Post-Christmas Trip to Chattanooga

Just as we did last year, we went up to Chattanooga this year for brief post-Christmas vacation. We were only there for two days (Tuesday and Wednesday, yesterday and today), but it was still a nice trip, since going to Chattanooga gives us easy access to two of our favorite places: Rock City Gardens and the Tennessee Aquarium. (It also allows us to stop for lunch at the Fazoli's in Ft. Oglethorpe on the way up, but that's only a small part of the attraction.)

We went to Rock City first thing Tuesday afternoon--we pretty much had to, since we couldn't check in at our hotel until 4:00--and then went back at night for the "Enchanted Garden of Lights" We spent much of today (Wednesday) at the Aquarium, then headed back home.

Here are a dozen and a half pictures from our brief trip:

Elyse decorated a cookie at the North Pole Lodge (or the Pavilion, as it's known the rest of the year):

Butch Ross played Christmas songs on the mountain dulcimer:

Along the trail headed to Mother Goose Village:

A couple from the Aquarium:

Snow Mountain!

Today, after years of them begging for us to do it, we took the girls to Snow Mountain at Stone Mountain. Overall it was a good experience; the girls both loved the SnowZone area, with its small tube ride ("Penguin Run") and snowman-making equipment and snowball targets

The big snow rides were a different story, though. At our appointed time of 12:00 we got in line and did an Avalanche Alley trip--that's the one where the whole family rides down an impossibly steep and forbiddingly tall hill on a giant inner tube--and Elyse and her daddy were both traumatized. That was enough of Snow Mountain for us. ("Are you okay?" I asked Elyse after the ride as we walked towards the Crossroads area. "No," she said. We sat at a table and I held her and we talked about it for a while, and eventually she was okay, but she said she doesn't want to do that ever again. I don't either.) Jessica, however, wanted to do it again, so she and her mommy did.

After that, we went back to SnowZone for a while, then we rode the train, and we ended the day with a red velvet funnel cake (which, sadly, I did not take a picture of).

Here are some pictures from the day:

This is the Christmased-up Pebble Ridge Courthouse, as seen from the train: