These are just some of a few of our favorite attractions from the neighboring mountain city! Let’s take a look:

Ripley’s Aquarium of the Smokies
Don’t leave the Smokies without visiting Ripley’s Aquarium. This is one of Gatlinburg’s most premier attractions and one look at the complex on River Road will show you why. Whole oceans worth of sea life await you and your family at Ripley’s Aquarium with video presentations, classes, divers, play area, interactive fun stuff, and African Penguins (you heard that right). Ripley’s Aquarium is also often the site for Gatlinburg’s special events. There is nothing to not love about the Aquarium, so make sure you don’t leave Gatlinburg without a visit! http://www.ripleys.com/gatlinburg/

Christ in the Smokies
Formerly “Christus Gardens”, this is one of Gatlinburg’s oldest and most dignified attractions. Christ in the Smokies is a museum dedicated to the story and portrayal of Jesus Christ with over 100 life-sized wax figures and the famous “Carrera” face of Christ. http://www.christinthesmokies.com/

Guinness World of Records Museum
Consider this to a compliment to the Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Museum. Also owned and managed by Ripley’s, Guinness World is a sister site where you can indulge in more interactive weirdness and awesome displays of official incredulity like the world’s tallest man, the world’s fattest woman, the longest jump by a human being and much more. The world’s most incredible display of dominos and much more! http://www.ripleys.com/gatlinburg/

Gatlinburg Arts and Crafts
The reason the city is here – The Arts and Crafts Community is famous throughout the country as being the largest collection of independent artists and artisans in The U.S. Potters, painters, broom-makers, fine restaurants, sculptures, sketchers and incredible stores of all kinds could take days to see in full. http://www.gatlinburgcrafts.com/

Ober Gatlinburg
An icon in the large roster of attractions in Gatlinburg, Ober has been a site for many things for over 40 years in the city. In the winter time, it’s the only place for miles around to go for skiing, snowboarding and ice skating. In the warmer season, it’s a mountain-high family fun park with mini-golf, arcade, park rides, shops, indoor ice skating and more. http://www.obergatlinburg.com/

Space Needle
The tallest structure in Gatlinburg is a center place for a good portion of the entertainment in the city. From the top of the tower, you can see for miles and miles around of the Smokies. At the bottom is Arcadia, a 25,000 square foot arcade and family entertainment center and Jon Dee’s Hypnotized Comedy Show. Watch for the Space Needle on New Years Eve where the city of Gatlinburg traditionally lines the whole structure up with fireworks and creates one of the most spectacular displays you’ll ever see. http://www.gatlinburgspaceneedle.com/

Mysterious Mansion
Appropriately enough, Mysterious Mansion sits in a quiet, unnerving corner behind Gatlinburg on River Road, a place that is reported to be haunted in the first place, and has offered families spine-chilling adventures through its unhallowed halls for many years. Ghosts, Ghasts, Goblins, creeps, creeks, chains, chainsaws, things that glow in the dark, things that go bump in the night – this is the Mysterious Mansion during operating hours. The disturbances only multiply at night when the kids are wanting something with some edge to it, something to really excite them before they turn in for the night. Mysterious Mansion is just that!

Mysterious Mansion
424 River Rd, Gatlinburg, TN 37738
http://gatlinburgsmysteriousmansion.com/
(865) 436-7007

World of Illusions
Watch things that disappear and appear right in front of your eyes at the World of Illusions of Gatlinburg in Reagan Terrace Mall next to the Brass Lantern. The weird and wonderful, plus the waxy figures of the most well-known science fiction stars to adorn this wild structure as you discover mind-melting activities. How do you keep from dematerializing in this odd simulacrum? How do you resist building your own tornado? Is that a Knight or Death in disguise? How are you moving that ball? If you can’t trust your eyes, what can you trust? All this and more awaits at the World of Illusions.

World of Illusions
716 Parkway # 37838, Gatlinburg, TN 37738
https://www.gatlinburg-attractions.com/attraction/world-of-illusions/
(865) 436-9701

Wonderworks
WOW is the main word of choice for describing Wonderworks on the parkway between pigeon Forge and Sevierville. This is a major amusement facility where your brain, no matter how high or wild its intelligent strength is, will get one heck of a workout. Up is down, left is right, nothing is what it seems and yet everything is exactly how it should be in the naturally unnatural world. The entire complex is 35,000+ square feet offering over 100 exhibits, and it wouldn’t be surprising if you and your family or group ended up spending the afternoon there. See what it’s like to stand against the wind force of a hurricane, sit inside the earthquake cafe in a recreation of the 5.3 magnitude “Quake of 1989”, stick your hand in a mesh steel armor glove and experience 100,000 volts of electricity through your fingers. Ever want to be an astronaut? You can test the metaphorical waters there too as you explore Wonderworks’ Space Zone with its interactive astronaut training emulations. You can get inside a life-size replica of an EVA suit or a life-size replica of the Mercury Capsule. You can practice your hand at landing a space shuttle in the same manner that NASA does (you might be surprised how difficult it can be). You can train like an astronaut in a 4-person gyroscope that will surely make lifelong memories for you and your group and there’s still more!

Wonderworks
100 Music Rd, Pigeon Forge, TN 37863
https://www.wonderworksonline.com/
(865) 868-1800

Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Museum
One of Sevier County’s longest running centers of the strange and brain-boggling in multiple incarnations, no medulla worth flexing would ignore a trip to the Ripley’s Believe It or Not! museum in downtown Gatlinburg where you get to see and interact with things that are literally impossible to believe. Travel the worlds seen and unseen throughout Earth and find freak occurences, one-of-a-kind individuals, supernatural skills, builds of ridiculous properties and illusions the likes of which you may or may not be familiar with. The museum has been renovated as of 2019 and is practically brand new from top to bottom. See it as soon as you can!

Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Museum
800 Parkway, Gatlinburg, TN 37738
www.ripleys.com/gatlinburg/odditorium/
(865) 436-5096

Guinness World of Records
Also a Ripley’s attraction much like the Believe It or Not! Museum, the Guinness World of Records explores similar but different terrain of the incredible formed around people, places, items, animals, achievements and more in similarly interactive and themed environments. Learn more about the boundaries of reality and how we’ve broken them in space, underwater, in pre-history, modern history, automotives, sports, performance arts. Learn more about the tallest, smallest, fastest, slowest, most accident-prone, most dangerous, most insane, most colorful and most improbable of all things known to mankind at the Guinness World of Records in downtown Gatlinburg!

Guinness World of Records
800 Parkway, Gatlinburg, TN 37738
www.guinnessworldrecords.com
(865) 430-7800

There’s more where that came from, as well. See an enormous wax museum, a two-story crime museum, a salt-and-pepper shaker museum, a Shroud of Turin museum (yes, really) and more by visiting www.mypigeonforge.com, www.gatlinburg.com and www.visitsevierville.com.