Mike and I recently returned home from a 5 day vacation to Tennessee
without Derek. This was our first time away from him for more than one day. The trip was inspired by Mike's 30th birthday. He had mentioned some time ago that he wanted to go zorbing but it's only available overseas. I found a place in the US that does it at the foothills of the smoky mountains (TN).
We left on a Tuesday afternoon and flew to TN. It was a little more difficult coordinating luggage to avoid the check bagged fees because I had 5 bags alone (bag, laptop, pump, cooler for bottles & purse). Mike carried on the laptop & stuffed the cooler in his bag. I carried on the pump & stuffed my purse in my bag. Thankfully we are both pretty light packers. We picked up the rental car and headed out to supper. When traveling, we like to eat at places we can't normally eat at home. So we asked for recommendations and ended up at a great place for supper that had a baked potato on the dessert menu! Of course, we had to try that:
The next morning we enjoyed the breakfast and planned our trip. There were a surprising number of things to do in the area. Our hotel was about 1/2 between Knoxville & the Smoky Mountains. We were initially thinking that we'd spend a day or two in Knoxville, spend a day Zorbing, and a day in the mountains. We couldn't have been more wrong. Our research showed us there were shows at night (magicians, comedy, and plays - even a chinese cirque du soleil show) and lots to do during the day. One little town had over 43 different things according to Trip Advisor. Apparently Dollywood is down there too and it's a pretty big draw. We put together a tentative agenda and headed out for the day.
Our first stop was a Zipline Tour. It was a pretty great setup because we started out in a room to gear up and get used to the equipment
We proceeded outside and the course was very instructional. The first line was just walking across these planks to get used to the height and feeling to the gear. The second line was very short from one "tree house" to another "tree house" and we learned how to leave one platform and land on another. (This was also the first time of being fully suspended alone off the ground.) The next line was a bit longer (60'), over trees, and you could barely see when we were ending. That was the end of our beginner class. The lines got progressively longer or stepper, ranging from 600 feet to over 1500 feet.
We even went over two waterfalls - I saw one upside down (it was the "recommended" way to see it, according to our guide). It was a nice mix of distance and speed. Some of the faster lines were better for doing tricks whereas the longer lines you wanted to go fast (tuck up like a cannon ball) so you'd be sure to make it to the end. We spoke with some of the folks in our group and they really liked this tour because you could do tricks and were able to be in control of your orientation (didn't have to go backward or spin unless you wanted to). Apparently not all tours were as cool as ours. With the encouragement of our guides and Mike, on the last line I did an inverted tornado - spun upside down while ziplining down. Pretty cool experience and one I would highly recommend.
That evening we found a CiCi's pizza buffet (this is a vacation for Mike's birthday - what would be more appropriate?!) and went to an comedy show to round out the night. The comedy show was alright - a few good laughs but not rolling around the floor funny.
Thursday was the big day - the event that brought us to Tennessee was on the agenda, Zorbing. But first, we did a couple of other activities. We stopped by and visited Tomb, an interactive puzzle solving game that you discover a pharaoh's tomb and escape alive (okay...so it was kind of chessy, but entertaining at the same time.)
Then we headed over to MaqicQuest. This time we each had a wand and played this giant scavenger hunt to find these items on our quest. Once all of the items were collected, you could go on another quest or if you had completed enough quests, you could go on an adventure and complete this puzzle and fight a bad guy. I went into the adventure thinking it was going to be pretty dumb but it was actually entertaining and much more of a puzzle solving game than I imagined.
After a wonderful lunch at a little pub, we headed off to Zorb. Since we had such a big meal, we planned to watch some people for a while to get a feel for how it all worked and later decide on which rides we wanted to do. When we arrived, there wasn't a single person (other than the workers) at the facility! Seriously! We were wondering if we were in the right place and if this really was as great as it sounded if absolutely no one was there. As it turned out, there was one person that was getting ready to Zorb. We watched the teenage girl go down and then turned to head back into the office to decide which rides we wanted to do and were shocked to see the office full of people. Apparently several cars had arrived all at once. We scooted in line before some more arriving people to buy our tickets, changed into our swim suits, and headed out. We had to wait for almost 45 minutes to have our turn to ride. (If only we had known it would get so busy....) We opted to buy 3 rides each. The first ride was a wet ride together down a straight course and it was a lot of find sliding all around in the ball. The second ride, we both opted for a wet ride down a zigzag course. This was also fun because there was a lot of back and forth, but I still preferred the ride with Mike.
Our last and final rides, we both opted for the dry ride. This is the traditional zorb ride where you are harnessed in and go down the hill end over end. I went down first so I could take pictures and video of Mike. About 3/4 of the way down, I started to feel sick because my weight was centered and rather than rolling down the hill, I was effectively bouncing down the hill. It's a fast ride but not fast enough for me. I did manage to orientate myself so I could take a few photos and video of Mike:
He felt a little sick to the stomach when we was done too so it's a good thing our evening plans involved being stationary we went to see a magician at this crazy upside down building (literally).
On our final day we headed out to the Smoky Mountains and went hiking. We chose a medium length path (about 3.5 miles) with a moderate difficulty. As we were starting down the path, we came across several other hikers who all looked to be serious hikers (with special gear like special shoes, walking sticks, backpacks, etc) who were huffing and puffing. They commented about how difficult the trek back up was. Then we came across some forest rangers who also looked all sweaty and tired out. We continued on but I have to admit I was pretty nervous about the hike back. Within a matter of minutes, we were completely alone and all we could hear was the sound of us walking along the path. We reached our destination and took a moment to rest and take in how truly beautiful the Smoky Mountain are. The hike back wasn't as difficult as I was expecting. My motto was "slow and steady" and it worked!
Saturday we packed up and headed home. A SUPER special thanks to the Nistlers & Schultz's, who watch Derek while we were away. We had a great trip - Happy Birthday Mike!
