Took a little trip to Nashville Part 3

This is a continuation of the trip that my wife and I took to Nashville, TN a couple of years ago. It was a great time and if you ever get the chance to visit I encourage you to do so.

Easter Sunday

Our third day in Nashville was Easter Sunday. We weren't really sure what was going to be open if anything because it was a holiday, and since we had a rental car we decided to take a road trip. We had learned that there was an aquarium down in Chattanooga that we thought might be cool to visit. I called quick to make sure they were going to be open and after confirming they were, we got on our way.

The Bluebird

My wife and I are fans of the TV show Nashville that used to be on ABC, but is now on CMT. We enjoyed it more in the earlier seasons when they played more music, but we still watch it now. I believe it is in it's final season. Anyway a large part of the show used to revolve around the Bluebird Cafe. We decided to take swing by the real Bluebird Cafe and see what it looked like. Even before the TV show the real Bluebird Cafe has quite a storied history and has been host to many famous and up and coming performers over the years. It is actually a bit outside of Nashville and is just a pretty nondescript store front in a strip mall as you can see from the picture. We were happy to have visited it though. It was closed when we drove by, so the only pictures I have are of the outside.

On our way to Lookout Mountain

My intro picture was taken on our drive down 24 heading to Chattanooga. It is a pretty exciting drive as you head south. Lots of elevation changes and I have read it can get pretty hazardous when the weather conditions are bad. The picture here to the left is as we got closer to the town. We were hoping to visit a couple of local attractions in the area before we went to the aquarium. One of them was Ruby Falls and the other one was Lookout Mountain.

We got to the Ruby Falls area of the park and discovered that you had to pay to get in to see the falls. There was already quite a bit of a line and my wife and I wanted to make sure we made it to the aquarium, so we passed on seeing the falls and decide to continue on up to the top of Lookout Mountain. One of the key features of Lookout Mountain is that you are supposed to be able to see three or four states from the top of it. Well as you can see from the picture above and to the right the weather didn't really want to cooperate with us getting that view. The small castle structure is at the entrance to the "lookout" area. We didn't even bother going farther than the entrance because we knew we wouldn't be able to see anything due to the clouds and fog. We got back in the car, and headed down into town to visit the aquarium.

At the Aquarium

The Tennessee Aquarium consists of two main buildings. One is called River Journey and the other one is called Ocean Journey. Obviously different animals from the corresponding ecosystems are there to view in each of the buildings. We had a great time here and it was definitely worth the two hour drive down to see it. If you get the chance and you have the spare time I encourage you to take the trip. I am going to post some more of my photos from the trip below. Then I will continue on with our day.

We got lunch at a local brewery in Chattanooga and then headed back to Nashville. The weather turned a little on our way back and it took longer than the two hours we drove getting down there. It probably wouldn't be as bad in the summer, but it was still March/April when we went.

Back in Nashville

We relaxed at our hotel for a while and then we decided it was probably time to start thinking about dinner. We looked online and called around and found this local chain coffee shop called Frothy Monkey. We stopped in and got our food. It was fantastic. My wife got a chicken and tortellini dish while I got a small steak with brussels sprouts and potatoes.

After dinner we just went back to our room and relaxed because we knew we had a lot planned for the next day. Stay tuned for our final day in Nashville. I will be posting about it next week. Missed the first two days of our trip? You can check them out here:

Took a little trip to Nashville day 1
Took a little trip to Nashville day 2

Also I look forward to your comments. I know my wife and I only scraped the surface of what Nashville has to offer and we plan on visiting again this year. Is there anything we absolutely have to check out?