Goofy Trips To-Do List

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Goofy Trips To-Do List

Wednesday, June 29th, 2005 | Best Of, East Tennessee, Travel |

Goofy trips are what Melissa and I call little day trips and weekend trips within a couple hours of Knoxville. When we first moved in together we made a list of different things we wanted to do. Some of them were things neither of us had done and some of them one of us had done, but we wanted to do them together.

With a long weekend coming up we’ve been thinking about goofy trips. I used to keep this list in Excel on my computer, but I’m moving it to the blog. This is the list we’ll look at when we have a free weekend day and need something to do.

Things To Do

All cities are in Tennessee unless they’re not.

- Carter Family Fold in Hiltons, Virginia
- Sharp’s Chapel ferry ride
- Whitewater rafting on the Ocoee
- Scottish Games and Festival in Gatlinburg
- Lake Eden Arts Festival (LEAF) in NC (Memorial or Labor Day)
- Parkway Drive-in Movie Theater in Maryville
- Visit Mark in Bristol
- Kings Island theme park, Ohio
- Visit Tammy in Atlanta, Georgia
- Hot Springs, North Carolina weekend trip
- Cornbread Festival in South Pittsburgh
- Smokies baseball game at the new stadium in Kodak
- National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough
- Gethsemani Monastery in Bardstown, Kentucky
- Jefferson Co. Fair (July/early August)
- Rent a boat on Douglas Lake
- Alvin C. York birthplace (could combine this with the next two, which are in the same area)
- Historic Rugby
- Northrup Falls hike at Colditz Cove State Natural Area
- Jack Daniels BBQ Festival in October

Trip Reports and Pictures

Some of these were on the list, too.

- Abbingdon, Virginia theater and antiques
- Alleghany Falls and Alleghany Springs Hotel in Maryville (Blount County), Tennessee
- Asheville, North Carolina
- Athens, Tennessee
- Boone and Banner Elk, North Carolina ski trip
- Chattanooga, Tennessee
- Cades Cove, Tennessee (Great Smoky Mountains National Park
- Crossville, Tennessee
- Dayton, Tennessee, part 1: Scopes Trial Museum and Downtown
- Dayton, Tennessee, part 2: Stinging Falls Pocket Wilderness
- Dandridge, TN and Tennessee’s Covered Bridges
- Einstein Simplified (Knoxville improv/sketch comedy group)
- Elkmont Synchronized Lightning Bugs (2nd week of June in the Smokies)
- Grainger County Tomato Festival
- Gregory’s Bald Azalea Backpacking Trip Great Smoky Mountains National Park
- Hwy. 30 - Mayfield Dairy Tour, Etowah’s L&N Depot, Reliance, Ocoee River Whitewater
- Horse Racing at Keeneland in Kentucky
- Jonesborough, Tennessee
- Jonesborough, Tennessee Fifth Wedding Anniversary Trip
- Kephart Shelter Backpacking Trip, Great Smoky Mountains National Park

- Knoxville Zoo
- Ladies night at the pistol range
- Lake Lure, NC
- Millennium Manor in Alcoa (Memorial Day)
- Morristown, TN and Its Unusual Downtown Walkways
- Mt Airy, North Carolina
- Mt. Cammerer Firetower Hike, Great Smoky Mountains National Park
- Nashville, Tennessee
- Ripley’s Aquarium in Gatlinburg
- Tennessee Valley Fair
- Townsend and Walland, Tennessee
- Virgin Falls Pocket Wilderness Backpacking Trip, Middle Tennessee-
- Waynesville and Sylva, NC
- World’s Longest Yard Sale on Hwy. 127

Links to some other things we did on our list:

- Knoxville homes tour at Christmastime
- Foothills Fall Festival in Maryville
- Teddy’s play
- Palace Theater concert in Maryville
- Turkey dinner in Georgia
- Etowah antiques shopping
- Valleyfest Film Festival (now defunct)
- Pleasant Hill, Kentucky Shaker Village
- Crossville/Muddy Pond
- Steve Kaufman Guitar Camp Concerts at Maryville College

4 Comments to Goofy Trips To-Do List

chris granju
June 30, 2005

FWIW, I would put a recommendation in to add the Jefferson Co. Fair (usually at the end of July/early August)…it’s a great county fair that’s more like what you would *want* the TVA&I fair to be. Great demolition derby(s) too!

Les Jones
June 30, 2005

Cool. See - this is why I posted the list here.

I’m a fan of demolition derbies, too. Melissa had never been to one, and she really liked it.

Frank Murphy
July 2, 2005

Here are a few (mostly food related) things that I can recommend:

Jack Daniels BBQ contest (October):
http://www.lynchburgtenn.com/jack_daniels_bar-b-q.html

World Chicken Festival (September):
http://www.chickenfestival.com/

RC & MoonPie Festival (June):
http://www.bellbucklechamber.com/rcmoon.html

Mayfield Dairy Tour
http://www.mayfielddairy.com/visitors_locations.html

Weekly Comedy Improv Show:
http://www.einsteinsimplified.com/

Les Jones
July 2, 2005

Thanks, Frank. We looked at that Mayfield tour, only this is the one weekend of the year they don’t run it. But it’s definitely on our short list now. We may combine that with a raft trip down the Ocoee.

And Einstein Simplifed is on our mental list. This week is Melissa’s last week of summer term, so we’ll be free to go after that.