Overflowing River Banks

 

Creekstone Inn at Pigeon Forge.  Wow.  So this morning I got the idea that I should move the car up one level - there are two parking levels at the hotel.  And look what happened to that lower level not much later.  The rain came early today, and it came hard.  It was relentless, and the river level was rising.  We watched as it rose and rose all morning, as did many others here.  The people in the campground across the river slowly began removing their campers from across the street.  It was pretty wild.  Talk about a river rampage!

Back home there were talk of tornados in Hall County and plenty of damage and closed roads in Forsyth County.  We'll just have to get back there to see how things are, but of course that's been on our minds.

Clearly it was going to be an indoors kind of day!  Eventually we went out, the thinking was with the rain coming down so hard that Dollywood wouldn't be that great of a destination.  Also rejected was the idea of going too far away to Buc-ee's or some place like that (the traffic going up there makes the destination a lot farther away).  Wo we decided to get something to eat first.  We were off to Cracker Barrel!  One of the main reasons was a baby outfit there for Camille's newborn, a really specific inside joke on it.  Little Bonnie is due here in October.  Anyway, we found the Cracker Barrel right there beneath King Kong.  We've had the joke all week about this being the most unflattering angle of King Kong, and sure enough, we would up eating right beneath his backside!

We had a nice meal at Cracker Barrel, shopped around for a bit, and were on our way out on to our next few destinations.  We were just killing time before our bigger appointment of the afternoon.  We were driving up north a bit, and found this place along the road.

So we went in.  Some of the stuff was so over the top.  It was fun looking around in there though.  A lot of other people were there too, a constant flow of traffic into this small storefront.  

We got a pair of socks and a mug, and posed for a few pictures too, like this one above.  How could I not pose for a picture next to the Elvis and a former President wearing sunglasses and an Indian headdress?  There was some pretty funny stuff there, but also some stuff with some bad language on it - maybe a warning for kids, or a separate area for that stuff.  Anyway, we left there soon after - it was still raining - and we found what we were looking for!

We finally got to a Baskin Robbins!  Ever since "Ant-Man" we've wanted to go to Baskin-Robbins, but of course there aren't really any nearby us.  So we talk about it from time to time, and finally we got to drop by one.  We had to get our ice creams to go, but the traffic was so bad out there just getting out of the Wal-mart parking lot took fifteen minutes.  And then the traffic along the main road was abysmal too.  You just can't expect to get anywhere in a hurry along these roads here, and fortunately, we had plenty of time to get to our next destination, the primary one for the day:  the Comedy Barn!

This was a great time!  And yes, Joey the Porg and the rubber chicken Joaquin came along too!  Can you believe we had front row seats?  We bought the little group shot all these places make you pose for before going in, and after that we made our way to the intimidating front row there.  But it wasn't too bad, really! In fact, at one point we were interacting with the folks on stage, being called upon and pointed at - maybe it was my Hawaiian shirt.  The music was fantastic, the laughs were plenty, and it was actually a fairly long show that moved pretty quick.  

Here are a few pictures that Maddie took along the way.  There was an intermission, and Maddie got some taffy and a drink.  Joey the Porg and the rubber chicken were sitting in the front the whole show, and I think they were laughing too. 

We had such a fun time there!  We've heard about this show for a while of course, but with so much to do in Pigeon Forge, we never got around to it.  But I'm so glad we did now.  Eventually, we were able to get back to the hotel, and the river went down somewhat.  And also, later on, the sun started to come out!  

The skies began to clear, and we decided to take it easy the rest of the night, staying here the rest of the evening.  We fed the ducks the rolls we kept from Cracker Barrel, and some other bread too.  We watched a movie, packed, got cleaned up, and got ready for bed - reading, praying beforehand.  Hopefully the family one floor up will quiet down!

NOTE:  They didn't.  It was 2am when the toddlers stopped running around the balcony and screaming, throwing plenty of clothing, cups and diapers over the side of the balcony.