10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee

If you’re an RVer, it’s quite likely that you have an outgoing, lively and fun-loving personality. It’s also likely that you’re the type to form tightly knit relationships and strong bonds. That’s why you should consider looking at Tennessee – and Crossville, located in Eastern Tennessee, in particular -- as an ideal retirement destination. Let’s take a closer look.

Live the RV Adventure & Come Home to Friends! GardensRVVillage.com | 18 Our Way Drive, Crossville, TN 38555 | 931-456-7794 1. Stay Retired With Affordable Living! Tennessee repeatedly appears at the top of just about every list of desirable places to retire, including the Kiplinger Report, Where to Retire and Money magazines. According to the AARP, WalletHub lists Tennessee in the top five states for affordability. Tennessee ranks Number #2 in the nation for cost of living and for state and local taxes according to RetireToTennessee.com. According to the website, the state is credited with a number of other benefits, including great weather, health care availability and senior-friendly activities and services.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 2 2. Always Be Free To Roam. With a 360-degree range-of-travel, Tennessee is connected to eight states and is about a day’s drive to Orlando, Florida; Savanah, Georgia; Washington, DC; Gettysburg, Pennsylvania or Charlotte, North Carolina, to name a few. RVers here can visit any or all of our 54 state parks, as well as the most visited national park in the United States – the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Highways crisscrossing near Crossville include the I-40, I-75, and Highway 111. RVers can also easily access the I-81 to the north of Knoxville and the I-24 in Nashville. Once RVers arrive, they like to explore a few other famous roads, namely, the Cherohala Skyway, with its glorious views of the Appalachian National Forest, and the Crossing, which follows the original path of the Cherokee Warriors Path.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 3 3. Safe and Secure.

The tight-knit community of RVers living in the Gardens RV Village is strengthened by their mutual interests and their inherent socially-oriented nature. When you’re out on your motorcycle streaming along the ‘Tail of the Dragon’ in the Smokies, for example, you’ve got your buddies there looking out for you. When one couple in the neighborhood fell ill, each with long-term ailments, there wasn’t a day during the six-month-long period when their dog was not walked and when they did not receive a visit from a neighbor. It’s very common to hear reports of neighbor helping neighbor while out on the road. Whether it’s a matter of helping with a mechanical issue or something more serious, such as a medical emergency, there truly is strength in numbers.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 4 Discover the Great Outdoors 4. (And Get Your Summers Back)! Central to Eastern Tennessee (and less than an hour’s drive from Crossville), Knoxville has an annual mean temperature averaging 41°F in January and 78°F in July. The average summer temperature in Crossville, Tennessee, is probably even lower, thanks to its location on the 2,200-foot elevation of the Cumberland Plateau. Winters are mild. (At press time in February, the average daytime temperatures are now in the low 70s.) Predominantly great weather lets you get outside and stay active.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 5 5. Stay Engaged With Your Buddies. Crossville RVers, and especially those living in the Gardens RV Village, share your natural proclivity to socialize. This atmosphere of camaraderie and neighborliness is largely what attracted them to retire here in the first place. Although almost all the Gardens’ residents are not native to Tennessee, the state’s prevalent culture of Southern Hospitality is evidenced in the many ways they socialize. Perhaps because of their singular neighborhood, RVers in the Gardens are particularly active, with a plethora of social events in which they can choose to participate, from traveling together in caravans, assisting one another with projects and hosting potlucks; to throwing parties or playing cards.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 6 6. Enjoy a Rich Cultural Life. While Knoxville and Nashville (each easily accessible from Crossville via the I-40) offer world-class musical, theatrical and artistic venues, Crossville is home to the very popular Cumberland County Playhouse, which presents dramatic, comedic and musical theater events year-round. History buffs have plenty of opportunity to visit museums in nearby Chattanooga, Knoxville and Nashville, not to mention our very own Homesteads Tower Museum, constructed in 1937-38 as part of the Cumberland Homesteads, a subsistence homesteading program of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration during the .

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 7 7. Live Well; Stay Healthy. Experts like Doctor Oz say there are three secrets to long-term health. These are 1) eating right, 2) getting proper exercise and 3) maintaining personal relationships. While we may not be able to help you with the first item, the weather and culture of warm interpersonal relationships in our region can lead you to a more sustainable, healthful lifestyle. For example, we frequently see groups being formed in the Gardens to play pickleball, go motorcycling, fly model airplanes or hike in nearby mountains. Of course, the socializing in the community never stops! You cannot go for a “short” walk in the Gardens; people here are too friendly and engaging to just walk past you.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 8 Sample Music, Plays, Sports, 8. Arts and Crafts. There’s not enough space here to mention all the entertaining venues available. For football fans, there’s the University of Tennessee SEC Volunteers. Crossville is the golf capital of Tennessee, if that’s your thing. (Or maybe it’s a good opportunity to learn since green fees are under $25.00 in many cases!) Theater fans will appreciate the Cumberland County Playhouse, which books top-rated talent and is situated within one mile of the Gardens’ front gate. Of course, music fans will find nirvana in Nashville where you can enjoy every genre from country music to rock and pop.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 9 9. Fit Into a Warm, Welcoming Culture.

There’s a rule in the Gardens RV Village: if our garage door is open, we are welcoming visitors. On almost any day, you can walk through the neighborhood and find a gathering of friends discussing the finer points of RV maintenance, sharing travel ideas or sitting in lawn chairs to enjoy hors d’oeuvres in someone’s RV garage or on their porch. Every Tuesday, residents go out in groups of 20-to-30 to enjoy $10.00 steak night at the Zebra or buffet night at the State Park. Or, you just might wander over to pick up some barbeque from Big John’s for a picnic in one of your buddies’ garages. (Oh, yes! BBQ! This is Tennessee, after all.)

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 10 10. Explore Tennessee Attractions. Ripley’s Aquarium of the Smokies and Dollywood lie just outside the entrance to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. As a matter of fact, Tennessee boasts 184 nature and wildlife adventures including parks, forests, waterfalls, lakes and rivers. The Smokies offer limitless hiking trails including Rainbow Falls, Chimney Tops and the Gatlinburg Trail. History buffs won’t want to miss the Ryman Auditorium, Sun Studio or Andrew Jackson’s Hermitage in the Nashville area. There are also Lotz House Museum, Shiloh National Military Park, Stones River National Battlefield and Lookout Mountain – all located in Eastern Tennessee – for Civil War hounds. Eastern Tennessee is also home to the Bristol Motor Speedway.

GardensRVVillage.com The Gardens | 10 Reasons RV Retirees Choose Tennessee | 11 If you are planning to make the best of your retirement years, you should take a look at Eastern Tennessee; and if you are a RV aficionado, you would be short-changing yourself if you didn’t come by and visit the Gardens RV Village. Every homeowner in the Gardens started out the same way: Most of them had never even considered Tennessee as a retirement destination as opposed to Florida! But without exception, after driving over and spending a few days on our private campground, they began to understand the value being offered here.

DRIVING DIRECTIONS TO CROSSVILLE

From Nashville: Take I-40 E toward Knoxville. After 104.61 miles, take the US-127 exit, EXIT 317, toward Crossville.

From Knoxville: Take I-40 W toward Nashville. After 20.29 miles, keep right at the fork to take I-40 W toward Nashville. After only 45.89 miles, take US-127 exit, EXIT 317, toward Crossville.

For more information about our town, visit 15 Reasons to Move to Crossville.

OUR PROMISE TO VISITORS

We promise you there will be no pressure when you visit. We don’t need to use high- powered sales techniques. We simply let you park on Homeless Hill with all the other RVers for whom we are building homes. Their enthusiasm is so contagious, we don’t need to exert high-pressure sales techniques. So give us a call at 931-456-7794 and arrange to reserve your campsite on the Hill.

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