Day 3 - 748 miles ... A cave, a waterfall, memory lane and a traffic incident

It was very nice to start the morning slowly, this is in contrast to our "truck stop" mornings, which has us quickly transition from sleeping mode to travel mode. The motor home, has dinette, a sofa, and overhead bed and a bed in the rear. For sleep mode, the dinette table drops down for a bed ... this is the one that Genna usually sleeps in. Abuelo spent some time before we left creating some railings for this to ensure that no one falls out. The sofa is a "jack knife" bed ... think futon. This opens up for another sleeping spot ... Kelly's "room". The overhead bed is setup with most of the kids clothes, stuffed toys and general storage. In travel mode, this keeps the pillows, sheets and blankets.

Our destination for the morning was Ruby Cave. This is an attraction at Lookout Mountain, which cats its shadow on Chattanooga. It was a great drive (and only 6 miles) to the place ... great, in the sense, that it was a winding road with some switchbacks ... very impressive views and very pretty countryside. We made Ruby Cave around 1030A, ahead of a couple of tour buses. You enter and exit Ruby cave through a gift shop (couldn't help myself) ... Ok, the gift shop has an elevator that takes you down 260 ft into a cave. You then walk about .5 mile further into the mountain, putting you about 1200ft inside of Lookout Mountain. The cave is mainly limestone, and has some nice formations ...

I always have a love / hate relationship with commercial things like this ... the entire cave walk is paved, has great lighting, good backgound music and significant guard rails. Many of the formations have been named for you (fish, alligator, dragon's foot, bacon, steak and potatoes, chips, etc... these are all actual names). While you are warned at the beginning that this is a strenous mile walk and you shuld be in good

shape, our tour group had people with canes and some that tested the weight limit of the elevator.

Our tour guide, Mavis, loved to refer to herself in the third person (if Mavis can do this, you can do this) - she apparently was full of wisdom. Unfortunately, what Mavis lacked in eloquence, she made up in volume. As we would near a formation, she would yell ... "Above your head, to the right, bacon.". Since the tour was single file and probably spread out 150ft, she would repeat this, over and over and over and over and over again, loudly and with a nails on blackboard tone. About half way in the cave, I was convinced I could lead us out (follow the path), and where the body could be stashed ... who would notice one less person coming back.

At the end of the half mile walk, is the crowning jewel of the Ruby Cave ... a large room that is 30ft wide and about 300 ft tall. From the roof of this room, a waterfall.

Wow, impressive ... and, as you would expect, heavily lit, great music, and very commercialized ... regardless, was very nice to see it. We

returned to the elevator the same way we came, we this time, took the rear, instead of the head of the group ... which meant less of Mavis :)

Our next destination held some great sentimental value for Michelle and took us through some beautiful countryside in Tennessee. Around 430P we arrived in Watertown, TN. This is a small town a little more than an hour east of Nashville. Watertown, is where Michelle's mom is from and where her grandparents lived. It was interesting to watch the waves of emotions go through Michelle's face as we got closer and we entered the town. She guided us to her grandparents house and told stories about the people who lived in the houses around there ... Jaci kept as

king, "Who lives there?", "Do you know that person?" ... which was somewhat amusing. We circled the neighbourhood a couple of times ... and since our damage deposit was likely lost, the trees hitting our roof couldn't make much of a difference.

We headed to the town square, stopped in the library, where wee saw pictures of her grandfather in one of the town

history books (he was mayor and a banker). We visited a bridge that has a plaque that bears their names (that would be George Washington Griffith and Lucy Griffith) and stopped for some ice cream and a little shop. We wanted to walk in the bank, but it was closed ... but the "archives" building was open and we thumbed through some pictures and stories. Memories are such powerful things ... I hope that this trip makes some as strong as the ones I saw in Michelle.

From Watertown, we headed to Lebanon, which is about 30 minutes away ... took me a while to get the information into my GPS, as Michelle kept saying "Lebnon" ... I kept saying, there is no "Lebnon" ... she pointed it out on the map ... "Lebanon" ... hmmm

In Lebnon, we visited "Aunt Cile", this is Michelle's mom's aunt ... we found her house easly, and pulled into the driveway with our "rig". We had a wonderful visit and met her daughters, Cathy and Sherrie. Although our visit was short, we got some great pictures and I know it meant a great deal to Michelle. I am very glad we made this detour.

A stop for pizza, and a transtition to sleep mode ... then off to Hwy 40 and Memphis.

Within an hour of dinner, the kids are sleeping, Michelle is in the back with the babies and Kelly is in her "room" on facebook. I, have the road to myself (Ok, trucks everywhere) and am so impressed by the qaulity of this highway (so far, Tennnesee has the best roads). The surface is smooth and the ride is excellent. Somewhere along the way, we come across the paving crew that maintains this highway. They narrow the highway to one lane, using that large 50 gal sized drums.

Well ... my story is that they narrowed too much ... but a few of the Tennessee "drums" are no longer standing, not sure what I clipped them with, but I could see these poor things being flung to the side. To be fair, and in my defense, my other option was the concrete barrier, and yes, I know we had lost our damage deposit, but we still have 20 days in this thing. Apparently, these "drums" are able to communicate somehow, because in a couple of miles, one of them jumped out in front of us. Now, I cannnot tell you if it was in anger, in revenge for his brothers, as a martyr or if he was just suicidal ... but this thing did try to get me. We hit him hard (I think he was heavier than the others), a loud bang, a small "hop" from the rear axle, a swerve and his essence was gone. I am not ashamed to say, I was shaken by this :). About 10 minutes later, Michelle appears from the rear to inform me that there is a banging come from the outside somewhere ... hmmm ... not good.

We stopped shortly after at a truck stop ... Travel America for the night, about 70 miles from Memphis. I walk around the RV looking underneath for the victim ... but find nothing ... hmmm ... I check again, thoroughly ... nothing ... then I notice something "swinging" on the side of the unit. Apparently, the loss of drum life was not for nothing ... it took out one of the braces for our awning unit ... ugghh ... These things are clever ... because, our damage deposit does not cover damage to the awning .... ahhh ... this is getting to be an expensive trip ... the stats are not good ... 3 days, 2 with damage.