Don't be suckered in Anakeesta (1 star)

 On sweet dreams that are ads for adventures in Gatlinburg. See the image below of beautiful Anakeesta.

It is the embodiment of great marketing. It looks so cool. 

Anakessta is a mountain top pace you arrive at via a glass gondola. Up there are beautiful gardens, a skywalk through the trees, top-scale restaurants, zip lines, and two Swisstyle rail-guided toboggan rides.

And then there is the reality. It is a vacuum hose aimed at your wallet - okay at your credit card, it is cashless.

We expected to be slightly hosed at the cost. We had no idea. It is $20 to park (it is only $2 an hour, but a minimum of 10 hours is required). Then $30 to go up in a gondola to the top.

Unimaginable scenery?

Once you get up there...

The treetop walk loop is being worked on, so you should walk down about 100 feet and 12 million stairs, only to turn around and come back up. Now remember, I am 67 and Lynn is celebrating her 75th birthday, so we are no spring chickens. As we start down, and I am already thinking it might not be a good idea, we are told that there is a semi-crazy person down there and they are trying to get security to go down. That was the end of the treetops tour for us.

So, we proceed up the hill. The views are great, and the weather is great.

Decorative Bee Hives?

Hazzah. But we come upon the mountain coasters. They cost another $17.00 each (although both for $20 was a better deal). But we had to pay to get up, and the one coaster line was 55 minutes. We bunt.

Now I could go into how the fine dining experience was not, but I think you get the idea at this point. But we did celebrate America coming down.

We ended up at mini-golf back in Pigeon Forge.