Knoxville, TN

The View

Walkable downtown Knoxville offers an array of restaurants, small shops and 3 (yes, 3) old-fashioned ice cream parlors on the same block. Just to be fair, we felt the need to sample at least two - fantastic soft serve creations served by the red-and-white checked staff at Cruze Farm and an enormous Twixy Sundae (more than large enough for 2) at the vintage Phoenix Pharmacy and Fountain. I'd hate to recommend one over the other, so the only reasonable solution is to try them both.

We enjoyed strolling through Market Square at the center of downtown, as well as Old Town and the State Street/Theater District. Ready for a break from BBQ and other southern fare, we had a tasty and authentic Mediterranean meal at KoPita, just a few blocks from our hotel. I had a very well-prepared, seasoned skirt steak with veggies and Johnny raved about the grilled lamb chops, both served with fresh and fluffy house-made pitas, hummus and Israeli salad.

Best Museum of the Trip

On our 5-week trip, we visited a number of fantastic museums, but the Museum of Appalachia, 30 minutes north of Knoxville, may be the best for me. Founded in 1969 by John Rice Irwin, whose grandparents were settlers in Southern Appalachia, this Smithsonian Affiliate museum contains over 250,000 artifacts of Appalachian life hand-collected by Irwin over a 50-year period, plus stories gathered from hundreds of interviews, also conducted by Irwin, as a true love letter to the resilient, creative, and often desperately poor inhabitants of the area. One mini-biography tells of a boy who routinely had to walk 12 miles over a mountainside to buy salt and other essentials. That same boy grew up to become a college professor, and donated his family's one room cabin to the museum.