Great weekend

I don't usually post without a group of photos, but this weekend deserves to be documented somehow. It was one of those weird/amazing/magical weekends that really made me remember why I love Phil so much.

Friday, October 31st (Halloween)
We are normally very boring on Halloween, but this year I had curling from 8-10 then we went to my friend's house afterwards. We get tired early, so it was weird for us to arrive at a party at 10. We ended up staying out until 2:30 am which is completely out of character for us. We had a great time with some pretty great people though! When we arrived home, our adorable pain in the ass dog had chewed, scratched, and pulled the molding around our front door. When my dad was in town, he and I had worked on replacing this very piece of wood...due to Mischa doing this once before. We think the doorbell is what sets her off, so next year we will have to plan Halloween a little bit better. We do think the addition of chili oil to the door frame helped as she didn't seem to chew on it as most as last time.

Saturday, November 1st
Olga
I am not sure what possessed me to schedule an oil change for 9:30 on a Saturday morning, but I did it. Nothing out of the ordinary happened...dropped car off, ate some McDonald's for breakfast, and watch HGTV with a very nice lady in the waiting room. Since we said out so late, Phil met me later as we had planned to look at a few cars we saw online. We had gone to see 1 car last week, and then went to the Subaru dealership first to look at a used Mazda CX-7 (or something). Phil didn't hate it, but liked the 1st car better. We got some coffee and politely left the dealership. We then headed to the Volkswagon dealership to look at a used 2013 Jetta Sportwagon (one that I had found online I would like to note). We took that puppy for a test drive, and didn't even really need to say anything to each other, this was the car for us. It has a massive trunk, heated seats, high safety rating, and most importantly for Phil, a working gas gauge :-) What seemed like 15 hours later, Phil was on his way with a new car! There was a lot of sitting, awkward negotiating, paperwork, more sitting, eating a granola bar in between, but it was worth it. This was so far out of character for us because Phil is very picky and I am very practical/nervous when making huge decisions. Just like with our house though, it just felt right, and now we have a great new car, named Olga!
Butler Basketball
After all was said and done, we got home with about 45 minutes to spare before we had to leave for the first Butler Men's Basketball (exhibition) game of  the season. I was already loving the car purchase, because Phil drove us...which never ever happens! We got to the game and our friends from last year were genuinely excited to see us! We weren't able to get our exact same seats, but the people that "stole" ours are very nice and have an adorable daughter with a great laugh. So we were kitty corner to our friends Judy and Daniel, and then one row behind Nathan (a sweet, smart, and very loving kid with autism) and his family.
Air Supply
We had planned to attend the game for the first half because I had won tickets from NUVO to see Air Supply at Clowes, and we could just walk over from Hinkle to Clowes. We actually had amazing seats, but since it wasn't sold out we opted to sit further up, but on an end seat in case we got tired and wanted to leave. I can't even begin to express how amazing the concert was. Not only did their voices sound amazing, but you could just feel this incredible energy in the room. Phil and I are now fans, and said that if they were to come to Clowes again, we would pay for tickets! They highlighted all of their band members, and also were just genuinely funny in between songs. There were parts when just the audience would sing and because Clowes has such great acoustics there was this ethereal/eerie quality to the singing. It was really just magical. Gives me goosebumps just thinking about it. It also reminded me of Phil and mine's first date at the Vogue where we saw the Benevento Russo duo perform. It was just so romantic and we both were silently and simultaneously feeling this deep sense of gratitude for our very fortunate life together. I definitely got more verklempt when Phil verbalized all these same feelings that I was having. We left the concert before 11 and were please to have heated seats to keep our butts warm on the drive home!

Sunday, November 2nd
Our Sunday spent together was a nice combination of productive and lazy. We got an extra hour of sleep due to daylight saving time, so I woke up feeling very refreshed. I watched TV for a little until Phil awoke, and then I headed to yoga. When I returned home, Phil was out gassing up Olga, and only struggled slightly to figure out how to get the gas cap to open...you just push it :-) After picking up some lunch and hanging out for a bit, we went over to Target so I can do my annual day (or two) after Halloween candy purchasing. I buy it for my stash at work, so I tend to go a little overboard! I do set a limit for myself, and did stay within that. Once we arrived home, unloading the new car was so enjoyable and easy. We dropped off the cold items in the fridge, then headed back out to pick up Phil's old car that we had left at a bowling alley nearby where I had my oil change done the day before. The plan was for me to drive the new car home and Phil to drive his old one. The plan is to donate the old car to NPR as it wouldn't be worth the trouble of trading in. I really loved the way the car drove, and felt instantly comfortable in it!
Wood
Once we arrived home, I took a short break but then got to work on finally finishing up our giant pile of wood that needed to be moved. It has taken probably close to 6 hours so far over the course of 3 weekends. Phil threw his back out, so I wanted him to take it easy, so he helped where he could. We had started around 3, and I decided that I would try and work until 5. Just as I was rolling my last log up to the fence, Phil comes around the corner with a look of terror on his face. Apparently when Phil had come out to chop some of the larger pieces into fire sized pieces he had closed the garage and then come out the back door of the garage which leads out to our back yard. However, when he closed that door he didn't realize it was locked. He thought the top lock didn't work, so he didn't think to check it when he closed the door. If you know Phil you know he loves to lock up our house pretty consistently, so we were pretty much trapped outside of our own house. Luckily I had my phone, so we called Phil's mom who has a spare key to our house. Her husband (who was still at work) had the key, but said they would call us back. In the meantime, we walked the entire perimeter of our house checking to see if ANY of the windows were miraculously unlocked.  We had pretty much lost hope, but then Phil checked one of the guest bedroom's window...and shouted "THANK YOU SARAH". My sister had stayed with us a month ago, and she is notorious for leaving things unlocked, but in this case we were both very thankful to her! Phil especially because I was starting to get pretty sour with him! So I used a chair from our front stoop and hoisted myself through the window (which was actually very fun for me as I have always wanted to crawl through a window...and what better place to do that but your own house). Right before I was about to start climbing through the window, a disguised cop car drove by, so we narrowly missed being spotted breaking into our own home! Once inside our evening was pretty dang normal...minus the extraordinarily small hamburgers that Phil made. He was very annoyed that they shrunk up so much, but I just laughed and made mine into a 1/4 lb. slider!
I just wanted to document all of the details of our amazing/weird/fun weekend, more for my own memory than for anything else!

Our trip to Tennessee!

Day 1: Sunday, 5May13

After Phil dropped Mischa at his mom’s and picked up some Kolache’s for breakfast, we started our journey  around 10:30am. We managed to time everything perfectly, and took our, lunch, pee, gas break all at the same time around 1:30. The drive was scenic and lovely with the occasionally waterfall streaming down the rock walls that encased us as we drove. The weather was overall gloomy and rainy, but nothing I couldn’t handle.  We made good time, considering the weather, and got to the check-in location around 6:00. After signing what seemed like a novel’s worth of various documents, we received the code for the keypad and alarm as well as the written directions to our cabin. I asked if there was a physical address, and the lady kindly told me that sometimes when they give physical address it just sends people to other locations. I got the vibe that  his place was so off the beaten path that maybe the google maps car hadn’t even gotten around to.

                The drive probably took no longer than 20 minutes, but the winding, steep roads tested my sweet Hyundai Sonata to her limits and made the drive seem like an eternity. There was one section of the drive that felt like the tippy top of a roller coaster because you can’t see the direction of the road in front of you, until you have reached the very top.  I later did my best roller coaster rider impression by holding one hand in the air and screaming “weeee” as we inched our way down it.

                So after roller coaster hill, there was still the final ascent to our cabin, which reminded me of the little engine that could. I imagine that my car was saying to itself “I think I can, I think I can” as I forced it against its will up the incline. In my 26 years, I can honestly say that was the steepest hill I had ever driven up. Not to say I hadn’t been in the car during a steep hill adventure before, but this was my first personal experience driving up one…and I have to say, it isn’t my favorite. Once we reached our destination…or in our case drove past our destination, and had to carefully turn the car around with one of my famous 6 point turns, I parked the car on the incline facing down, and made Phil back the car into the driveway. 

                Even before stepping inside, I realized that the stomach churning drive was all worth it, because waiting for us, just on the front stoop was the most beautiful view. All the cabins have uber cheesy names, and ours is called “Take my breath away”…and I have to say it lives up to its name.

We explored every nook and cranny of the ridiculously large cabin. It can sleep 8, but was such a great deal, that we didn’t care hope obnoxiously large it was for 2 people.

 We unpacked the car and called to see if we had wi-fi included (we didn’t) and then figured out what to do for dinner/other supplies we needed (coffee filters, jam, creamer, bread, etc.). We had seen a Dollar General that was relatively close and wouldn’t require us to make the 30 minute or so drive back to Pigeon Forge. So we called and made sure they were open, and decided it would be best to go now before it got dark, as I could only imagine how much more I would hate the drive in pitch darkness.

I settled my stomach with a diet ginger ale, put my big girl pants on, and made the decent down the mountain. The decent (as one would imagine) was a lot less stressful, as gravity could do all the work, and all I had to do was delicately smash my foot on the brake. Once we reached the Dollar General, we were thrilled to discover that they had a frozen/fridge section. We only needed to supplement what had brought with us, but we went a little crazy. Here is what we bought: Half and half, a gallon of milk, a gallon of Samoa Ice cream, a frozen pizza (our dinner for the evening),  bread, sliced cheese,  strawberry jam, crackers, cheez wiz (for Phil, don’t judge him), cookies, soda, mini churros cereal (which was delicious, and it is upsetting that I have never had it before), and coffee filters.

After spending $45 (the most either of us had ever spent at the Dollar General), we went outside to put the groceries in the car and we were met by the site of a beautiful rainbow reaching halfway into the sky over the mountains. There was a parking lot full of people taking photos, and to not feel left out, we also took some pictures (on our phones).

The rainbow was just what we needed, a good omen for the start of our trip!

We made the ascent again (this time with Phil videoing me driving, and say weird things), this time with a little less anxiety as I knew what to expect. After we unloaded the groceries, I started up the oven and marveled at all the little luxuries this place had; an oven that gets up to temperature in less than 30 minutes, a fridge with water and ice (cubed AND Crushed, WHAAA?!?) in the door, and a dishwasher that is connected to the countertops! After eating our fancy frozen pizza on the balcony and relaxing a bit we decided to test out the hot tub…or as we will call it, the luke warm tub. It was perfect for me as a true hot tubs makes my extremities burn in anguish! We stayed in until we were sufficiently prune-y, then scooted quickly inside as it was pretty chilly. We put our jammies on and Phil watched TV as I ate ice cream and read “Bossypants” by Tina Fey.

Day 2: Monday 6May13

We awoke around 6:00am to the sound of what we will call the car alarm of the bird world. This thing was loud and dedicated. I will have to record it because my description will not do it justice...Phil fell back asleep instantly and I lay awake listening to this bird trying to pretend like it was singing me a lullaby…it was the worst lullaby ever because I couldn’t fall back asleep. I decided to get up and just sit and read and was glad I did because the morning fog over the mountains was beautiful. From inside the cabin it looked as though we were high up in the clouds as you could not see the mountains at all.

After eating breakfast, I read on the balcony a bit, came inside and fell asleep on the couch and then woke up when Phil got up for the day. Phil made a very strong batch of coffee, as we are spoiled by our Keurig and didn’t have the water to grounds ratio correct for an “old fashioned” coffee pot. After lounging around a bit more we got ready for our day out and about. We were under the illusion that it was supposed to thunderstorm today, so we decided to do a rainy day activity and wait for better weather to do the hiking. We ended up at the Tanger Outlets, and spent a good 3 hours there and bought a variety of items (a dress, a pair of sandals, a pair of pants, a new watch band, a shirt, and 2 necklaces...an Phil got a new wallet, how exciting!)

                The weather of course ended up being gorgeous. We ate a quick picnic in a nearby park:

Then headed to Smoky Mountain Knife Works…one of the places suggested by a friend and on Phil’s wish list of places to go to. We were there for about an hour, and for the first half hour I sat and read my book, and then walked around a bit with Phil and end up in the lower level of the store which had a really cool “antique” section that was a bit random for the store, but suited me nicely. I picked up a few items for my family and for Gale, and Phil purchased a Tomahawk (not kidding), a “Don’t Tread on Me” patch for his backpack, and a molle capable pouch for his knife sharpener. Here are some of the highlights from this store:

   After the Knife Works adventure we walked over to a strip mall across the street that had a Coleman store…all the plastic coolers you could ever need! Also part of this strip mall was a weird “antique” showroom/random tchotchkes/bear artwork/hot wheels dealer place…it was just weird and we couldn’t quite figure it out, but we got a kick out of it none the less.

                Since we ate a late lunch and weren’t ready for dinner, so we set out towards Gatlinburg from Pigeon Forge. The scenic drive through the mountains was beautiful. We arrived in Gatlinburg and found it less touristy than Pigeon Forge, but still hokey. It reminded me of an amusement park…Old Timey photos, street vendors yelling at you to play games, candy makers…you know the deal. 

              Phil looked up restaurants, and we made our way towards one that had good reviews “Smoky Mountain Brewery”. A little bit of a back story here…for the past couple of months Phil and I have been going out with friends on Monday night to do trivia at Drake’s. So wouldn’t you know it that as soon as we sat down we heard a guy providing the answer to the first trivia question of the night! We didn’t play (officially), but for the record we only missed two of the 9 questions that were asked while we ate….granted the questions were much easier than the ones we are used to, but still we were kicking butt. As it was getting late, and we wanted to make the ascent to the cabin before it got dark, we headed towards the car and managed to only pay $2.75 for parking! We only got stop by one guy who’s badge told me he had a solicitation permit…phew…I thought you were just bothering us for fun, at least now I know you permission to do so!

                After some small talk, Phil politely ended our conversation…even though the promise of $100 cash or a 3 night vacation was mighty tempting….On the drive back it was beginning to get dark, so I drove even slower than normal, and white knuckled my way back to the cabin. Driving in the day time seems like a piece of cake now that I have a comparison. We made it safe and sound, brought in our purchases went in the hot tub for a bit and were pleased to see that many more stars were visible than had been the night before. As predicted, Phil saw a shooting star, and even though I was purposefully looking the same direction as he was, I somehow missed it…like always. This has happened multiple times… I’m not bitter or anything. I ate some more ice cream, Phil watched TV, I read…you get the picture!

Day 3: Tuesday 7May13

                After waking up on our own (and not by a bird), we looked at the forecast for the day, and figured that the weather people don’t know what they are talking about, considering they were wrong yesterday. We made a good choice, because allow there was a chance of storms, it was 58 and beautiful all day long! We didn’t know how long the weather would hold out, so we made the decision to make today one of our hiking days.

After stopping at the visitors center and picking up a few maps and postcards, we settled on the Grotto Falls trail, which was said to be “mild” and was only about 2.8 miles round trip.  The drive up to the trail was so relaxing, forced to go 10 miles an hour, I felt much more at home during this winding drive. Once we started the hike we both realized we were woefully out of shape and "mildy" over prepared. I believe the latter could have made us imagine the former, because when Phil carried my pack for me later, the hike was much easier! Each hike is a learning experience and this one taught us to lighten our load for next time.

                Once we had traversed the root ridden path, and the various streams that had literal stepping stones in them in order for hikers to cross without getting their tootsies wet, we arrived at Grotto falls. It took us a little over an hour to get there…which with photo ops and water breaks along the way, wasn’t too bad. A lovely waterfall with a small cove behind it, and many a rock for sitting. Here are some of my favorites from the hike:

We both sat and ate, I my peanut butter and jelly sandwich, string cheese (which I ingeniously froze before leaving), and yogurt covered raisins, and Phil had just a snack of beef jerky (Thanks Miriam and Stuart), string cheese, and some nuts and sunflower seeds. Following our feasting, we took some photos and both walked under the waterfall and could feel the cool clean water splashing on us.

                We started our decent, and met some very friendly people; a pack of Mennonites who wondered how much further it was, some folks who didn’t seem to be bothered by the cold water and said heck to the stepping stones and just meandered through the streams, and a pair who were equally disappointed in the lack of salamanders, but who informed us that they had seen a momma bear and her cubs the day prior at Cades Cove. So we put that location on our short list of places to visit.

                We started our drive back down and stopped briefly at a historical location called Ephraim Bale’s Place. Which wasn’t a trail (which made me happy), but was pretty neat. A collection of old structures; main house, hog hen, corn crib, etc. Very cool, but would be creepy at night. 

We made our way a little but further, and stopped at another historical structure, and ran into the Mennonite family again while they were eating their lunch.

                After realizing that the other trails we were interested in were a bit of a drive, we settled on finding the cheesiest putt putt place (many to choose from), and getting dinner at Kroger and bringing it back to the cabin, with a goal of starting our drive up before 7:00 in order to see the sunset.

                We found this awesome place called MagiQuest which was better than we could have every hoped for. Not only was there putt-putt…but it was blacklight Pirate themed putt-putt. In addition, this grand castle housed an interactive game aptly named “MagiQuest”, the largest mirror maze in the history of mankind, and a laser agility course. Since we had only spent $4.00 up until this point, we splurged and each spent the $20 it cost to do all 4 things! The best part was we could separate the tickets and come back another day so we didn’t feel rushed. We split up our tickets and played the pirate putt putt first (I was beaten by 4 points).

Then went on to the laser agility course…I am not sure what to call it, but it was just about the coolest things ever and needs to be a sport. The best way to describe it is with one of those jewelry robbing scenes in a movie. You are about to get your hands on the most valuable diamond, when all of a sudden the security system kicks in and there are laser surrounding you pointing at every angle. No valuable diamond here, but the rest was true. You are timed on speed as well as your ability to avoid the lasers. I thought my smaller stature and overall flexibility would have given me a leg up over Phil, but I was so wrong…Phil had a better score than me on this too! I made the rooky mistake of wearing my sweater, which ended up hitting the lasers left and right without me even noticing.

                After that we stopped by Kroger to pick up dinner (rotisserie chicken, some sides, crusty bread and some brie and for dessert…cookie sandwiches with frosting in the middle, yum yum), I also had a code for a free redbox rental, so we picked up a movie to watch. After Kroger we stopped by AutoZone because the day before, Phil had noticed that one of my headlights was out. After a little confusion regarding which bulb I needed, I opted to switch only one bulb out because the 9.75% sales tax (yuck) made the $22 bulb $25 dollars, and I will replace the other one when I arrive back in Indiana.

                We got everything heated up for dinner, and rearranged the furniture a bit and took the coffee table from the living room out to the balcony so we could enjoy the sunset in all of its glory, while we ate.  It was the perfect day for a sunset with very few clouds, and a light chill in the air. We sat and took a large amount of pictures of the varying stages of the sunset, then came inside to watch the movie.

                Watching a movie seems like a simple act, but when you have to figure out a new dvd, TV, surround sound configuration, it becomes increasingly more difficult. After about 15 minutes of Phil fiddling with it and only get video, with no sound, I stepped in to save the day! Which of course I did! All of those years watching my dad set up VCRs and such really paid off! We watched Part 2 of Twilight Breaking Dawn, and I have to say I was disappointed…SPOLIER ALERT: I have read all of the books and although I have a strong dislike of the main character Bella and really a strong dislike of Stephanie Meyer as well (mainly because she is an awful writer). The last book was my favorite because that is when Bella finally turns into a vampire. The creepy CG version of Renesme (dumbest name ever), as well as the horrible change to the ending was really disappointing….Got off on a tangent there, sorry!

                After our eventful hiking day, we were pooped and decided to hit the hay.

Day 4: Wednesday 8May13

We made a good choice to go hiking yesterday, as we woke up to the sound of rain. I got up and ate breakfast then took a dip in the hot tub, my legs were a tad sore from the hike. Our tentative plans for the day were to go into Gatlinburg again and explore the shops further and maybe go to the aquarium! However…Wednesday did not turn out how we had planned. We explored Gatlinburg further, and parked our car for free at an outdoorsy store.  Phil tried the hotest hot sauce he has ever tasted and we went to the "Mountain Mall", which I suggest should have the tagline "Where Dreams Come to Die". It was an indoor mall and had a lot of abandon store fronts, but the ones that weren't abandoned were just weird and bad and creepy. Here are some pictures:

Mountain Mall:

By the afternoon, the stomach ache that had started around 11:30 hadn’t felt better.

I can usually tough things out, but when I told Phil my symptoms and likened them to food poisoning, I had a thought that maybe my appendix was going to burst. So after hemming an hawing, Phil convinced me that I needed to go to the hospital, at the very least for the peace of mind to know that I didn’t have appendicitis. Phil drove me to an urgent care center, and the folks there were amazing. The doctor asked me if Phil had hit every bump on the way over…and I laughed because he had.

                After learning that my white cell counts were extraordinarily high, we were sent over to the Hospital just down the road. The urgent care center had set it up so that I could go to the outpatient wing as opposed to the ER (and get charged a $200 ER fee). The waiting room looked like the check-in counter at a fancy hotel and once I was checked in I was given an electronic buzzer similar to those at restaurants…super cool!  I was taken back and had a CT done,  we sat in a waiting room for about 30 minutes. We were told to go back to urgent care center to get the results, which was good news because if it was appendicitis I would have stayed at the hospital. We both let out a big sigh of relief, and made our way back to the urgent care center. The doctor told me that it was not appendicitis, but gastroininitis or ileitis. The prognosis, it should clear itself up in 24 hrs. and I should eat bananas, rice, applesauce, and toast…mmm yummy…and keep my fluids up.

                We stopped at Kroger to pick up some Gatorade and the aforementioned “BRAT” diet as well as dinner for my sweet sweet boyfriend who had been amazing through all of this. I will mention he abandoned me during the blood draw, but I can’t really blame him. We made it back up the hill with my newly working headlight, and just relaxed at watched TV the rest of evening.

Day 5: Thursday 9May13

                Since strenuous activities were out of the question, we took it easy in the morning, I ate my boring breakfast and read while Phil slept in. I didn’t want to spoil our last day of vacation, so I said I could handle a drive to Clingman’s dome. I had heard that the walk up to the dome portion was steep so I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I wouldn’t be walking up it, and I would give Phil my camera so he could “cheat” and take photos on my behalf. It was a winding road, and my terrible motion sickness kicked in and I asked Phil to drive the rest of the way up. Once at the top I took a nap in the back of the car, while Phil muscled his way up the steep path. Phil said he saw a bunch of “old people” sitting in their cars as well, so this made me feel fantastic!

                Here are some photos courtesy of Phil:

There are strategically placed benches on the entire path, and Phil said he had to stop at every other one. The walk up took about 40 minutes, while the walk down took only 15 minutes. On the way down, he had just missed a bear sighting, but did see a baby bear’s butt, but not well enough to get any photos. Just gives us something to look forward to next time we visit! We made our decent and the full effects of my motion sickness kicked in (I’ll spare you the details). But I felt instantly better and the drive down was much more enjoyable than the drive up. We had planned to have BBQ, but with my stomach still not at its full level of strength, we opted to stop at TGIFridays so Phil could get something to go and I would eat more toast…yay!

                We again made the trek up the mountain, and settled in for the night, me with my book and Phil with his Tomahawk. We saw who had been kicked off Idol (and were outraged) and then watched Glee (live!). After that, we watched this awesome show called Surviving Zombies, which was very educational and the dudes were super cool. It plays on the Discovery Science channel in Indy, but isn’t new…so we will probably watch it on demand eventually. I fell asleep pretty quickly in hopes that I would feel better in the morning for the drive home.

Day 6: Friday 10May13

                I popped out of bed a little after 8:00am because I knew we had a lot to pack up and get situated for our departure. The instructions for the cabin told us to put away all dishes (after running them in the dishwasher of course) as well as take the trash out. We also had to move the coffee table back in from the porch and pack up the food as well as our suitcases. We were pretty efficient and were on the road by 10:00am. After reviewing the cabin instructions again we saw that we needed to call the check-in location to let them know we had vacated the premises. We called, stopped at a gas station to get some additional beverages for the trip, and headed out on our way.

                We made one last stop at Smoky Mountain Knife Works, and then we were on our way. We managed to only make 2 stops on the way back and again made pretty good time considering it rained for almost the entire drive. We had David Sedaris’ new book “Let’s explore Diabetes with Owls” on CD, so it made the drive much more entertaining than it would have been had we listened to the same 5 songs on the radio. I was happy that the rain were the parenthesis around the vacation, and even though rain was forecasted it never affected any of our waking moments at the cabin or out and about.               

                We made it to Gale’s house before 6:30 to pick up our sweet poopalah that we had missed so so much. She was pretty happy to see us too, as evidenced by the kisses we got on our faces which she usually reserves for when we have some sort of food particle or sweat on us!

All in all it was a great vacation. We explored a lot of things, and for our next visit can focus on the National Park and just enjoying nature. The cabin was beautiful but really over the top, so now that we got it out of our system we will stay in a tent or a KOA cabin next time or at least somewhere more centrally located and easy to access. You can’t beat the views though from a cabin up in the mountains. We both had a great time, and really did get to unwind and just relax. And what is a vacation without a trip to the hospital anyway!?!