This year for Spring Break, we wanted to do something different with the kids other than the beach and thought we should take advantage of places we could drive from Mobile. We had done some research on Gatlinburg, TN and after talking with a friend at dinner one night, we had them signed up to go with us! The incredible cabin was too hard to pass up :)
We headed out the Friday the kids got out of school. We checked out Ryan a little early and got on the road. We headed north toward Birmingham, and not too long into the trip, B and C fell asleep for a short cat-nap. Our friends told us about this amazing store called Priesters Pecans that we had to stop at. They had all the candy and nuts you could imagine, along with every sample under the sun. I think I ate my weight in the samples, but still managed to purchase quite a bit!
From there, we headed to Birmingham for dinner. When my friend, Kay, told us there was a Chuy's there, we decided that was a MUST! Even though we had to wait and sit outside in the cold, we made it happen and I enjoyed every bite of it! Our last leg of the evening was getting us to Chatanooga. We checked into the hotel pretty late that evening, especially because the time changed to Eastern time zone once we crossed over into Tennessee, but the kids didn't seem to mind too much. The boys slept on a sleeper sofa that randomly had this chaise attached to the sofa so it was more of a sectional. It ended up being the perfect place for Charlie to sleep!
They were SO excited!
We got up the next morning and after a late breakfast, we got on the road to head toward Gatlinburg.
After stopping in town for lunch and walking around some, we checked into our cabin. The view were breathtaking.
The boys were ecstatic. They had looked at the pictures on the computer no less than 20 times leading up to the trip, so they were running around like crazies checking out the pool table, air hockey, arcade, hot tub, movie theatre, etc!
Running between the floors!
We figured out that first night, that I forgot the pump to Charlie's air mattress, so the boys got to cram into a King bed! They thought it was the coolest thing and surprisingly, didn't do too bad for the week. A little bit of kicking here and there, but more or less it was fine.
Silly face time!
The next morning, we walked the main strip of Gatlinburg and after more crowds than we had hoped for, made the trek down to the other end of the strip to Ober Gatlinburg.
We rode the train in the air as Charlie called it to get up to the top of the mountain.
We snow-tubed for a few hours and had so much fun.
Ryan didn't end up in many pics or videos because after the first run, he took off on his own and we never caught him!
Although it was somewhat overcast, the little bit of sun reflecting off the "snow" was blinding to me!
Check out B at the end of the video with the mask over his face. He thought that would make the ride more thrilling not being able to see where he was going!
This was our ride back up the hill
We hung out afterward and were hoping to ice skate, but they were about to zamboni and by the time we could skate again, it would have been too much time waiting. So, we opted for a few minutes in the ghetto arcade instead!
When we rode the aerial tram back, we caught a peek of a part we didn't visit. So we just took a pic of the bear from above as consolation!
I thought they may be a little nervous on the tram, but they ended up loving it and talking about it for weeks.
They loved the machines that imprint the pennies. They seriously thought it was the coolest thing ever!
We had to stop at an old time candy shop on our walk back and watched the taffy being made and stretched. I'm not a huge fan of taffy, but when its warm and fresh, it was actually really good.
This boy went the entire week without a nap, so he was definitely sneaking in little ones wherever he could!
The following morning, we headed to the Smoky Mountain national park for some hiking and sightseeing.
The boys loved being outdoors all day, just exploring and running around looking at random things!
Ryan wanted a pic by himself, and he just randomly held onto the tiniest twig he could find.
One of my favorite pics of B of all time. Typical Buzz
We found these old cabins that had been torn down, but had their stone fireplaces mainly still intact.
We picnicked by the water, then headed off to another part of the park that we drove through.
Once we made it to the loop, we weren't 5 minutes into the drive and we saw a Mama bear and some baby cubs. We actually stopped and got out of the car and ended up only about 15 yards from the bears. They were completely unphased and apparently, we've talked to quite a few friends who have visited here multiple times and have never seen a bear.
The kids were in awe! Of course, the remaining hour of the drive we didn't see a dang thing, but that made it totally worth it.
Although, the views were incredible.
We let the boys out to run around. I felt like they were in the Sound of Music :)
We decided we hadn't had enough excitement for the day, so on our drive out of the Smoky Mountains, we decided to add in another 2 mile round-trip hike to the Laurel Falls. Wes was a trooper and did about 90% of the hike (which was elevated, btw) with Charlie on his shoulders.
We capped off the day with dinner for Ryan's birthday at one of the local restaurants and headed back to the cabin for cake! It was a jam-packed day, but all 6 boys did great!
Happy 8th birthday, Ryan!
The next day, the dads took the big boys to go whitewater rafting. Kay and I took the little ones into town for lunch and shopping.
Ryan was a little on the fence about going, but Wes was able to convince him. I think the rapids were between a 1 and 2, and Ryan had a blast.
He definitely said it was one of the highlights of the trip.
We took the littles for ice cream, shopping, and to purchase more candy/treats to take home. They were all pretty beat that afternoon. We opted for a lower key evening with movies, games, hot tubbing, and takeout!
Our last full day there, we went back into Pigeon Forge to take advantage of some of what it had to offer. The Hill boys really wanted to mine for gems somewhere and we weren't exactly sure what to expect, but the boys ended up loving it.
They got to pick out their own bucket of rocks and dirt to sift through the water for gems.
Bradley found a really cool geode that hadn't been cracked yet and was really excited.
He was amazed by just about any gem he found, though!
Ryan needed no assistance as he became a pro pretty quickly.
One of the ladies working there was kind enough to go and crack open B's geode for him.
The whole place was really cool and the boys enjoyed it!
They wanted to go ride go karts while we were there, so after a few stops we finally found a place that wasn't too crowded and had karts for the little ones as well. It was all of their first time to try this and was hilarious to watch.
Bradley caught on pretty quickly....
....Charlie got log-jammed a few times
He took it very seriously and needed assistance from some of the workers multiple times to get him unstuck.
Ryan got to ride the big track with the adults, and we all had so much fun! There was actually a pretty steep drop on one of the tracks. I think this is something we'll need to do more of as we all had a great time. We headed down to Old Time Pigeon Forge called the Old Time Mill and had a great meal with more shopping.
That evening was spent packing and getting ready to head home the following morning. We were making the drive straight through that Friday which I think turned out to be a 9-10 hour day after stopping for Starbucks and lunch. Luckily, the kids were troopers, although they slept for only a little while. We had such a fun trip and I think the boys loved it even more.
As if we didn't already do enough that week, we decided a spring break wouldn't be complete without one trip to the beach. We headed to Orange Beach with some friends the following day.
They had so much with the Lillypad wrestling around and pushing each other off.
After a long day on Robinson Island, we hopped on the boat and headed over to the Flora-bama Yacht Club.
It was such a fun week capped off with Easter weekend. When Monday rolled around, we all still could have used an extra day or two to recover!
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