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- Welcome to Chattanooga, Tennessee.
I am gonna show you some of the best outdoor things to do
in this awesome town.
Now, Chattanooga was actually voted
Best Small Town ever by Outside Magazine readers twice
and Best Adventure Town by National Geographic Adventure.
And there is a ton of stuff to do here
from hiking and mountain biking,
to kayaking and even rock climbing.
So I'm gonna show you some of my best picks
over the next 36 hours.
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Chattanooga sits on the Tennessee river
just two hours from Atlanta, Georgia.
Now, downtown is a great place to explore
when you arrive into town.
You can enjoy a visit to several great museums,
there's also an aquarium and you can learn about
the rich civil war history and native American history
that goes back 10,000 years.
Now, one of the things I enjoyed was a scenic walk
along the beautiful Tennessee river
and along the pedestrian only Walnut Street Bridge,
which is the oldest bridge of its kind on the East Coast.
Now, the name Chattanooga refers to a Muskogean word,
meaning rock rising to a point
which is believed to refer to look out mountain.
If you're looking for a spot to relax
or have a picnic in between all of your adventures,
you can come to Ross's Landing,
which is where I am right now.
This is a beautiful area in town,
right on the banks of the Tennessee river.
And a lot of people are out here
just enjoying this beautiful day.
I'm gonna do the same for you.
Ross's Landing was actually used
as one of the largest native American internment camps
prior to the Trail of Tears.
And after their removal, Ross's Landing
was incorporated as the City of Chattanooga.
The Cherokee once lived throughout
Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee,
Cherokee that lived in this region
prior to European colonization
were actually forcibly removed in 1838
and sent out on the Trail of Tears
to live on reservations in Oklahoma.
Chattanooga is located at the joining
of the Cumberland Plateau and the Appalachian mountains,
which gives it some unbelievable nature experiences
right in town.
And the first one we're visiting is Rock City Gardens
located at the top of Lookout Mountain.
Right now, I'm at Rock City Gardens,
which is basically a giant rock garden.
It's been open since the 1930s.
And it's a bunch of pathways
that meander through a bunch of big rock formations
here on Lookout Mountain.
Tickets to Rock City are 22.95 per adult,
and you have to reserve a timed entry to get in right now
because of the pandemic.
There's a lot of really beautiful scenery here
that I'm gonna show you right now.
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Now, this is just six miles from downtown Chattanooga
and rock city is a true marvel of nature.
It features massive ancient rock formations gardens
with over 400 native plant species
and breathtaking panoramic views over Chattanooga.
Now Rock City officially opened as a public attraction
on May 21st, 1932.
And while you're here,
you can follow along the enchanted trail
where each step reveals natural beauty and wonders
along the Woodland path through rock formations, caverns,
narrow passageways, and wonderful displays of life.
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From the top of Rock City Garden,
there is a place called Lover's Leap.
You can actually see seven States from here
and a beautiful Waterfall.
So even with that timed entry,
it's actually still pretty busy here at Rock City,
so just know that and make sure you do bring a mask
and you do have hand sanitizer in your bag too.
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Now we're going down into Fairyland Cavern,
which you might think is for the kids,
but this is absolutely beautiful.
They have all these colorful lights.
There's these sparkly rocks down here
if you're like me, you're probably in to all of it.
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My next stop is Point Park,
now this is just up the road from Rock City Gardens.
And this is actually the nation's first
and the largest military park.
It sits prominently up on this hillside
with fantastic views over the city of Chattanooga.
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Point Park was the site of the Civil War battle,
commonly referred to as the Battle Above the Clouds.
Now, this is part of the National Park System.
So if you have a national park pass,
you can get in for free.
Otherwise it is $7 per adult
and children under the age of 15 are free.
It's open from 8:30 in the morning till about sunset.
And I highly recommend you come here at the end of the day,
the view over the town of Chattanooga
and the Tennessee River is just spectacular.
You can get some great photos here.
If you're looking for a family photo or just a great picture
of you with the sunset.
I really enjoyed coming here at this time of day.
As you guys can see, the colors were just phenomenal.
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Right now, we're at Foster Falls
just at 30 minutes outside Chattanooga.
And this is a great place to come
and see a beautiful waterfall.
If you've got small children or are with your family,
it's super accessible.
This is also a great spot for people to come
if you are a rock climber or looking to do some hiking,
there's a lot of trails around here as well.
And as you can see behind me, this waterfall is stunning.
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After visiting the top of the falls,
you can actually take a trail down
to the bottom of the trail,
which is what we're doing right now.
And it is (indistinct) as you guys can probably tell.
One of the things I'm seeing on this trail is leaves
but just look at the size of this, absolutely massive.
Foster Falls is part of the Tennessee State Park system.
Parking here is free and dogs are also able
to use the trails here.
Now situated near the falls, there are a camp grounds.
It's got 26 sites, bathhouse with heated showers
and flushable toilets, picnic tables, and campfire rings
at every site as well.
Now, the state park system here in Tennessee is awesome.
You can actually check out my website
or the Tennessee State Park website
for more information on booking a campsite as well.
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If you're looking to rock climb the crag,
(indistinct) offers 179 routes
at a wide variety of grades and heights.
It's a great for all levels of climbers.
And I didn't see anyone at climbing when I was here,
but it's definitely one of the most popular spots
outside Chattanooga for rock climbing.
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Fall Creek Falls is located
about 90 minutes North of Chattanooga.
It is in the central time zone also so make a note of that
when you are coming up here,
Chattanooga's actually on the Eastern time.
But this state park is amazing.
It's pretty big,
it's got over 50 miles of hiking and biking trails.
It's also got a lake, there are campgrounds here
for RVs and tent cabin.
There's also cabins for rent and there's lots of facilities.
Not only is there a plentiful bathrooms,
but there's also a camp store.
Right away on this trail, (water falling)
you are brought to this overlook
where you can see Fall Creek Falls.
Now, Fall Creek Falls is actually the tallest waterfall
east of the rockies, it's 264 feet.
And at the bottom here, it goes into this gorge
which actually at the bottom is the last virgin forest
in most of the East coast.
So, this is just a remarkable area,
this waterfall is absolutely breathtaking,
I'm gonna be heading down to the base of the waterfall
to give you guys a better view.
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I've got even more ideas for you
in my complete outdoor adventure guide to Chattanooga,
which you can check out on my website,
Alice's Adventures on Earth.
And I wanna hear from you too,
so make sure you leave me a comment down below
with your favorite type of outdoor adventure.
There are two things
that North Georgia and Tennessee have a lot of.
One of them is waterfalls, the other one is caverns.
Right now, we're in Sweetwater at Tennessee
to actually visit the largest underground lake in America.
Now, this is the second largest underground Lake
in the entire world.
The first one is in Namibia.
But we are here to go down under the ground in this cavern
with a company called Lost Sea Adventures.
They're going to be taking us down on foot,
and then we're gonna be actually hopping in a boat
to explore this more than four and a half acre lake
a little bit more.
The Lost Sea is a national registered natural landmark.
Now, it's part of a vast cave system
called Craighead Caverns,
which extends underneath the mountain
here in Sweetwater, Tennessee.
The cave actually contains fossils
from the Pleistocene Epoch
and a large volume of crystal clusters.
So, this cavern was used
for a couple of different things over the years.
The Cherokee actually used to have meetings in here.
And then during the civil war,
it was used to mine saltpeter.
The Lake has a visible surface area
of approximately four and a half acres.
I headed out in a little flat bottom boat
to explore what we can see,
but there's actually more than 12 acres
more of the Lake that goes below this cave system as well.
This Lake also has been stocked with rainbow trout,
which you can see swimming around here.
They have installed lights and feed the fish fish food
because there is no natural food here in the cavern.
One of the super interesting things about this cavern
is that the Lake wasn't actually discovered until the 1960s,
even though it was a known cavern
for more than a hundred years beforehand.
All right guys, what did you think about that lake?
That was pretty awesome.
And this whole trip has been just amazing,
exploring Chattanooga and all of the outdoor activities
are so much more to do here.
There's a more hiking or biking, fishing,
hunting, you name it.
There's an adventure for you.
So I hope you guys enjoyed this video.
You know what to do now, if you are new here,
make sure you hit that subscribe
and give this video a thumbs up.
Don't forget to share it with a friend or on social media
so that we can grow this channel also.
And thank you guys so much for watching.
Before you go, check out one of these other videos
on my channel and I will see you guys out
on another adventure very soon.
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