Our Epic Road Trip: Part Four - Tennessee

From New York City, we drove 15 hours to Adams, Tennessee.  Honestly, the kids did pretty well.  At this point, I was not worried at all about too much screen time so I let them watch as many movies and play on their tablets as much as they wanted.  Survival was key.

It was late when we arrived.  My brother was out of town for work, but my sister in law (Alethia aka Ale), my niece, and two nephews were there.  I'd let Ale know in advance that we wanted to be super chill for this last stop on our trip.  We just wanted to hang out with family and see the area a bit.  The kids had fun playing with their cousins, swimming, going to the park, and having a Harry Potter marathon.

My nephews were having their baseball playoffs so we went and cheered them on.

 Ale insisted Tom and I take a date night while she kept the kiddos.  We headed into Nashville to see what all the fuss was about.  We stopped at the Grand Ol Opry to see if we could get tickets, but it was all sold out.  So, we headed to downtown Nashville to explore and hopefully catch some live music.  When we got there, we were stuck in the most insane traffic and parking was scarce.  We finally found some event parking.  I texted my sister-in-law and she thought it was really strange.  But then we noticed all the signs everywhere.  Yep, we chose to go to Nashville the night they were having the CMA festival AND playing in the Stanley Cup Final!  The main street was blocked off and big blow up screens were playing the Stanley Cup.  Even though Tom and I usually avoid crowded situations like the plague, it actually ended up being a really fun night.

We stayed a total of 3 nights at my brother's house and then left Friday morning for the 13 hour drive back to Houston.

When I asked my kids what their favorite stops were, they said Tennessee and New Jersey.  The two stops I did the least planning because we had family there and I knew they could just play with cousins.