Originally Posted by
Domeguy
Ok, the new bewbs have been put away and sent back home. So...to answer a few questions, the new bewbs come in a matching set with an attractive baker attached. She owns two bakery's, and I'm up to about 498lbs. Damn, she makes good fritters. Yes, I think she is a keeper.
Now for the serious side, everything bacpacker has said is so true. We arrived in Gatlinburg on Saturday night, and ash was falling onto the cars. We drove out to Pigeon Forge on Sunday, and things were getting smokey, but not to bad, with ash still falling. We were going to go into the shopping district of Gatlinburg Monday, but the smoke was so bad, they were closing all the shops around noon. People were walking around with masks on, and the wind gusts were around 30-50 mph. She we drove back into Pigeon Forge to get tickets to the Christmas Show she wanted to see near the Titanic show. We bought the tickets, and bought a few things, then went back to Gatlinburg. The wind was nearly blowing me off the road, and the smoke made visibility only a out 50 feet. I felt we might need to get the hell out of there in a hurry that night, so I backed her SUV in the spot heading out, loaded up as much as we could, and ate a bit and tried to take a nap around 4pm. But with all of the smoke and wind gusts now up to 80 mph, that didn't happen. We still didn't know the extent of what was happening and how close the fires had jumped. We left around 6:30 pm to go to the show, and I can now say luckily, but a large tree had blown down across the road out of the resort about 1 minute before we went down the road. We were the first one to find it, and I reported it to the main desk. The crews were working on a tree down in the area, and came to clear the road out. This delayed us by about 30 minutes. So when the road out was open, we headed out to Pigeon Forge, as we had already bought the tickets. But as luck would have it, the delay let me see the fire on the mountain that by now had reached all the way to the road about 1/2 mile after we came out of the tunnel headed into town. I realized this was probably not normal.
I knew they were going to close the road in and out within minutes, and turned around as soon as possible. I could see them closing the road of the other side, and fire was all around on each side of us, with smoke and burning embers everywhere. Fire was erupting everywhere, and the were closing this side back into Gatlinburg behind me. If the tree hadn't fallen and kept us in the resort, we would have been stranded in Pigeon Forge. But we got back, changed clothes, and I packed everything except meds and the clothes we were wearing. I would have left then, but I had no idea where there fires were, and all it would take was another fallen tree, and we could have been trapped in the car in a fire storm. So we switched on the tv, saw we were quickly being surrounded by fires, and I knew we would be forcefully evacuated soon, and just waited for it. The tv went out, the internet went out, then the lights started to flicker on and off. I already had the hot tub filled with water, and had wet towels in it, ready to jump in, get soaked, and run out if needed. We had wet towels over our mouths in the room as the smoke was getting bad in the room.
About 10:30pm, they pounded on the room to get out, and the lights then went out. I had flashlights ready for this, and we were out the door in 1 minute, and were one of the first ones out of the resort. I think they delayed the evacuation as long as possible to bring in as many fire and police to help with the evac. All roads were blocked off except the one headed out. Since I was one of the first out, it was pretty low key, not too many cars on the road yet, but things were starting to catch on fire within 1/2 mile of were thr resort was. Within that 1/2 mile, I kid you not, entire mountains were on fire on each side of us. People can make fun of me being a prepper, but if I had not been expecting it and gotten prepared, the outcome could have been very different.
As bacpacker stated, people did die, and more are still missing. Probably billions of dollars worth of property were lost to the fires.
And also, as he stated, they were most likely started on purpose so some asshole could get his rocks off to watch it of prove how important he could be in trying to fight it. I hope they all burn in Hell, as this was the most scary and dangerous situation I have ever been in my life. But I must say all of the people in charge I saw had done one hell of a good job. Equipment and people were coming in by the hundreds. We passed firetrucks, electric powerline trucks, cable trucks, ect. by the dozens headed toward the area. I even saw a salt truck, which I think they were going to use the plow to push fallen trees in the road, I can only assume.
And for the honeymoon, we are thinking of someplace more peaceful and quiet...like somewhere in the Middle East.
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