April 5, 2025

If you are a Jimmy Buffet fan, you will recognize these themes in my opening.  I was in Biloxi when I drafted this blog, and I have changed my latitude, attitude and, in general, my route back home.  I went back along the Gulf Coast to escape Tornado Alley, to retrace my path at least through Mississippi, Louisiana and the eastern part of Texas before I head a little further north for my final months/weeks of this journey.

After the threat in Myrtle Beach, I’ve got two different weather apps I’m checking about twice daily.  On Thursday, March 28, I didn’t like what I was seeing – another storm brewing with the potential for destruction along its path (tornados and extreme hail).  It was going to hit Nashville, where I’d stopped for a few days, on Sunday, 3 days away.  I decided to enjoy the day and monitor the storms. 

The next day, Friday, the threats were still there with radar maps showing that Nashville wouldn’t be safe.  I began searching for an escape route – looking north into Kentucky, east into North Carolina and south into Georgia – where could I go within 300 miles or so that would clear me of tornado warnings?  I landed on Atlanta, about 260 miles away.  It would get the storm, with potential for severe thunderstorms but no tornados or high winds predicted.

On Saturday morning, I checked all apps, watched a weather channel and by 11 am, had new reservations in Atlanta, completed my departure routines and hit the road, thinking I’d at least weather the storm in Atlanta, then return to my route through Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Northern Texas.  But something in my gut was telling me head south and stay south until you’ve cleared Tornado Alley, since April was the beginning of the season for twisters.  The forecasts for the next few weeks in those states proved my gut was given good guidance.

The storm didn’t hit Atlanta on Sunday, it stalled a little.  And I used the time to look at the forecasts of yet more storms following the one I was running from.  I made the decision, following my gut to head to the gulf again and pick up I-40.  No guarantee of good weather, but more chance of no tornados. I spent that Sunday cancelling existing reservations and planning my new route, making new reservations.  I’m glad I did.

On Monday morning, and learned the storm was now due to hit Atlanta by noon.  So, I got up radar apps and tracked the storm -at what point it would clear what city, and what were the official “warnings” for that area (i.e., did they include tornado warnings).  I created a chart of what would happen.  Atlanta was still the mildest prediction for the overall storm.  I could not go west without driving through some portion of the storm and leaving when it hit Atlanta would be my best chance of getting through it.   Being from the Pacific Northwest, I have lots of experience driving in heavy rain and even thunderstorms.

My calculations were correct, I left at 12:30 pm and immediately hit the worst deluge on the freeway – it was like driving through a car wash rinse cycle.  There was inches of standing water on the road and everyone slowed to at least 10 miles per hour, putting their flashers on and we slowly moved through it. After 15 minutes, I was clear of the heavy rain, within 45 minutes the rain stopped and when I arrived at my campsite in Montgomery, the sun was out. One of the best reasons ever to open a beer and sit in the sun reading for a few hours.   

My former coworkers will tell you that I am a planner, applying logic and strategy.  But what isn’t as obvious, my intuition often drives me to conduct the analysis and evaluate risks.  I’m letting my gut (intuition) lead me more these days but still calling on the other tools.  In this case, my gut steered my clear of a nasty storm and made me rethink my entire route home.  Facts were applied to logic analysis.  It is paying off.  I wish more people in this country would stop and listen to their guts and evaluate the facts.  If they did, maybe we wouldn’t be in trouble as a nation as we are today.

Okay, now that my changes in latitude and adventure have been explained, let me do some recap on the fun I had before and after the escape!

The Great Smoky Mountains – where the moon shines

I visited both sides of the mountains – Cherokee, NC and Gatlinburg, TN.  Beautiful, scenic but I had to miss the most viewed parts of the park since they tend to happen on a highway that is narrow, twisty and often have steep drop offs without guard rails – and in general, not recommended for RVs.  So I enjoyed what I could, visiting one of the park’s visitor centers on the NC side and shopping in Cherokee.  Then I drove around on the recently reopened I-40 to Gatlinburg.  This freeway was washed out by the Hurricane last fall.

In Gatlinburg, I stayed at a new, cute little RV Park that was really into bear carvings. However, they also warned of real black bears that wander through the park. This area had a great free shuttle system which picked me up and dropped me off right in front of the park. Which was a blessing because even if I could drive into town, traffic was a mess! Picture one of those scenes of a major city in Asia where pedestrians, cars, bikes all converge with little room between them.  Well, this was Gatlinburg without the bicycles!

It was a fun place to wander around; there were multiple ski lifts to take you up into the local mountains, all kinds of tourist attractions (of which I did none).  I had the best steak for lunch that I’ve had in a long time.  And I went moonshine tasting!  Whoa.  The first thimble was something like 220 proof!  One small sip and I think it completely cleared all the cholesterol out of my system. The rest were strong thimblefuls, with a variety of flavors – root beer I liked, waffles and syrup I passed on and the rest, well after about 10 thimbles of at least 80 proof, who can remember them all?  Warning to my family – I am bringing some home with me!

What was interesting about my visit to the Smokies is getting a very tiny insight into how we might be divided or how us northerners might be suspicious.  In Cherokee, I was talking to a man in the dog park. Nice man, we swapped stories of business and travel.  As he was saying good-bye, he asked me “are all northerners as friendly as you are?”  It took me a minute to respond, he took my delay as agreement at first – but I corrected him and said that I’ve meet people all over the world and find people to be the same everywhere – friendly, rude and/or indifferent. 

At the moonshine tasting, I arrived a little late and everyone had already stated where they were from.  This round tasting bar was full of laughing people, talking and the host asked me to state where I was from.  When I said Oregon, the whole table went silent.  People stopped laughing and talking and looked away.  I can’t read too much into it, but the host finally recovered the moment by saying they didn’t get too many people from my area. The people next to me awkwardly stuck up a conversation, and as the drinks were poured, we were laughing and talking about life again.  It was strange.

Chattanooga and Ruby Falls

A friend recommended a stop at Ruby Falls, a natural* waterfall inside a mountain.  It was definitely something to see, hiking deep into Lookout Mountain, walking 1 mile roundtrip through caverns to see this free-falling waterfall, about 62 feet.  I asterisk (*) natural, because this is a commercial venture and the falls are subject to water available, drought impacts the free flow significantly.  So, the venture has engineered a water recycling system that collects the fall and pumps it back up to the opening, so it doesn’t dry up.  Not sure if I saw true, natural conditions or the engineered one – but it was spectacular!  Music and water/light show deep in the earth.  Along the way I saw many natural and interesting cave formations.  There is an interesting story behind the discover and naming of these falls as well – the passage followed to find them is one only a serious caver would attempt (belly crawling would have been the method used!) I stayed in Raccoon Caverns RVP, which I did go to but thought the rocks and old structures were interesting.

Nashville – short visit

Since I left early, I didn’t get to the original Grand Ole Opry (Ryman Theater) or downtown as planned.  However, I was lucky enough to stay at a KOA that had live music every night.  What a great evening, sitting by the pool and listening to a very talented duo, but not a couple, who sang and played guitar. She had a wonderful voice. Their repertoire was eclectic, she did her best when singing country songs (go figure, it was Nashville) but they threw in some Beatle songs.  Interesting choice?

Down around Biloxi – where the girls all look like sisters in the ocean

I’ve always liked that line, not that we’re girls in the ocean, but that all women are part of a sisterhood, all women, period.  And all men are my brothers.  Anyway, making it down to Biloxi and then spending a few days here helped me unwind and relax.  It was muggy and was mostly overcast, but I still got a long walk on the beach walk (no dogs on beach) and some pool time in.  During yesterday’s walk, Audy and I stopped by Shaggy’s, right on the beach, and enjoyed lunch on the second-floor deck (of course, due to the high stilts, it was technically the first floor) Gulf shrimp served 2 ways, grilled, bacon-wrapped with bourdon glaze and coconut crusted.  Yummy.  So was the pina colada.  And Audy got a beef patty, served on a keepsake frisbee.

Along the way, it was interesting to see the new requirements for stilts since Katrina and other hurricanes.  If you look closely at the pictures, you will see an older construction next to a newer one.  And for the new construction, note that the stilts are above the streetlights and compare the height against the cars on the street.  For me, if you have to build your house a mile off the ground, I’d be terrified to think waves that high could come along.

 Life is good if you take your time and remember to enjoy the good times after the challenges.  Namaste.