Chattanooga, Tennesee

We traveled from Joe Wheeler State Park to Chattanooga last week.  Do you see how the river twists and turns in this photo?  At some points we could look through the trees and actually SEE the river on the other side.  I told Tim the tugboat was too heavy to portage.  Don't know what that means?  It means if the tugboat were a canoe we would have pulled up on the shore, carried our stuff overland to the river and then went back and carried the canoe.  Sort of a short-cut.

Tim's all about short cuts.
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But we didn't.  The scenery was beautiful.

Tennessee Aquarium

The Tennessee Aquarium has one building called The Ocean and one called The River.  Jellyfish?  Ocean!
We spent the entire day looking at all the exhibits.  I like the jellyfish because the room was dark and quiet.  Sort of zen-like.

Tim liked the LIVE presentation.

​We wandered into a Presentation in the River part of the Aquarium and THEN found out it was about rat snakes.  I immediately relocated to the back row of the theater.  I know my limits.  I didn't want to do my "snake dance" in front of all those people.

You will notice Tim is in the front row with the other kids.

The snake is climbing up the tree.
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I'm still creeped out.

From the top of Lookout Mountain

​We rode the Incline Railway to the top of Lookout Mountain.  We learned all about the Battle for Chattanooga and other Civil War battles. It was impressive to see the actual location of the fighting including the cannons used in the battle.
The Battle for Chattanooga was a turning point in the Civil War.  We watched a movie at the visitor center before we walked around the Chattanooga National Military park. It was sobering to realize how many men were killed on that mountain.

13,824 total estimated casualties in 3 days. 

November 23-25, 1863.
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Hallowed ground.