Guild, TN – Chattanooga, TN- October 10, 2008

Our daughter Keely arrived last night around 11. She flew into Nashville, then rented a car and drove about 90 miles to the marina.

We left about 9:45 this morning, with a sunny and beautiful blue sky. This stretch of water from here to Chattanooga is known as the “Grand Canyon of the Tennessee”. The scenery was indeed beautiful, with mountains dropping steeply into the river that, in places, is barely 700 feet wide. The river makes dozens of turns as it twists through the mountains. Everyone has told us that in a couple of weeks the fall colors will peak and the views will be spectacular. Although we won’t be here then, we are beginning to see the start of the colors.

We were passed by many raceboats, all going very fast. We found out later that there are races this week-end on the other side of the next dam. Wonder what their fuel bill was!!


We rounded a bend and saw Lookout Mountain, one of America’s most famous landmarks. The mountain is more than 2,000 above the river and extends for nearly 100 miles into Georgia and Alabama. The last battle of the American Revolution was fought here. And it was here in November of 1863 that Union and Confederate forces fought in the “Battle Above the Clouds”, one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War where more than 34,000 were killed.






We arrived in Chattanooga and were tied up by 1 p.m. We stayed at Marine Max, just a few blocks from the Tennessee Aquarium. We had heard many good things about the aquarium so that’s the first thing we did.

All of us enjoyed the aquarium. We took a self-guided tour through both an ocean and river journey. There were sharks, stingrays, jellyfish, turtles of all kinds, penguins, alligators, otters, a live interactive butterfly exhibit, seawater and freshwater fish, macaws and frogs, just to mention a few. There was also an exhibit on seahorses. It was surprising to find the many kinds of seahorses and to actually see them. Some were really strange. It is interesting to know that the male seahorse gives birth to the young. It was all very interesting. (Some of the pictures didn’t turn out very well, going through glass)

Back to the boat late afternoon – dinner and bed. We were all tired.