Day 4 - Nashville KOA

Today we left Pigeon Forge in the morning with the intent of going to the Smokey Mountain Knife Works that we tried to get to yesterday but gave up on. As we were driving up the main drag the people were lining up their beach chairs on each side of the road yet again. I took a video of the hot rods lined up on the right side of the road west bound. DH was starting to think we passed the knife works so I plotted a course for it. We passed all sorts of weird buildings like half of a Titanic ship, a building that was upside down and the Empire State Building with King Kong on it just to name a few. As we approached the Smokey Mountain Knife Works we parked on a side street. We were asked to move the rig into the lower lot which had RV parking. The store, I easily could have spend all day in. The first section I came into was all kitchen  everything. I purchased a plastic butter dish for the motorhome so if it falls out of the refrigerator it won't break. The next room had all minerals and museum type relics such as ceramic bullets from the early American History, antique guns, arrow heads, chain mail, Civil War uniform buttons, cannon balls, old books etc.
the minerals were of all varieties from copper to toddler sized geodes cut open revealing crystals galore. There were also bear skeletons and fossils of a variety of animals. So I am looking at the various fossils when I think I heard my name mention over the loud speaker. "If there is a Debby K. in the building, come to door number 3."
So I am thinking to myself, which door is number 3? So I took the chance that it was the same door we came in. First I looked at my phone and I noticed DH had called and texted me. He said he was lost in the store. Anyway, I found him in the kitchen supplies area near the door we had come in. We left there and head toward the Mt. Juliet, TN, to the Wal-mart Super Center that we had stayed at on a previous trip to Tucson, AZ. That Wal-Mart sheltered us all during a tornado warning that was close a personal. However on the way, DH talked me into staying at the Nashville KOA, and it worked out good. MIL decided to stay in the Motorhome to do laundry (her favorite pastime) while DH and I went into downtown Nashville. First we plotted the route with the GPS that came with the MDX only to realize it was lost. So then I used Google maps on my phone and it too was temporarily lost, but then it found its way. The first GPS took us a couple of Miles out of our way in the wrong direction. Finally we got there. So we pull into this parking lot and a guy comes up to DH and says, "Would you rather pay $30 for parking or 75 cents at the meters across the street, so we turned around and went to park at the meters which had a sign that said NO PARKING. So we didn't park there and went around the block and parked in the same Public Parking Lot from a different street. We paid at the kiosks and put the ticket on the dashboard. $23 for 6 hours. We went to numerous hat and cowboy style boot stores but bought nothing. Most of the bars with restaurants had loud music coming from them from hard rock to country, plus many had live bands. We also were looking for BBQ and finally found one called Jack's Bar-B-Que. We shared a partial rack of St. Louis style ribs, Mac & Cheese and sweet pickled coleslaw. We had two beverages and they also threw in a piece of flavorless cake bread thing that was as stale as one of the fossils I had seen earlier in the day. Everything else was very tasty. After dinner we were walking and a pan handler shook my hand and asked me for some money but all I had was plastic. But when he smiled at me, every tooth was gold. We walked further and looked in more shops, then crossed Broadway Street and walked down to the park by the river and the U. S. Marines had their tanks, personnel carriers, antiaircraft guns, tents, and other equipment on display. Children and parents were allowed to get in the vehicles on display. I sat on a wall overlooking the water and so drunk came up to me asking if I saw his bottle that he left there. I moved closer to the Marines lol. Then I called DH to find out where he went. I told him the creepy peeps were out & about and I always attract nuts where ever I am. So he had been looking at all the military equipment. I finally said I was ready to go due to the heat. The MDX was like a sauna but eventually cooled down. Went back to the motorhome and we are watching sequel of Jurassic Park. Tomorrow we are headed to Memphis, TN.