We spent a really fun weekend in Pigeon Forge to kick off the Pigeon Forge Family Challenge! This is our second time in Pigeon Forge, and we truly had a great, family trip. I’m going to break down everything we did and everywhere we ate to help you plan your future trip to Pigeon Forge!
First off, we had some family challenge events that had to be done, which included meeting THE QUEEN herself! Poor Lincoln must have eaten something that didn’t sit right and had to run out right before our picture, but he was totally fine after that and right back in the mix!
After that, we spent the rest of the day in Dollywood. It was our first time, and we had so much fun. We rode a couple, big coasters, and I was really shocked at how many big rides they have there! Wild Eagle was everybody’s favorite and it’s seriously such a great coaster. I really enjoyed all the Dolly areas – seeing her costumes, her wigs, her shoes, and all the pink glitter everywhere! The food was excellent and if you go, you must get the cinnamon bread! I can’t wait to get back and spend some more time in Dollywood.
One of our favorite things in Pigeon Forge are all the mountain coasters. They’re really great for the whole family because you can actually control how fast your car rides down the track. I tend to go slower than the rest of the family, so they always put me in the back of the line! This year we repeated a coaster we’ve already done, and that was Rocky Top Mountain Coaster.
We also wanted to try a new one, so we went on Lost Mine Mountain Coaster. We actually ended up doing that one a second time on our way out of town because we loved it so much!
The Island is a super fun spot to stay, eat, play and spend quite a bit of time. Here’s a throwback of the boys on our very first trip to pigeon Forge in 2021. You can read all about that trip in this post.
The Great Smokey Mountain Wheel is a bit of a scary ride – being suspended in a glass room – but it is so beautiful and goes super slowly around, giving you great views! This year, the boys did the Islands rope course, which is insanely high, while I got a margarita at Mellow Mushroom with my feet safely on the ground. We also rode SkyFly, which is like Soarin in Disney, but dare I say even better?!
The Island also has several carnival type rides to choose from and you can get a wristband that covers them all to make it easier and more affordable.
There are plenty of arcades to choose from around Pigeon Forge, and we hit up a couple of them. Those are always such a good time for my boys!
Let’s talk FOOD! We went for breakfast at The Old Mill, which is a highly recommended restaurant in Pigeon Forge. Everyone orders their own food, but there are lots of sides and bread served family style, which makes it super fun. We’ve never eaten for anything other than breakfast there, but we heard great things about dinner as well.
We made reservations at Local Goat and that was very hard to get! It is one of the more highly rated restaurants and has great food.
One place we really loved was getting takeout from Pizza Rio. I was surprised to see that it is more of a nice restaurant when I went in to grab the pizza. They offer a unique menu style that includes Brazilian style price fix menus for brunch and dinner. Their pizza dough has 5 ingredients and is fermented to lower the glycemic index. All things I found out after we ordered and loved it. I really want to eat in the restaurant on our next trip!
The last restaurant we at at was Gorilla Taco. This is new to Pigeon Forge and had excellent (classic and unique) Mexican food at really good prices. They also have a big margarita menu!
Hope this post helps you with some of your Pigeon Forge trip planning!
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