Blogs from Mississippi, United States, North America - page 11

Wednesday-August 22, 2012 Day 1 of our 5 day Great Race to Rewards (Harrah's summer promotion) trip found us leaving home at 7:00 A.M. and headed to Tunica, MS by way of Effingham, IL and Memphis, TN. We decided not to stop at Lambert's in Sikeston to be pelted by those delicious "throwed" rolls, but opted instead to enjoy that deep fried hamburger and side of fries at Dyer's on Beale Street in Memphis. So good! We arrived in Tunica around 3:00. We visited Harrah's, Fitzgerald, and Hollywood before checking into the Roadhouse for the first of our comped nights.... read more

It only gets better......our travels took us to the Mississippi River at Memphis. We took a paddle boat ride on the Island Queen which was very nice. It even went into Arkansas. It was a horrible place to get to, though. Cory had to drive our car onto a very steep slope of cobblestones to park. I almost fell down into the river going down the embankment. From there, we hopped a trolly to Beale St. in Memphis. It was just like the festive street in Nashville we visited coming down. We stopped at a couple bars and a park to listen to the Blue's singers & bands...excellent! Next stop: Tunica, Mississippi to hit the casinos, again. This time we stayed at the Hollywood Hotel & Casino. And again, they compt'd our room. What a way ... read more

Reluctantly, we left Winter Park, by far our most comfortable stop, both in terms of the weather and luxurious accommodations, and descended the mountains heading east. To give Adina a feel of Colorado's biggest city, we stopped for a walk through Confluence Park and Denver's downtown area before picking up a late morning meal and continuing on our way. Our forthcoming plans were entirely up in the air. Originally we had thought we would attempt to drive to Oklahoma City on this day, but our unanticipated time in Denver put OKC beyond our reach. Instead we drove all day across the parched Great Plains of eastern Colorado and Kansas and called it a night at a motel in Wichita. I'll just say, driving on the interstate in Kansas was frightening. You couldn't help but notice there ... read more

Any drive along the Gulf Coast is sure to be beautiful, but I enjoy the one from Pensacola to Biloxi especially. Unlike the boring corridor of mostly pines east towards Tallahassee, this stretch of I-10 leads across the westernmost edge of Florida, through Alabama's coast, and into the lowlands of Mississippi. I have driven it there and back twice per weekend for the past month as Damon's been in tech school there. My favorite part is just as you cross into MS, the swaying grass stretches out to the ocean and a narrow inlet winds like a stream through the reeds.... read more

The place is almost like a ghost town. Driving up Highway 49 is a drive back through time. It may not be what it looked like in its heyday. But a movie would set it up like this to show a scene of a time gone by. Plantation fields dominate the area. The Mississippi was a place many African Americans saw as a promise land. A place to work and earn enough money to buy a plot themselves to work on. That time didn’t happen with many working on plantations. Working on cotton fields. It is a different part of America. Slushy looking still, the swampland was perfect for growing cotton. This is where the blues began. It’s hard sometimes that a music genera I like came from hard slave labour but its true. The weather ... read more