(For those of you who don’t know who he is, he is most famous
for having been celebrating his 10th birthday on the very day on which I was born.) Once
into Memphis, we went to the Post Office and picked up some mail that Diana, our house
sitter, had forwarded to us. Unlike at Austin, this went without a hitch. We then had lunch
at Elvis Presely’s Memphis Diner. It appears that this part of the country is very proud of
the connection with Elvis. Even more so, for example, than the Texas Hill Country is proud
of its connection with LBJ. Hmmm?
We then walked up and down Beale Street and stopped Schawb’s, a unique department store. Schawb’s advertises, similar to “Prairie Home Companion” advertisement, that if they don’t have it, you probably don’t need it. They displayed a size 60 pair of overalls. It isn’t a very big store, but it does have probably the most eclectic mix of goods that I have ever encountered.
When we got up in the morning, it was cloudy and the weather report called for rain. We had earlier encountered a few light showers, but after we left Beale Street, it started to rain. It continued to rain throughout the night. I think that this is the first rain that we have seen during the day since we left California, and it is the first rain at night while we were staying in an RV camp. In six weeks of the trip, that’s not anything to complain about. As it turned out, we just went out to a KOA camp right across from Graceland, and just stayed in our car and dealt with the mail. The most inconvenience is at night when we have to get to the bathroom, but we dealt with that ok, too.
We have, on occasion, commented to each other that we are getting a little bit travel weary. It is not a function so much of the rain, although that affects me, but just the constant moving about, packing and unpacking, insufficient cooking capabilities, and constant closeness. It is also not so severe that we want to quit. There is still a lot to see and many places we want to go. In the future, however, we will probably think about limiting our trips to four or five weeks, if we can think of ways to do that.
Graceland
The house itself was smaller than I had expected, but there were lots
of additions that contained some of his hobby rooms (like the handball court).
The tour was well executed with an audio tape guide. The discussion of Elvis’ life
emphasized his good side, and seemed to ignore the darker side of the process of a person
born and raised in poverty who suddenly becomes very wealthy. They mentioned that the
pressure caused him to become addicted to “prescription drugs.” The only cause of death
mentioned was a heart attack. All in all, however, the tour was well done.
The weather on Thursday varied from gray and dismal to gray, dismal, and wet. As a result, we really didn’t have much we wanted to do in Memphis in the rain, so we headed out to see the Shilo battlefield.
Shilo
For most of our trip so far, we haven’t had much trouble with the accent, but tonight we are in Savannah, TN. In a pizza place for dinner, we encountered small town, southern for the first time. After signing the charge slip for dinner, I took the yellow copy. The clerk said, “you take the waht copy.”
“What,” said I.
“Yes,” she said, “the waht copy.”
“I’m sorry,” I said “which copy do I take.”
“We changed recently – we keep the yellow copy and you take the waht copy.”
That was the easiest of the conversations that we had in the evening. As near as we can figure, the word “Kahnahgitchyawlannythangelse” can best be translated to “Can I get you anything else.” We wound up laughing pretty hard about how little we could understand. Even the waitress and clerk laughed with us.
In any event, we did make it to the Shilo National Military
Park. On Thursday evening we did the visitor’s center thing, and checked out Pittsburg
Landing. On Wednesday morning we did the car tour of the various battle field sites. We
spent most of our time looking at “Fraley’s Field” and the “Sunken Road” (aka "The Hornet's
Nest).
The sunken road was where the Union army held off the
Confederate attacks for eight hours, allowing General Grant to prepare better defenses at
Pittsburg Landing, and also allowed General Buell time to bring his army to Pittsburg Landing
to reinforce Grant.
The defenses at the Sunken Road were finally broken when
Confederate General Ruggles amassed 62 cannons, the largest artillery battery previously
seen in the U.S., and fired up to 3 rounds per second at the Union lines.
(As an aside, Linda encountered a web site address, The Civil War Soldiers and Sailors System that is a computerized database containing very basic facts about servicemen who served on both sides during the Civil War. It looks like this could be a great source if anyone is interested in researching the roll of any person or unit involved in the Civil War, Confederate or Union.)
Nashville
The weather continued to be gray as we toured the battlefield, but it cleared up as we finished our tour. Since the forecast was for rain on Saturday and Sunday, and we wanted to do a volkswalk in Nashville, we decided we should get up there and get the walk in on Friday afternoon. As a result, we skipped the back, scenic roads and took a direct route to Nashville.
People who know me know that one of my philosophies is that it is better to be lucky than smart. As we got into Nashville, we were mostly very lucky. The start of the volkswalk is at a Shoney’s Inn, so we decided that maybe we should just stay there for the weekend. As we registered for the walk we also got a room. It turns out that, unknown to us at the time, part of the NCAA Basketball Tournament was at Nashville, and that rooms were pretty scarce by the time we had finished the walk. We also had some great weather for the walk. The bad luck that we had (as well as anyone reading this) is that the cheap batteries I bought for my camera quit at about the same time that we started the walk (and I forgot to bring extras). As a result I will have to describe the walk rather than show pictures of it. Nashville is a very picturesque city. Much of the walk followed a “green line” walking tour of the city. That is green line painted on the sidewalk that takes the participant by some of the 19th century buildings in the downtown area, “Printer’s Alley” – the original site of the printing industry in Nashville and the site of the Speakeasies during prohibition, the capitol building, and Hermitage Hotel where the sufferagettes lobbied to have Tennessee narrowly approve the women’s vote (the last state necessary for ratification), and the original home of the Grand Ole Opry as well as other sites of interest and beauty.
Off the “green line,” we also went to the Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park, celebrating the bicentennial of the admission of Tennessee as a territory of the United States. The whole park was very nice, but the World War II memorial was outstanding in our eyes. There is a fountain that consists of a 18,000 pound, 6 foot diameter marble sphere etched as a globe of the world. This sits on a base that has water with sufficient pressure to squirt about 6 inches up the globe, but, more importantly, actually supports the weight of the globe. As a result, with enough force to overcome the inertia of the ball, you can change the rotation of the ball. It is one of the nicest fountains that I have seen.
Grand Ole Opry
On Saturday, March 18, we spent nearly the entire day at Opryland, the home of the Grand
Ole Opry. Linda wanted to see the show, so we went out early in hopes that we could get
tickets for the nights show. Here is another example where it paid for us to be lucky. We
had no idea that the show was only presented Friday and Saturday nights, but since we
happened to be there on a Saturday night, that didn’t matter. In any event we did get
tickets for the 6:30 show, then we spent a great deal of time in the Grand Ole Opry Hotel.
I have never seen anything quite like it. It is a huge complex, filled with both lush green
plants and foliage, and clever ways to get the lush green stuff out of our pockets. Much of
the foliage we had not seen since last time we were in Hawaii – things like antherium – and
through all of this, there were water falls and fountains. It was really amazing.
In addition to the foliage and fountains, there were also a myriad of shops and eateries.
One whole section of the hotel is called the Delta, and it is supposedly modeled after New
Orleans. All around the shops and atria, were the rooms – many with balconies that opened
onto all this lushness and opulence. I think I overheard a tour guide (yes, they have guided
tours of just the hotel) quote the rate of the biggest of the penthouse suites at $5000 per
night – somewhat out of our range.
After touring the hotel, we went to the Country Music Hall of Fame for a little while, then we went back to the van and read and napped. Finally, we decided to go to the show a little early, and we got there at about 5:45. As it turns out, they start with a “warmup show” at 6:00. From 6:30 to 7:30, they have the show live on their radio network. From 7:30 to 8:00 they continue the show live on their TV network. Then from 8:00 to 9:00, it goes back to being on the radio network again. All in all, it was a very long night of entertainment. I think Linda enjoyed it more than I did. I liked the Blue Grass and Cajun Music, but the slow, pitiful country music kind of gets to me after awhile. There was one cute (in my opinion) parody – “If my nose was running money I would blow it all on you (but itsnot).” Linda thought that one was gross, and it probably was.
The rain that had been predicted for late Saturday, finally got here in the middle of the night. It rained, mostly very hard, all day Sunday. All we did was to drive up to Louisville, KY in hopes that the weather would clear up for a Volkswalk on Monday. We did drive right past the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln without stopping. What does it say about us that we pass by Lincoln’s birthplace but stop at Elvis’. Actually, it says that the weather was pretty foul.
