chattanooga. After seeing her photos of how beautiful this area was for so long I’d really felt a pull to come here and with a name like ‘Chattanooga’! It’s so fun to say.


Cont...

[miss_mouse]

Cont...




Now, for someone that doesn’t really like ice cream (except for my homemade) this was amazing! For some reason, I always try it and want to like it like everyone else, but I rarely do. (I’ve made the family promise to stop letting my buy Ghirardellis sundaes in Disney Springs… I pay $12, take a cute picture, eat the strawberry, have a few spoons, feel sick and bin it every time).
This however was amazing!
I had blackberry crumble. It was creamy, tarte and textured.
I keep meaning to try and recreate it.
Everyone else loved theirs too. We also bought the cutest chunky mugs and Ade bought a cap.

Dad was due around 5pm, so we didn’t chat with Steph for too long. As ‘Food King’ was over the road I wanted to go back and do a proper shop before Dad arrived.



The view from Food Kings carpark was much better this time. We could see to the top of the mountain now.



And the card that was swiped earlier to give us the 20% off was given back to use to use each time we came. So we got another 20% off.

We got back unpacked and I started pacing knowing that Dad was due anytime. I had proper butterflies.
It was July 7th and we’d last seen him in October.
I pulled around a chair and sat on the front deck waiting until his car pulled down the drive.
I was surprised as I had told him to pull in to the little Mountain Memories shop and wait for me. But he decided to find us himself and got in to bother.
He’d pulled in to the wrong driveway….he went next door and theirs was worst. He scraped the bottom of his car coming down our steep drive and his car ended up being left until they left in a few days.
I’ve never known my Dad not want to drive. He’s one of the most confident drivers I’ve ever known. But his car was too low for this drive.
We got to meet Ollie for the first time.



When we booked the cabin last year, they were dogless. Ben their old dog had passed and then a dog rescue centre came to the Ford dealership where Dad works to try and find homes for some dogs. Dad has such a soft spot for animals, went to see them and Ollie just came over and sat on him…. They’ve been together ever since. He’s just fitted right in to their family. He’s about 2-3 years old and they were his 5th home. (and last!)



As well as a rather big Bath and Bodyworks box that Dad had bought me, we’d also had these sent to him.
It felt so odd saying that we were going to Disney next week. I just didn’t feel real.

Dad and his wife Janet had wanted to do dinner. Dad’s specialty is steak.
They bought a massive cooler for the trunk of the car and unloaded it all.



Massive steaks, salads, beer, potatoes…



No one does steak like Dad.
The rain came down so heavy just as the steaks were about done and we had a big storm.
Ade and Louis said at the end of the trip that, that remained their best meal.



And he bought us a tray of Donut Bank Donuts. Their local little independent bakery that we fell in love with when we visited. The best donuts ever!



Everyone fell in love with Ollie. He’s the sweetest pup and loved all the attention.



It was such a lovely day.
I love my Dad so much and went to bed feeling so happy that we’d made this decision to do this and invite Dad. Knowing that he was getting all this quality with the kids too. And I slept so well knowing that if some slasher scary person broke in to the cabin downstairs that they would hopefully shout loud enough giving us time to escape.
I slept well knowing all these things!

Tomorrow….Sweet Home Alabama.

Thanks for reading.

[Melbatb]

That drive looks scary! It is bad enough pulling out onto a fast road with that steep incline being added in!

A great first day though! It looks like a lovely area to be in!

[disneywiseowl]

What an absolutely lovely day. Great accom. Nice weather. Terrific meal. Fun train. Family. A cute dog & England footie. Life doesn’t get any better than this.lol.

Thanks for sharing!

[Palm trees]

What a lovely day, how fab to see a friend and then get to see your dad too!

[margyloveswdw]

Great first day; it looks beautiful!

[miss_mouse]

Originally Posted by Melbatb

That drive looks scary! It is bad enough pulling out onto a fast road with that steep incline being added in!

A great first day though! It looks like a lovely area to be in!

See more...

I'm just glad I wasn't driving
I think if that were the case, we'd still be on that mountain!

Thanks for reading

[miss_mouse]

Originally Posted by disneywiseowl

What an absolutely lovely day. Great accom. Nice weather. Terrific meal. Fun train. Family. A cute dog & England footie. Life doesn’t get any better than this.lol.

Thanks for sharing!

See more...

I totally agree.
One of those special days when you look back on.

Thank you for reading

[miss_mouse]

Originally Posted by Palm trees

What a lovely day, how fab to see a friend and then get to see your dad too!

See more...

Yes, I felt so lucky.

Thanks for reading

[miss_mouse]

Originally Posted by margyloveswdw

Great first day; it looks beautiful!

See more...

Thank you so much.
It really was beautiful