Twelve Days of a Dixie Christmas #2

A Countdown to our Favorite Christmas Destination

The Christmas season is taken pretty seriously in the southeastern US, and the Richardson Tribe has a dozen suggested destinations to make your holidays more adventurous. Over the next 12 days, we will reveal each of our favorite RV camping and recreation spots until we reach our #1 Christmas Holiday Destination. Come back each day to see the places this southern family has grown to love.

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#2 - Dollywood - Pigeon Forge, Tennessee

Considering some of the other Christmas destinations listed in our top twelve, our number two choice may be a bit of a surprise. Well, as I mentioned previously, this was put to a vote, and the kids were unanimous on this selection.

It's understandable. Dollywood has tons of Christmas decorations, shows, and music. Add to that dozens of amusement rides and games, crisp cool Smoky Mountain air, and a real steam locomotive, and the environment is perfect for unlimited holiday fun.

The park's general theme, besides the affiliation with Dolly Parton, is southern country charm. It's not a put-on. Folks that work here are typically real southerners, and in some cases, related to Dolly herself. There are numerous shops that sell the work of local artisans including leather goods, musical instruments, and candles. There is also a blacksmith demonstrating his trade.

Regarding amusement rides, there is a surprising variety from spinning tea cups to monster roller coasters. Most of the fast rides have cameras stationed at the most scary parts to capture your worst, most terrified expressions. Here we are riding the Mystery Mine, and Heath's expression is that of absolute terror. The funny thing is, after the ride was over, the first words out of his mouth were "let's do it again!"

There are many impressive things about Dollywood, but the park's cleanliness and staff's professionalism are perhaps the most obvious. Everyone seems to have a job to do, and they do it with a smile.

Dollywood is located in a very popular area on the Tennessee side of the Smoky Mountains National Park. Pigeon Forge and nearby Gatlinburg are known for their musical and comedy shows, go carts, helicopter rides, museums, miniature golf, candy shops, rock shops, and pretty much anything related to tourists and the Smoky Mountains. There is an awesome aquarium in Gatlinburg that must be mentioned.

When visiting Dollywood, we typically RV camp at nearby Townsend KOA. It's far enough away from the crowds to be peaceful, but near enough to be convenient. The campground has lots of activities for the kids, and the riverside campsites are very picturesque.

So there you have it. Our second favorite Christmas destination is Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. Tune in tomorrow when we reveal our absolute favorite place to be on Christmas.

Dollywood - A Real Value...

Eventually (visit our Dollywood page)
The day after the extended Richardson family's Thanksgiving feast, the Tribe headed out for an early lunch at No Way Jose's Mexican restaurant in Pigeon Forge, then on to Dollywood. It had rained all morning, and we were hopeful that the crowds might be a little smaller. When we arrived, the crowds were just as we'd hoped, thin. The weather was pretty chilly, but we were prepared with the toasty trapper hats we bought here last Winter, one of our best investments. This was the first of our two days at Dollywood during the Thanksgiving holidays.

Another good investment from last Winter was the purchase of Dollywood Season Passes. As far as value goes, a single day at Dollywood is not necessarily a good value, especially with four kids (and cheap like me). However, it's pretty inexpensive to upgrade it to a season pass which gets everyone in for free for the next 12 months (or from before Christmas through Christmas of the following year). If you spend a few bucks extra, you can upgrade one of those passes to a Gold Pass. Gold Pass holders pay no parking ($10), and receive a 10% discount on everything in the park. 

Now, if you've never been to Dollywood, wipe those images of redneck midway carneys and sticky sidewalks from your mind. A nicer place you'll never visit. It's clean, the rides are top-notch and safe, and the people that work there are very friendly and down-to-Earth. For kids, the rides, games, and sights are awesome. For grown-ups, it's better than Disney, especially this time of year when millions of Christmas lights sparkle all over the park and a variety of seasonal musicals and live bands also contribute to the holiday spirit.

For many more pictures and details about this trip and other trips to Dollywood click here.

Mama always said "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

But then, I never was a very good listener...
November 25 - The Tribe ate Thanksgiving lunch with the extended Richardson family, then jumped in the packed camper and headed for Wears Valley, Tennessee. Typically, when we visit this area, we stay at the KOA campground in Townsend. It's one of the nicest campgrounds in the area, but it's a bit pricey (we paid almost $70 this Summer for river-side sites), and if you don't plan to use their many valuable amenities, it's hard to justify.
On this particular trip, our plan was to spend two full days at Dollywood, and very little time at the campground. I spent several hours researching campgrounds in the area, even over in Pigeon Forge and Sevierville. I found a few questionable prospects, but most were booked-up through the holiday weekend. Then, I discovered Cove Creek RV Resorts and Rentals, a destination that appeared to be an ideal place to camp in Wears Valley between Townsend and Pigeon Forge. What's more, the rate was an acceptable $33.00. It sounded great!

Here is what their website said: (the words are theirs, the pictures are mine)
"At Cove Creek RV Resort choose sites offering personal outdoor gazebos with lounging areas and outdoor fireplaces or perhaps you would prefer to be creek-side so the lull of the babbling waters can soothe you to sleep at night. Whichever you choose Cove Creek RV Resort will not disappoint. We offer a first-class clubhouse, bathhouse, workout facilities, onsite laundry facilities, a game room, an outdoor pool and outdoor recreation, a conference center as well as an onsite fishing pond. 

We are working to make the campground better, please bear with us as we are 75% complete.” Please enjoy our reduced summer rates as compensation for any minor disruption."

Ok, the key here is the last sentence of the above quote. It gives you the impression that the campground is undergoing some "improvements", and it's almost done. Further investigation made it appear the description was published in early Summer (June), so one might assume, as I did, this nice luxury campground is probably nearing completion by November. The pictures were great, but there were suspiciously very few pictures to view. Finally, I cast all caution aside and booked three consecutive nights. Shame on me.

When we arrived at Cove Creek RV, the office was dark, but our site was identified on a map taped to the inside of the clubhouse's front door. As we pulled through the park on the way to our site, I began to feel as though I'd been a little misled. I was getting peeved. The first sign we saw said something to the effect of "Buy your own RV Site starting at $69,000". I asked myself, "when is $69,000 too much to pay for a concrete pad in a pasture?". The sites are narrow, and nothing was really finished. Our site was at the end of a row. It faced a gravel drive, some unfinished pads, some exposed sewer pipes, a dumpster, construction equipment, and a storage warehouse behind an old chain-link fence. The pictures tell the story.

In all fairness, that last sentence on their home page does provide a bit of a disclaimer that warns of the campground's condition, and there is a nice looking pool and exercise room with four pieces of equipment, and Wears Valley is beautiful, and it is convenient to Pigeon Forge, and it was just $33 a night, and we really didn't spend anytime there during the day, and the site was pretty level, so I'll give them a break. I'd have probably stayed here in the same situation had I known the truth in advance, but I'm most offended by the website's misrepresentation of the camping facility and its surroundings.

On the other hand, I think that someday this will be a very nice "RV Park". I doubt you'll be able to rent a site for $33, and maybe someday in the far far distant future, their sites may also be worth $69,000, but I'm not holding my breath.

I began reviewing destinations for this very reason, so you won't have to make the same mistakes I make. You won't find Cove Creek Luxury RV Resort on our Places to Go page, but I still felt like I owed them a little write-up.

Townsend/Great Smokies KOA - A long weekend on Little River.

Adventure Journal
Entry Date: October 2010

The Richardson Tribe has just returned from our most recent adventure in the mountains of East Tennessee. We camped at the Townsend/Great Smokies KOA on Little River just outside the park for four nights.

While in the area, we visited Dollywood, Pigeon Forge, Gatlinburg, and took a nice drive through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Yes, I am afraid we did the "tourist thing" on this trip, but we still enjoyed all the KOA's campground and activities.

We spent Saturday at the campground fishing, playing bingo (the kids loved it!), making tie dye t-shirts and various crafts, playing in Little River, and warming beside a toasty fire. The folks at the KOA in Townsend really know how to keep the kids happy, and the river and scenery keep everyone happy.

As usual, the night sky was a light show. I actually snapped a few time-lapsed shots this time, and realized there were many stars that I wasn't seeing with just the naked eye. We come here in the Winter between Christmas and New Year, and the sky is even more clear and brilliant at that time of year. For these and other pictures, click here.

John's Soapbox Moment:
I plan to write a series of articles on camping and RV etiquette soon. I may dedicate an entire segment on one neighbor's multiple offenses on this trip. For instance, one of the few negatives of this park is how narrow the riverside sites are. It's normal for water sites to be narrow, so I can't complain much. However, a courteous camper is careful not to intrude on their neighbor any more than necessary, and to try to make the area on the back-side of their camper as neat as possible (the back-side of one camper is the front- side of someone else's). Our neighbor on this trip had the patio-side of her old Class-A motorhome decorated with lights and FSU (Florida State) flags (and stickers, and pillows, and banners, and more lights, and flags, etc.). Her back-side on the other hand was disgusting (pardon the pun). She threw her sewer hose, water hose, and poser cables on the ground wadded-up in a mess. She stayed inside most of the time, except when laying out on the deck sunbathing and coming around to shake her sewer hose and grunt. She never said a single word to us in four days. I would move her sewer hose away from our picnic table only to find it back, almost on my patio, later. Unbelievable. I personally think other FSU fans need to hunt her down. She's giving your university a bad name.