Discover the USA, the online guide dedicated to your journey in the United States of America

Northeast Tennessee

In the north of the Great Smoky Mountains, "The Tip of Tennesse" is located, standing between the neighboring States of Virginia and North Carolina. Tennessee is a region that you cross when coming from New York or Washington by car, through the Highway 81, and it would be a pity if you do not visit the State, because Tennessee is so much more than Nashville and Memphis.

The east point of Tennessee, more precisely Bristol (city of horses, on the Virginian frontier) is one of the birthplaces of Country Music in the 1920s, with the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers.

Here, the mountains of Cherokee National Forest meet the blue waters of Lake Watauga and Lake Holston, built frm the Tennessee Valley Authority in 1948.

The Highway 67 will lead you to the banks of Lake Watauga, and to Butler, in the Johnson County. Nicknamed "The town that wouldn't drown", the city was moved, together with everything in it, including houses and shops, by its inhabitants, to escape the flood resulting from gigantic works around the valley in 1948.

You will also discover the charming villages of Mountain City - the highest city of Tennessee, Trade - the first frontier, and Shady Valley, in the quiet corner of the State, this "land where the sun of Tennessee rises".

Great Smoky Mountains National Park

The Great Smoky Mountains of Tennesse do not really smoke. But a dark mist sometimes floats on the highest peaks of this splendid mountainuous chain, once worshipped by the Indians and today by the tourists admiring its extraordinary beauty.

Located in the southwest of the State, along the border between Tennessee and North Carolina, this magnificent park of 200,000 hectares large reigns within the Appalachian mountains, a view of such a breathtaking beauty and a paradise of excursions.

The Appalachian Trail draws its ribbons along the park's whole length. Camping sites are distanced one another by a day of walking. From Gatlinburg, the tracks lead to Mount Le Conte's peak, 1,800 m high.

Lookout Mountain is about 10 km from Chattanooga. You can go by car up to its peak, or perhaps, a more interesting option is to take the train.

There, on the top of the mountain, you will find the Rock City Garden, and Ruby Falls, a 44 m high underground waterfall.

Nashville

Capital of the State, located in its center, is the cradle of country music.

Recording studios and country music producers are the city's main economic resource, and it is in Nashville and nowhere else that you can discover everything about this typically American music genre.

Opryland USA is a giant theme park offering the choice between stage plays and many great attractions, and everything is linked with country music.

In the center of the park, Grand Ole Opry, a radiophonic country music show, is presented every Friday and Saturday, from an ultramodern studio.

Every year, the Country Music Fan Fair Festival is held in Nashville (June 7 to 10, 2007 for the next one).

Memphis
Tennessee's most important city, Memphis, is a big port on the Mississippi, located on its rocky eastern benches.

De Soto, in the discovery of Mississippi River, stopped here in 1541. But it was only in 1797 that the place started acquiring its importance, marked by the construction of Fort Adams. In 1801, Fort Pickerwick was built near the river - today the name is still used to call the quarter where Fort Pickerwick once stood.

The colonization of this occidental region of Tennessee started in 1818, after USA bought the area from the Chickasaw Indians. The colony developed quickly, until Yellow Fever epidemy almost destroyed it in 1878.

After the beginning of the 20th century, Memphis started the economic development and within a hundred years it has become not only Tennesse's, but also America's most important port cities.

In the centreville, the famous Beale Street is the vein of Memphis's Black Music, with its Home of the Blues. It was on this very place where William C. Handy (1873-1958) composed his famous standards Memphis Blues and Saint Louis Blues.

In Memphis you can also visit the Pyramid, a 22,000 seat stadium, and the National Civil Rights Museum, built in the place where Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated.

In 1953, a young man named Elvis Presley paid US$ 4 at the Sun Studio, 706 Union Avenue at Memphis, to record a song he dedicated to his mother. With this song, the era of Rock'n'Roll was started. And even long after Elvis's death, his fans still come to Memphis to see his mansion.

Other interesting sites :

• In Jackson : House and Museum of Casey Jones, the legendary train mechanician.
• In Vonore : the Sequoyah Birthplace Museum honors the memory of the Cherokee Indians who invented the first written alphabet for an Indian language.
• In Pigeon Forge : Dollywood, the theme park dedicated to Dolly Parton.
• In the small town of Lynchburg : Jack Daniel's Old No. 7 Tennessee Whisky Distillery.

Credits : Ken Voorhis - Terry Clements - Gary Layda -

Robin Hood - Donnie Beauchamp