Rock City

Chattanooga - Lookout Mountain, Tennessee

Garnet Carter invented miniature golf. This would be enough for most people. Instead, in 1932, he and his wife decided to risk all and open Frieda's Rock City Gardens to the public. It paid off. By 1940, Rock City was a roadside institution. Its inviting slogan, "See Rock City," was painted on barns and birdhouses throughout the Southeast. It still beckons today.

Everything in Rock City is conveniently located along its narrow "Enchanted Flagstone Trail" and there's only one way you can go - forward. At first, Rock City may bore you. A rock. A tree. Another rock. The trail winds its way through grottos and glens while it crosses and recrosses itself at varying elevations. This enables you to drop things on other tourists.

The Rainbow Room offers a breathtaking view of the surrounding countryside through windows covered with sheets of colored film. "This is what Chattanooga would look like if everything were red." "This is what it would look like if everything were green." At Lover's Leap you can hypothetically see seven states.

Onward, ever onward goes the Enchanted Trail. Past High Falls and the Old Stone Face. Through Fat Man's Squeeze. Around concrete elves tending a moonshine still. An eerily silent walking egg steps out along the path -- a Rock City worker in a Humpty Dumpty costume, but you never know. Later, a cartoon pig grabs you for a photo opportunity. Finally, you reach the entrance to Fairyland Caverns.

Fairyland Caverns

Fairyland Caverns is a most magnificent showplace of ultraviolet sculpture. Demonically grinning and glowing elves perched on simulated rock shelves greet you as you descend a long series of underground rooms. The walls, floors and ceilings are completely covered with fake crystals, stalagmites and stalactites, all painstakingly glued in place.

In little manufactured grottos are a succession of hand-painted dolls depicting children's fables. Overhead float fluorescent Barbie Dolls wearing wings and glowing tutus, while "Dance of The Sugar Plum Fairies" echoes faintly over the speaker system.

Dolls and models look as if Rock City put distorted old peoples' heads on healthy children's bodies. Wide-spaced, huge eyes. Bloated lips. Exaggerated lines and creases on every face and, of course, all are aglow in the "groovy" colors only blacklight can produce.

Mother Goose Village

Fairyland Caverns' climaxes at Mother Goose Village, inside a dark room the size of a small auditorium. It stretches before you into the darkness - an alien ultraviolet landscape of dozens of intermingled nursery rhymes, topped by a ten foot tall castle.

Families shuffle like zombies around the village, barely illuminated by the glowing dioramas. No children cry. All are in awe. Hushed voices of parents and children mingle with unrecognizable music echoing from above. There's Jack Spratt. And Little Bo Peep. And a dish running away with a spoon. Who needs drugs? Life doesn't get any freakier than Mother Goose Village.

And then, you're out in the sunlight. Back in the real world. Rocky, the elfin Rock City mascot, embraces you as you stumble from the gift shop. Out the front gate, back in your car, driving down Lookout Mountain toward Chattanooga you wonder, "Where was I? What was that?"

Rock City, brother. See it.