You know, that’s interesting. I grew up in Chattanooga and I don’t think of it as a tourist spot - I think if it as a dull place I have to go to see my family, but I do know how much effort they’ve put into improving the city. Next time I make it down there, I may actually have to check out the city again (I left in 1991, and haven’t really been back for a significant amount of time since 1997).
DeadlyAccurate, I’d go with their opinions here, because I’m a little biased. 
Nah, no trains or cruises. I don’t need time to read books (I have to ration the ones I have or I run out too quickly). You are definitely intriguing me about a trip to Mexico or Central or South America. I do like museums well enough. We’ve considered a trip to the Smithsonian. I wonder how cheaply we could make a week-long trip to England. I’d love to tour some castles.
Found the links to the places I mentioned:
Petit Jean Mountain:
http://www.petitjeanstatepark.com/lodge/default.asp
Mountain Harbor (Lake Ouachita):
http://www.mtharbor.com/
I started looking at Expedia for trips to London, England. Looks like we could find a good 4-star hotel, coach airfare for a week for under $1700. Add in food, travel around England, and fees to get into various museum-type places, and we could still get by fairly cheap. We’d still need to get passports and other various stuff necessary to go to Europe; the only other country we’ve been to is the Bahamas, and all you need is a birth certificate (at least 10 years ago you did). How far is it from London to Paris and how does one get there?
I’m interested in this. Now, to talk my husband into it. (The 12 hour flight is a definite downside).
Go to Belize!!
You can go west of Belize City to the jungle (Cayo) and go cave tubing, do more active caving (check out caves where Mayans sacrificed folks to the rain god, and see actual skeletons of sacrificed people along with thousands of pots), hike through the jungle, go horse-back riding, visit some Mayan ruins (Xunantinich, Lamanai, Caracol, Altun Ha, and Tikal to name a few), and lots of other stuff (play golf in the jungle).
You can go south (to Placencia or Punta Gorda) or east to the islands (Ambergris Caye or Caye Caulker are the most famous) and go snorkeling, diving, sailing, windsurfing, etc. etc.
You can fly down from Houston really cheap if you catch a good deal on Taca, and you can set an email alert on their website. English is the official language of Belize, everyone takes US dollars at a fixed 2-to-1 exchange rate, you don’t need a visa to visit, flights only 2.5 hours from Houston, San Diego, or Miami, and you can drink the water without strapping a toilet to your ass for a week afterwards.
That’s normal. I have the same reaction about the places in Arkansas that pullin mentions; I went to college less than a half hour from Petit Jean Mountain, and the thought of deliberately going there for a vacation dumbfounds me. But I know that lots of people do and thoroughly enjoy it (heck, my parents honeymooned there 41 years ago). When we go to Arkansas, we visit family rather than doing all of the tourist things. Same with my wife’s family – they live in Asheville, NC, which is also a place that has tons of things to do, but even though we go up there at least every six weeks or so, we never take advantage of them – we’d been together for twelve years before we finally went to the Biltmore House. After seventeen years in Atlanta, I rarely do any of the things tourists do here unless I have out-of-town guests. Locals just don’t do the tourist stuff, and of course locals see all of the downsides to a place much more frequently than visitors do. All that being said, I’d pick up stakes and move to Chattanooga myself if it were a viable location for a long-term career in technology (or if they built the high-speed mag lev train between Atlanta and Chattanooga that’s been talked about so that I could commute from there).
Yucatan Peninsula (Isla Muejeres or Tulum)
You can hike, see Mayan ruins, swim with turtles, visit the nature reserve, snorkle or scuba, sit on the beach, and eat well.
OK, I just canceled my order for London For Dummies and am looking into Belize seriously.
The Grand Canyon. It’s way better than it looks in pictures, if you can imagine that. You can fly down into the canyon or take a beast of burden down one of the trails. The surrounding area is beautiful as well. There is so much to learn. I don’t know if the tours fill you in on all the archeological wonderments, but I think they might. I’d do it in a heartbeat if my husband was the vacationing type.
I won’t miss a chance to plug my part of the world, Western Canada.
Given that you’re from Texas, you may or may not be interested in visiting our fair city of Calgary for the Calgary Stampede, an epic celebration of western traditions. From here, I’d head west, spending some time in Canmore, Banff or Jasper, all on the eastern edge of the Canadian Rockies. The wilderness and wildlife can be utterly awe-inspiring. Several celebrities maintain vacation homes in Canmore because of the peace and tranquility of the area.
If you want to keep moving west, you can leave Alberta do some whitewater rafting in British Columbia. If you enjoyed your hiking, you can also do plenty of that in either Alberta or B.C. There are any number of both day-hikes as well as backpacking trails. There are at least a couple where you hike into the wilderness for a few hours, ultimately finding yourself at a campground that can only be reached by that trail. No vehicles out here! Watch out for the bears, though.
Westward, you will pass through the Okanagan Valley where you’ll find fruit orchards and tourist traps aplenty. If you’re lucky, you might even catch a glimpse of the myserious Ogopogo, a monster reputed to live in the waters of Lake Okanagan.
How I managed to hit “Submit”, I’ll never know. I was nowhere near the button.
Anyway…if you still have time left, continue on to visit Vancouver as well as the beautiful Vancouver Island, whereon is the unique city of Victoria.
The total drive time from Calgary to Vancouver is about 12 hours. Assuming you will be taking some detours here and there, you’ll get to visit Canadian prairie, foothills, the Rockies, beautiful valleys, urban centres, the Pacific Ocean, hotsprings, stunning golf courses, and perhaps even the house made entirely of embalming fluid bottles, all with under 20 hours driving time.
Plus you can camp all the way, or even rent a motorhome for the trip.