Trip to Fall Creek Falls, TN- March 4 & 5, 2008

On the way to Fall Creek Falls (a few hours north of Chattanooga), we stopped off at the Chattanooga Aquarium & visited the Murder Mystery Dinner Theater in town. It was terrific! The aquarium has a butterfly sanctuary that we enjoyed the most. The dinner theater was great, too! We love that sort of thing.

When we got to Fall Creek Falls Bed & Breakfast, it was late at night. The next day, we visited the park and saw the waterfalls. There were tons of deer in the park!

Two of the deer that we saw in the park!

The falls- They're huge!

The smaller waterfall with the bridge over it. It was scary!

We ended the trip by going back through Chattanooga, and checked out Bluff View Art District for the first time. The Hunter Museum was closed, so we enjoyed the sculpture garden in front of the museum instead.

A Butterfield Horse

Calder's Pregnant Whale

We loved Chattanooga a lot. We still talk about going back to Fall Creek Falls! We finished our trip by visiting McKay's used book store in Chattanooga. We spent hours there looking through the books!

2007 Recap in Pictures

We have so many great memories captured in photos that I had to share them for the year 2007. 2007 was a great year- we started dating in April, Albert went to Idaho for a few months, Katie went to Paris, and we spent tons of time together.

A pretty bird at the zoo

Alber fitting in at the zoo

@ the zoo

Dressing up to play tennis. This was our first official date- a 3am trip to Ihop

June 2007- we put my computer mouse in Jell-O

At Dragon Con, marveling at the R2D2 post office dropbox

in October at Thompson Park, where Albert would propose months later

Halloween- we were zombies!

Trip to Orlando, FL / November 2-4, 2007

The first trip we ever went on together was in November 2007. Destination: Orlando, Florida for the Sigma Xi conference. Albert was presenting research that he did for the University of Idaho.

it was like a 10 minute walk from our cars to the building!

the golf courses in the morning

the view from our room

We stayed at Shingle Creek Resort, a huge, uncomfortably luxurious hotel, resort, and spa that had a huge golf course, shops inside of the hotel building, valet parking, and like 5 pools, just to name a few of the amenities. They had a big aviary for zebra finches in the lobby:

two of the finches inside of their little nest!

Our drive home was by far our most favorite part.

a bridge on the way to Little Talbot Island

We camped at Little Talbot Island, which we can't wait to visit again! We hopped in our bathing suits and went to the beach before it got dark, but the water was freezing cold and the sand fleas were INSANE so we ended up with itchy backs for the next few weeks.

It was freezing! What were we thinking?

Albert on Little Talbot Island's Beach

Albert used to accidentally close his eyes for every photo!

the lake at the campground at sunset

another shot of the beautiful lake

By the time we got hungry, there was nothing to eat nearby, so we drove to Amelia Island and ate at Baxter's. It was delicious!

Albert's car, Hot Wheels, at the campsite the next morning

The next morning, we woke up and walked along the beach again. This time we dressed warmer. We saw a horseshoe crab on the beach and I got REALLY excited because I thought it was some kind of trilobite or ancient animal. We heavily debated whether or not to take it to the ranger's station, assuming they'd want it for testing or a collection or something, but we decided not to. We kept walking along the beach and saw more, and then felt silly because we realized they were really common! Later, when we visited the ranger's station, we saw a bunch of them on the mantle and asked them what they were. We still laugh about this today!

"the ancient wonder of the world"

one of my all time favorite photos of Albert!

Katie and Albert on the beach! We were 18 and 22 at the time!

It was a great trip! We can't wait to visit Little Talbot Island again!