5/9/13 - Chickamauga and Chattanooga NMP (Chickamauga Battlefield)

The first (and largest) military park authorized by Congress was Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park.  It’s also the largest NMP in the country, and the model for most of the rest.  Only about 15 miles apart, Chickamauga Battlefield is in Georgia and Lookout Mountain is in Tennessee.  We stayed in Chattanooga and bounced back and forth across state lines and time zones. 

At Chickamauga Battlefield near Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, we stopped at the Visitors Center, watched the video (of course), bought a HUGE Civil War history book for George, and stood in on part of a ranger presentation to a college tour group. 

Chattanooga was important because of the railroads and the river (Tennessee).  The way the ranger explained it was to think of the interstate system near Chattanooga:  I-75 north, I-24 east & west, I-59 south.  The railways were the same kind of hub 150 years ago.  Both sides wanted Chattanooga to control railroad supply lines.

There are eight stops on the battlefield tour, which is also a cell phone tour (call a number for audio info).  Most of the fighting on 3 days in September, 1863, was fought in woods and across fields, totally different than Vicksburg.  The Park Service has done a good job in keeping the terrain much like it was then.  Trees are where trees were, fields are where trees weren't. 

 

 

 

There are 1,400 monuments in the park, planned and placed by veterans of the battle. 

      

 

More pictures if you click here.

5/8/13 – Russell Cave NM

Camping World in Chattanooga has an RV park, so it seemed like a plan to take the RV in to have a little work done on it, and we could go to Russell Cave National Monument.  The only problem is that it had rained (a lot!) the last two days and part of the campground was flooded.  This is the dog walking area...glad we don't have a dog.

To get to Russell Cave, we travelled through three states:  Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama (as well as a couple of time zones).  It was a pretty drive past fields of wildflowers and cows. 

People have used this cave as shelter for almost 9,000 years.  In the 1950s, It was one of the first places archeologists used carbon-14 to date artifacts.  Over 10,000 stone and bone tools, pottery shards and jewelry were excavated.  A few (that means “not very many”) are in the Visitors Center museum .  I'm sure most are at the Smithsonian (they dug there for three years).  They always take home souvenirs. 

There’s a boardwalk out to the cave. 

A creek runs through the first cave we saw.  The map identifies it as “Dry Creek”, but after all the rain this spring, it was anything but dry.  It looks really cold.

Going on a little further is the actual cave shelter.  If you were expecting Carlsbad Caverns pictures, this isn't it!  It’s more like a big alcove than a cave.  Good protection out of the weather 9,000 years ago.

The dioramas are a little hokey, but we've seen worse.  

We went around the corner to see a sinkhole, where the roof of another cavern fell in.  Not much to see. 

We had planned on going on the nature trail, but some people we saw on the boardwalk said there was a copperhead sunning himself on the trail.  I told George I’d wait for him on the bridge if he wanted to go look for it.  That way if he needed first aid, I’d be able to run back to the Visitors Center.  After he rejected my idea, I told him he was missing a great photo-op.

I didn't go crazy at this park, but there are a few more pictures:  Russell Cave Natl Monument 
 

5/3/13 - Ave Maria Grotto

Clarkson Covered Bridge

On the way to the Ave Maria Grotto in Cullman, Alabama, we made a short detour to the Clarkson Covered Bridge, which is one of the state's longest the covered truss bridges. (The two little dogs live nearby and escorted us around the park.)  There's also a little dogtrot (no pun intended) cabin and an old mill at the little county park.  Click here for more pictures.



The Ave Maria Grotto was created by Benedictine Monk Joseph Zoetl of St. Bernard Abbey.  His hobby was to make miniature replicas of famous religious buildings.

St. Peter's Basilica in Rome

Although not-to-scale, the reason is simple:  Brother Joseph had never seen the buildings himself.  He used postcards as his reference.  (We forget how difficult research was before Google.)


  

European Churches

Holy Land Scenes

Using cement, stones and lots of imagination, Brother Joseph built 125 miniatures on a hillside in a garden--a hobby that got out of control.  His other job was stoking the abbey's coal furnace, so he had a lot of boredom to alleviate. 

People donated shells, marbles, broken tiles, costume jewelry and other junk for him to use.  Besides the cathedrals and churches, he also built fanciful things like "Hansel and Gretel's Visit  to the Temple of the Fairies", complete with a dragon chained beneath it.

  

I think some of the shrines are a bit over the top, but some of them are pretty cool.  Some remind me of a Watts Tower in city-scape.  And some may even be a little tacky...

     

I told George that I wanted him to do something like this in our backyard--and then he can set up a little railroad track to go around the buildings.  I think he needs a hobby too.  He just looked at me.

For more pictures of the Grotto, click here:  Ave Marie Grotto