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I live n the DC/Va/MD area and my brother lives in Va. I have never seen anything like a casino in VA. I don't think it's legal. They do have the lottery, scratch tickets etc. but the closest gambling that I know of from us is Atlantic City and Charlestown WV.
Cherokee does have a nice casino just opend in the past ten years or so. It should satisfy your gambling needs and if you get hungry, they have a lovely resturant in there that is very reasonable.
You might have to take a back road to get there, check Google of course.
In fact, if you could arrange it with a babysitter for the night gambling, check out Cherokee itself during the day. Very educational for the kids and at night during the summer they put on a play called UNDTO THESE HILLS, if it doesn't rain, because it is outside. The kids will love it as well as yourselves.
Visit to Maryville, Townsend, Pigeon Forge, Sevierville, Newport, Erwin and Tri-City area
Quote:
Originally Posted by marmac
MaNoWA-----it would be interesting if you would post again after your trip to give your observations.
Best wishes on your trip.
Enjoy !
First, let me just say, ya'll live in a beautiful state! LOL! That southern draw is so magnetic and contageous. Both my husband and I caught ourselves sounding like we'd been living there instead of just visiting for a week.
I would also say, that nothing can prepare you for the landscape of the land. Even though I'd seen beautiful pictures and even looked at the area via Google Earth, I was not prepared for the sea of trees and their height. Incredible.
Also not prepared for the speed at which you all drive your vehicles! My husband was in heaven. And believe me I am not known for being a pokey driver. Now for an area known for laid back people in no hurry to go anywhere...you all drive crazy fast! 45 in a twistie-turnie residential area outside of Cooksville with no shoulder to any road...(Iowa's residential areas are 25!). I thought I'd wet myself and my husband thought he was Mario Andretti or something. "Honey, I'm going the speed limit!" Also, noted...the state doesn't spend a bunch of money on posting speed limit signs.
I know it's hard to interpret in writing...but we are having a great time at this point. Not complaining at all, just posting my observations... Really enjoying our trip and the views while driving. Just a couple marital spats regarding navigation. Nothing to sweat.
We spent our first night camping in Edgar Evans State Park. Really nice park and the facilities were nicely cared for. The second day we made our way up to Newport because it was about the only available camp site due to the pending Memorial Weekend Holiday. But it proved to be a good vantage point and a place to set up camp and not fuss. Well of course until it rained 4 inches in an hour and the wind blew at 60 mph. We spent the evening at the laundry drying sleeping bags and the tent. But it's all good!
We visited the Maryville area and then drove down through Townsend and up through Pigeon Forge and Sevierville. Again, very beautiful, but all for the tourist. We decided it would not be a place to live...but rather a place to come play. The shops are art and cabin rental centered. Now, from what we heard, if you work in the service industry there are jobs-o-plenty in this area. And it has also been said in this forum. We decided unless we wanted to get into the property management field and build some log cabins for tourist to rent...it's probably not for us.
In regards to jobs, the advice given in these forums was repeated over and over. Jobs are few and far between especially in the factory, manufacturing and construction fields. This will be our biggest issue in relocating.
Newport was an interesting community. People were nice. The area beautiful and it was easy to get to every where we wanted to go between Maryville and there. As I posted in a thread specifically about Newport...the town didn't give us the best feel. And apparently it is not known for being a spanky clean place.
Dollar General, Sonic and Churches! In almost that order, over and over down the same drag! It doesn't seem possible that there are enough people in these towns to actually populate that many churches. I know it's the Bible Belt but really??? And I noticed that people often left eachother with the parting words "bless you", "Have a blessed day.", etc.
We are not big drinker's of alcohol, but since we were on vacation and camping we thought it would be okay to have a wine cooler or two and my husband asked a gentleman at the grocery store if they sold them. He replied, with a crazy look in his eye, "No! We're too close to a church!" So we determined that there weren't many places to buy if that was the case. Crazy Northerner! What were we thinking?
I did make a note to self...I will not be able to quick stop and pick something up at the store before heading to daycare to pick up the kids. I'm a laid back kind of person and have nick-named myself Last Minute Missy. So, because I am laid back, I don't have much structure and often take care of things on the fly. But nothing seems to happen too quickly in the supermarket check out lines there in East TN! It's like old home week and ya'll have 10 minute conversations with each other, regardless of the number of people in line behind you. You just have to love that! Life is too short...we should all be taking the time to connect with eachother. So I'll just go to the store after I get my kids...
We then packed up and headed to Ashville, NC and planned to make our way up through Erwin and then over to Roan Mountain for a hike. Unfortunately I received a phone call that my grandmother had fallen and had been placed on life support but would be taken off soon. So we had to make a bee-line for home.
We did briefly stop in Erwin and we both were like, "oh yeah. This is what we're looking for." Many of you have named Erwin as a great place to land. And I will begin focusing my attention on the Johnson City area, specifically Erwin.
Erwin had a down home feel. Obviously big enough to have most of the things you would want to live with a small town setting. And man...a quick drive to JC. It was clean, for the most part, and flags flew everywhere. I know it was Memorial Day but it was the only town that we noticed that in. We just briefly visited an ice cream shop, a gas station and the Walgreen's but at each place the people were nice and easily conversed with us about the school system, jobs, housing, crime (including drugs). Most of the information was consistant with that being posted in this forum. Which just reinforces the quality of the people providing the information. Really a tool to get mostly accurate information. Really great. I hope I continue to find that people in Erwin are welcoming to outsiders. Although, I hardly would consider my hubby an outsider...he was really just born in the wrong geographical area.
We did travel through Johnson City and Kingsport on our way up to KY to head home but did not take the time to stop.
I was very disappointed, not only by the loss of my grandmother, which was heart breaking and made for a long trip home. But also, because I think our time might have been better spent in this area.
So one final bit of feed back regarding gambling, which was one of my concerns. We did notice signs in stores and gas stations advertising the state Lottery and there were a few billboards advertising the casino in Cherokee but we were both very glad to find it very understated and I will feel very comfortable with that aspect of the state. And it doesn't sound like casino's, touch-play games, etc will be coming any time soon. So that gets a big A+ from us.
Overall, we left the state eager to learn more and return soon. I will be reading through old posts and generating my need to know list.
This forum is a great tool and the people from Tennesse who share their knowledge are very gracious.
Sorry for the long post but wanted to give my feed-back and testiment to the quality of this forum.
Glad you had a good time. Since you liked the Northeast area, when you come back for a closer inspection of Erwin, also check out Jonesborough. Their "feels" are a little different but it's another option to consider. It also has the advantage of being even closer to Johnson City (~10 minutes) for both your education and your follow-up job at JCMC . It's also closer to Knoxville, but Erwin is quite a bit closer to Asheville. Just depends on what you want there. Jonesborough is a little more redeveloped, "cosmopolitan" and more expensive, but has better schools by a fair margin.
Glad you had a good time. Since you liked the Northeast area, when you come back for a closer inspection of Erwin, also check out Jonesborough. Their "feels" are a little different but it's another option to consider. It also has the advantage of being even closer to Johnson City (~10 minutes) for both your education and your follow-up job at JCMC . It's also closer to Knoxville, but Erwin is quite a bit closer to Asheville. Just depends on what you want there. Jonesborough is a little more redeveloped, "cosmopolitan" and more expensive, but has better schools by a fair margin.
jabogitlu - In an older post I read that you would not recommend Erwin as a place to live. Obviously out of context here and I didn't get the idea that you were slamming it in any way. More that compared to the other options in this particular thread would win out. However, hoping that you would expand on this for me as Erwin is one of the places in the immediate JC area I'm focusing on...
Erwin is less welcoming to outsiders than you would expect. It is a much better place to live now than past years but it is not for everyone. It is indeed a gorgeous area but it does have drawbacks (like every place). I think you would be ok moving there but if you do, please don't come back here saying that you don't like it.
Erwin is less welcoming to outsiders than you would expect. It is a much better place to live now than past years but it is not for everyone. It is indeed a gorgeous area but it does have drawbacks (like every place). I think you would be ok moving there but if you do, please don't come back here saying that you don't like it.
Beretta - Actually, I'm not sure how to take your response. Don't blame you if we fail to heed your warning and move there anyway and they don't accept us??? I mean, really? First hand example of Erwin hospitality?
We visited Erwin and the beauty of the area is not what put it on the top of our list. Everyone was very friendly and spoke openly about the town with us. Even when we said specifically we were in town for the purpose of moving there. Do you s'pose they all said "Dang outsiders. Why don't they just stay where they are?" once we turned our backs? If so, then it is not a place I want to move.
Further, Erwin is repeatedly suggested in this forum...to "outsiders".
We want to move our family to TN to become part of the community. Because we are drawn to the way of thinking and way of life. To accept it's ways and be welcomed to do so. Not to bring our ways to the community. There is a reason we are leaving our hometown behind...we are definitely not wanting to take it with us. Otherwise we wouldn't leave. I know this is not always the case when folks move in.
I'm reaching out to this forum, as are hundreds of other people, in order to find precisely this sort of information in hopes to be as well informed as possible by those who live in the area. To do our best to determine if our perceptions are accurate before we leave the place we've lived our whole lives, up-rooting our two youngest children and leaving our oldest daughter 800 miles behind in college...not to mention all of our parents, grandparents, siblings, cousins and friends... We are putting a lot at stake to gather up the strength to follow a dream. And this forum is the best place I know how to do that. I am definitely not interested in moving somewhere that I am not able to get my furnace or vehicle fixed because I'm not "from around there." We also understand there will be dues to pay and time needed to be fully accepted and embraced...where ever we land.
So the real question...Are there any communities in the JC / Erwin vacinity that would welcome us with open arms? Help me make sense of your post. What do you mean when you say,"they are less welcoming than you would expect." In what ways? Maybe you can help to ensure that I won't come back here saying that I don't like it.
This is extremely important to me and my family... and I do appreciate every one that takes they're time to read through these threads and provide some insight.
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Visit to Maryville, Townsend, Pigeon Forge, Sevierville, Newport, Erwin and Tri-City area
Both my husband and I caught ourselves sounding like we'd been living there instead of just visiting for a week.
Also, noted...the state doesn't spend a bunch of money on posting speed limit signs. 
We spent the evening at the laundry drying sleeping bags and the tent. But it's all good!
And I noticed that people often left eachother with the parting words "bless you", "Have a blessed day.", etc. 
What were we thinking?
So we had to make a bee-line for home. 
. It's also closer to Knoxville, but Erwin is quite a bit closer to Asheville. Just depends on what you want there. Jonesborough is a little more redeveloped, "cosmopolitan" and more expensive, but has better schools by a fair margin.
Help me make sense of your post. What do you mean when you say,"they are less welcoming than you would expect." In what ways? Maybe you can help to ensure that I won't come back here saying that I don't like it.
