Some rest and relaxation in Tennessee

For the last couple of years, I’ve been hearing about the Anchor Down Resort in Dandridge, TN, in the Smokey Mountains.  I’ve always wanted to stay there, but it never seems to be a good stopping point for us.

At 360 miles from Charleston, it still wasn’t an ideal stopping point, but we were getting up early to say good-bye to Nicolas, so we could get on the road early and it was all freeway, so we decided to go for it.  There were plenty of sites available, so we opted not to make reservations . . . just in case we had some unforeseen delay.

It was a beautiful travel day, and other than a small delay around Asheville, we made really good time, arriving at Anchor Down by 1:30 pm.  We selected a site in the main campground that would give us a view of the lake out our windshield.

If the campground were full our view would have been obstructed by other RVs, but since the park was half empty, we had a great view of the lake and mountains!

All the sites are good-sized concrete pads with full hook-ups, including cable.  Our standard site was plain concrete with a brick firepit, but the higher level sites were stamped concrete and many of them had large outdoor fireplaces, in addition to great views.

The resort was impeccably clean, with all new bath houses and laundry room, and a clubhouse under construction.  The main area of the resort was on the road level, where we were, and there was another group of site uphill from the main area,

and another area of sites down at the lake level by the pool and marina.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There were 4 host sites . . . and they had great sites!

This has got to be the most beautiful RV Resort we’ve been to – not only were the facilities top-notch, but the setting was amazing with the lake and the mountains!

We spent our time relaxing, walking, and visiting with other RVers . . . it was a great couple of days!

They even had a dog park for Casey . . . she had fun running around, chasing a ball, and jumping over obstacles.

Our new friends, Jim and Erin, had a fireplace at their site and we were able to enjoy a fire with them one evening . . . Casey decided that Jim was her new best friend – we couldn’t even walk by their site without stopping to see Jim!

We woke up to thunderstorms on Thursday, and found Casey sleeping in the corner next to our bed . . . she needs to feel protected during a storm!  Silly doggy!

We’ve been to Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg enough that we didn’t feel the need to go there at all, but we did check out the little town of Dandridge one afternoon.  It’s a very historic town – named for Martha Dandridge – otherwise known as Martha Washington.  There are lots of historic buildings still standing, and I would have loved to walk around and take pictures of many of them, but it was pouring rain while we were there, so we just enjoyed the town from the Jeep.

 

Crossing over the lake from Dandridge, we drove several miles to the Bush’s Baked Beans Visitor Center and Museum.

They were nearly closed when we arrived, and we missed the last showing of the video tour of the canning plant, but we did walk through the museum exhibits,

and learned about the history of the Bush family and the little canning company that grew into a household name in baked beans.

 

 

We couldn’t get near the secret family recipe, but Tom did find out his weight in beans,

and we got our picture taken with Duke!

It was a great 3 days in Tennessee, and well worth the long travel day!