re: Chattanooga/Gatlinburg Trip Report - With Some Pictures

Tuesday we slept in a bit and then headed into Gatlinburg for pancakes…. There are so many pancake places… but on recommendations we went to one called Pancake Pantry. It was very good…. But after we got there we realized it was cash only, with an ATM available. Places that do this annoy the living crap out of me, and this was somewhat of a theme in Gatlinburg… more than a few places were cash only. But breakfast was good, and after that, we walked around "The Strip" which is called The Parkway. Lots of shopping and touristy type stuff. I bought some Moonshine and Wife bought some Cotton Candy Wine - after we did some tastings! Around noon we got in the car and headed to Hartford, TN, for our rafting trip. It was about an hour or so away with a very pretty drive. Youngest was a bit too small to do true whitewater rafting, so we did an easier "family rafting" trip. The company we used was Rafting in the Smokies and they were great. We had packed a picnic lunch and ate at some tables there, and played in the river for a bit before our adventure began. Our guide - Ben - was awesome. We booked this in advance as well. We were on the river for about 2 hours. We learned the "town" of Hartford has 1 gas station, 2 restaurants, 2 stop lights… and 12 river rafting outfitters. The river was a bit crowded but not terribly. It was a fun trip. Afterwards, we headed back to Gatlinburg and ate at Alamo Steakhouse… a bit pricey but very good food.