Gather ’round, folks. Story Time on the SoBros Network Patreon is back. Today, I have a bit of a weird, surreal Thanksgiving story to share in honor of the holiday approaching this week. Fair warning – it may only be cool if you’re familiar with Nashville and its recent history. I’m going to be referencing the infamous Opryland in this one. Maybe that’s enough for you, but I just wanted to give you a heads up.
It’s kind of funny how one small change of plans can lead to a memory that will last a lifetime.
Thanksgiving 2005 was one of those situations for me. For my entire life up to that point, every Wednesday night before Thanksgiving, my family and I would pile in the car and head out to Smithville, Tennessee to my grandparents’ place. Smithville is a little over an hour outside of Nashville, and we always took the opportunity to spend some extra time with my grandparents before the whole family got there on Thanksgiving day.
Those Wednesdays really are among my favorite memories of my childhood. I used to get so incredibly excited about it. My grandfather routinely placed in the Smithville Christmas lights competition, and that Wednesday night was always the first night of the year that he turned ’em on. It meant we were closer to the holidays, and it always felt like a mini-vacation to me. It was the one night of the year I’d get to stay up there with them in Smithville. I’d wake up super early on Thanksgiving morning, and my granny would make hot chocolate for me while she got breakfast started. When she could take a break, we’d go up to the front door and watch all of the birds in the front yard.
I swear, to this day, it feels like a Norman Rockwell painting in my mind’s eye. We made that trip every year until my grandmother passed in 2007. My grandfather stayed in Smithville, but we convinced him to allow us to have Thanksgiving at my Aunt’s house in Smyrna, which was much more centrally-located for the rest of the family…just about 20 minutes southeast of Nashville (however, my grandfather outright refused to give up Christmas – we had Christmas in Smithville every year until he passed in 2017).
So, as you can imagine, even as I got older, I always loved those trips up to Smithville. It was comforting – no matter what was going on in my life, it was a break from reality. In 2005, though, we had a major change of plans.
My mother has an irregular heartbeat (AFib, to be exact – if you know, you know). I noticed she was feeling a little off that day, but nothing overtly concerning to begin with. Eventually, she said she wanted to lie down for a bit. NBD – we’d just get a later start than expected. As the day went on, though, it got worse. By that afternoon, things had escalated from needing to lie down a bit to ‘we better go to the hospital right away.‘
At the time, I didn’t know what was really going on. I just knew my mom didn’t feel well. My parents had a way of avoiding things like that. I wouldn’t understand what truly happened that day until later on in life. But, at the time, I was pretty bummed. My dad insisted that I stay home while they went to the hospital, so I did. I was worried about my mom -and- was crestfallen that we wouldn’t get our annual night before Thanksgiving trip to Smithville.
As fate would have it, though, that night would turn into something spectacular for a kid who grew up going to Opryland theme park in Nashville. Friend of the brand Mack was in town from Cookeville, another town about an hour out of Nashville, where he attended Tennessee Tech. He just happened to call me up and say he was in town and looking to get into something. I told him I just happened to be home alone while my mom was in the hospital. So, it just worked.
Eventually, my mom came back home feeling much better with doctors orders not to travel until the morning. Mack would pick me up that evening, and we’d venture down to the Opryland Hotel. It was a favorite of our group’s back in the day. If you’ve never been, scope it out. It’s a massive hotel and resort. They flattened the theme park back in the late 1990s in order to build Opry Mills, a large shopping mall. To say us locals were pissed about that would be an understatement. Nonetheless, Opry Mills was adjacent to the Opryland Hotel. We used to park at Opry Mills, walk the pathway designed to guide people from the hotel to the mall, and sneak in a side door to go in and play hide and seek until security wisened up to us, realized we weren’t staying at the hotel, and kicked us out.
Another favorite memory of my youth – we’d play hide and seek for hours. The hotel is sprawling, so you could get some high quality tactical espionage style hide and seek in.
So, with a game of hide and seek in mind, Mack and I met up with some other friends from the Mount Juliet area to go raise hell in the Opryland Hotel. I don’t remember who exactly it was, but as we approached the hotel from that beaten path, someone mentioned, “you guys know the Grizzly River Rampage is still just on the other side of this fence, right?”
Now, it’s important to understand that the Grizzly River Rampage was one of THE rides at Opryland. It was a bona fide landmark to a college kid in Nashville. It’s the ride at the 7-second and 10-second mark of this video. You’d get in what was essentially a raft, and you’d haul ass down the “river,” getting soaking wet in the process. Nothing felt better on a hot summer day.
I’m sure you can see where this is going.
We made the genius decision to jump the fence. How could we not? This was a piece of Nashville history. In my mind, I can remember thinking, “yeah, it’s trespassing…but it’s already been a pretty weird day, so why not?” It definitely wasn’t “hey, maybe I shouldn’t end up in jail for trespassing when my mom just went to the hospital because of a heart problem.” Oh, to be young and dumb again.
Curiosity got the better of me.
No one noticed that we hopped the fence. The course had obviously been drained, so we hopped down into what was once the vast flowing river. I stood in awe of what used to be, with childhood memories flooding six feet deep all around me. It was dark, as pine trees lined the old ride. We were illuminated solely by a few slivers of moonlight slipping through the trees. I couldn’t help but think of what a huge liability issue this could’ve been….like, it was super easy for us to get onto the track, and we were well-hidden enough that no one would know we were down there unless we made a ton of noise.
The course used to go through a tunnel. At night, with no flashlight, it was pretty damn intimidating to walk through. But, we did….we had to…this was history, after all. With our hands outstretched in front of us, we just followed each other’s voices until we made it to the other side. It would’ve been the perfect opportunity to pair off and get some…..however, none of us were getting some at that time in our lives.
After walking what would’ve been about half of the ride out on foot, we eventually made our way to the loading zone. Up a giant ramp we climbed….when we reached the top (probably 15-20 feet in the air), we saw where the deck that had once held people waiting to get in the raft had been torn down. It was just this concrete ramp leading up to a giant pit in the ground. Water was still standing in it, and we had no idea how deep it was. We’d have to cross it…how, we didn’t know without the deck to hop on and walk to the other side. Some suggested that we jump for it – it looked feasible, but what happens if you don’t make it? What if that pit was as deep as the ramp was tall?
Thankfully, more reasonable minds prevailed that night and we elected to back down, retrace our steps, and go get in that game of hide and seek we were all there for.
Though I was 19 years old at the time, that night definitely had a Goonies-esque sense of adventure to it. We were exploring a place that so many of us tied fond memories of childhood to. It’s something I never would’ve experienced if not for the cancelation of our usual Thanksgiving eve plans.
Odd how those things work out sometimes.
Since then, the ride was completely cleared out, and that space is now a parking lot for employees and an events space for ice skating rinks at the holidays. I didn’t realize it at the time – I just thought of it as a fun night out that was spawned out of an unfortunate changing of plans – but it was a rather surreal intersection of time and space in Nashville for me. That moment, to me, connected two eras of the city’s history…the past and the future, if you will.
It sounds dramatic, I’m sure, but it is something that still gives me chills to think about.
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD and #BeBetter. “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Nashville, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
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