I'm home again, after spending most of the week in Chattanooga, Nashville, and on the road to and from. I decided to make a bigger deal of Mom's 87th birthday than we usually do since she'd been feeling good this spring, and took her on a vacation to mark the occasion. I'd originally looked into making it a cross-country train trip in a sleeper car since she loves trains, but when that proved impractical I opted for a driving vacation in Tennessee instead.
I booked us into the Hotel Chalet at the Chattanooga Choo Choo to keep with the train theme. As it turned out the converted sleeper train carriage I reserved had plumbing problems and flooded, but since that was unavailable at the last minute the hotel comped us a very nice regular king room plus dinner Tuesday night at the hotel restaurant.
We toured the ocean exhibit at the Tennessee Aquarium Wednesday morning, where we walked through a solarium filled with tropical butterflies and I got to pet stingrays. Then we traveled to Nashville in time to take a dinner cruise on the General Jackson Showboat. I'd expected entertainment to be a house band in the background, but instead there was an hour-long stage show with six talented singers performing Country standards. We enjoyed the show alone enough to be worth the ticket price, nevermind a nice buffet and getting to see the downtown city lights from the river.
Thursday we continued our nautical theme with lunch at The Aquarium Restaurant and a brief wander around the Opry Mills Mall. We spent the afternoon and evening walking around the Gaylord Opryland Resort, touring the conservatory and atriums, taking an indoor riverboat ride, watching a fountain show, and having coffee at the Cascades before returning to the hotel for our last night.
