Tornado X 2

Wednesday April 27, 2011

Site 79 C

Cumberland Mountain State Park, Tennessee

Still raining………….

A knock at the door around 7:30 AM

proved to be the Ranger suggesting that we might

want to go to the bath house since there was a tornado warning.

Not a watch,
a warning.

We were taken by surprise. 

Even though we had been looking at the weather on line,

we hadn’t seen anything but “severe storms”

which we could see out the windows.

But off we went where we hung out with other

campers for about 45 minutes.

When the warning became a watch,

we came back and made chocolate chip pancakes

to celebrate our reprieve.

I spent yet another hour

on the phone with Citi-card

trying to explain full timing to three

different customer “noservice” representatives,

telling them each that we had received the cards

they overnighted to us at the RV-Dreams Rally

which were now good until 2014.

And asking WHY were they STILL sending cards

to our old address and

then blocking our 2014 card when they were returned?

The incompetence is just amazing.

I have learned just to tell the first person who picks up the phone

that I am furious and want to speak to her supervisor. 
Unfortunately it saves time to start yelling,

Then ask for the supervisor's supervisor in order to get to a

SENIOR supervisor who
SHOULD
be able to actually do something. 

Today was the second SENIOR supervisor I've spoken to.
AGAIN after pitching yet another fit,
I was told things would be different now.
I guess we'll  see.

Rain, pouring rain, more rain and then a break about noon. 

Weather.com said there was a 3 hour window

of only a 10% chance of rain before the

“SEVERE weather”

started again.

We’d been indoors for most of 2 days by now

and were starting to get cabin fever

or should we call it coach fever???

We walked over to the restaurant on our way

to the Pioneer Short Loop Trail.

David, ever interested in any and all food,  

went in to look at the buffet. 

Today was Crazy Chicken Day. 

chicken

fried,

smoked,

tenders,

livers,

soup.  

The restaurant is highly regarded and after looking at the schedule,

 which is apparently the same every week,

we determined that we should have gone for lunch yesterday

when they had not only grilled chicken with rice

but country fried steak with gravy,

white beans and cornbread,

fried okra, mashed potatoes,

macaroni and cheese and potato soup.

The full buffet includes four hot vegetables,

soup and salad bar,

made from scratch rolls,

homemade banana pudding

and choice of numerous cobblers and cakes. 

Such a LOT of food.  

While we were there,

one of the guys from the kitchen came out

on his break and in conversation

asked what we doing in this rain break. 

We told him we were just walking around and, 

since we had this big window of no rain, were going on a hike

He said, in his GREAT Tennesse accent,

“nope, gonna rain again way before that,

stay close to shelter”.

Well you can guess what’s coming.

We were trusting those same weather guys

rather than the local man.

Turned out to be a mistake of course.

But I’m ahead of myself.

We walked from the restaurant down to the boat dock

where we took this rather questionable bridge

and picked up the Pioneer “Short” Trail.

We thought surely we could hike the 2 miles in less than an hour. 

It was a really nice hike down one side of the lake

and creek that feeds it,

across a very cool swinging bridge

and up the other side.  

First half of the hike went just as planned.

But it started to drizzle by the time we got to the
very cool swinging bridge.

(Notice the high muddy water

and raindrops on the final picture.)

As we crossed the bridge,
it began to thunder.

Soon the rain was coming down harder
and it was lightning.
At that point, we were
HUSTLING
down that path.

We didn’t get soaked,

but were getting  pretty seriously wet.

Before trail’s end, 

I saw a cabin off to the left.

We scrambled up the hill to the cabin loop road

and got under the overhang

of Timberlodge Cabin #2 to wait it out.  

And JUST in time. 
We were wet but
within a minute of our

getting under the overhang,
it began to pour.

“Sometimes” I have to wonder...........

What IS this man so happy about.

Look how wet he is?

After about 20 minutes it let up
and we walked back

to Winnona in the drizzle,
put on dry clothing,

and made a red bean toss for dinner.

I had just settled in to the continuing effort

to get the Smoky Mountain blog caught up

when the cute young ranger lady came by

and said another tornado was coming our way

and they were asking everyone

to go to the restaurant’s basement.  

Given the change in venue
to a more serious shelter,,

it was clear this was a bigger threat.

This time we drove,

thinking perhaps EITHER

Winnona or the car would be safe.

I keep all our important papers

in one portable filing box which

I hadn’t taken to the bath house in the morning

but did take both this time and previously in Hungry Mother State Park.

We also took cell phones

but the ranger said we had less than 10 minutes so

in our hurry we did not take

our laptops (which of course contain our entire lives)

or flashlights, or food, or water.  

We clearly need a “tornado list”
if this is going to keep up.

Luckily the restaurant basement had chairs,

and couches for us all to sit on.

The staff provided sweet tea and coffee.

A restaurant basement is clearly THE place to be stranded.

with a huge buffet just up stairs.

After about 90 minutes of chatting around the circle,

with all the cmapers in the campground,
the warning was again decreased to a watch

that was in effect until midnight.

The ranger told us we could all go back to our

campsites but to keep an ear on weather radio.

So we spent the rest of the night

listening to NOAA radio

update weather bulletins.

With the Tennessee map spread out on the sofa,

we could track exactly what towns the

severe weather,
golf ball sized hail,

flooding

and tornados

were affecting and how close they were to us.

Rain pelted our roof.

Thunder was often so loud we couldn’t hear

the radio and lightning flashed all around.

It was a tense evening for sure. 

Finally around 10:30 it all seemed to die down

and we thought we could go to bed

without concern.

The park personnel had been

terrific at notifying everyone

and we all have them to thank for our safety. 

Happily we are supposed to have good weather

for at least 3 or 4 days

and I’m sure glad of it.  

This has been WAY TOOO
many tornado

watches and warnings for me.