Blogs from Memphis, Tennessee, United States, North America - page 22

Our Memphis location is at the Tom Sawyer RV Park, on the Arkansas side of the Mississippi River across from Memphis. Our campsite is literally on the banks of the well-nick named 'Big Muddy." It's both! There is considerable commercial shipping traffic. The Park's promo is right on - we are 10 minutes from Downtown Memphis and Beale Street. Beale St. is like an on-going festival area and is closed to traffic. The atmosphere, music, food, people watching, and plain old fun exceeded expectations. On our first Beale St. night, we sampled three groups - two at clubs (one with no cover charge) and one in a pubic park. We could hardly believe how many people had gathered on a Monday night - WOW what is this place like on the weekend. Dinner (ribs, chicken, ... read more

MEMPHIS! I love this place so much--and this time it's not snowing (though I still brought inappropriate shoes with no option for safer wear)! We got into town and checked into our West Memphis, Arkansas, Days Inn hotel (a real classy place) and then went straight to Beale Street. After finding parking and an ATM, I was in dire straits to get some catfish in me so, naturally, we headed a few blocks down to Alfred's. The catfish was amazing, and I got to see the Same Ol' 2 Step Band w/Lil' Guyland for a half hour or so. Although the band isn't the most energetic, there was the same little kid playing the squeeze box, which I'm impressed by. Maybe I'm just uneducated, but a six? seven? year old kid playing an accordion THAT well ... read more

WEDNESDAY 1/3/07 NASHVILLE to MEMPHIS We visited the Parthenon in Nashville first thing this a.m. It is a full-scale replica of the original Parthenon in Athens. Created with exacting attention to detail, the massive building was originally built in 1897 as the centerpiece for Tennessee’s Centennial Expo. Today it houses a permanent 20th century American art exhibit, gallery space for temporary exhibits and a massive 42-foot gold sculpture of Athena. Then off on Rt 40 W to Memphis. Great lunch at Cajun Catfish Company on the way into town. Memphis has a nice small trolley system, and we rode the Main Street Trolley to the Civil Rights Museum. It’s located in the old Lorraine Motel where many black civil rights leaders stayed when visiting Memphis, the same place where MLK was shot. We didn’t know this ... read more

Well, I'm glad to say that Russ and I are back on the road again. Woohoo! We spent 2 great weeks in Ohio, the time to rest and catch up on things as well as brain storm where our next pit stop would be was definitely appreciated. Our vehicle was returned to us on the 28th November so we went out that night with Jose's friends to celebrate which put our departure day back to the 30th after having too big a night. I think it was just part of Jose's plot to get us to stay a bit longer :) On Thursday we went back to the transmission place and had them check that the transmission wasn't leaking fluid and to disconnect our drive shaft and with an Adios Amigos we farewelled Jose' to head ... read more

Ok, so I went to Tennessee for a funeral (which was funny in a cynical way), but since I had a day to kill between the funeral and going home, my dad and I spent a delightful day in Memphis. At first, we only found the bad parts of town that reminded us of Flint and we were disappointed. I thought that maybe there wasn't much to Memphis, and we decided that we should at least drive by Graceland. It's a big white house. I'm glad we didn't pay to go in, but it was cool to see. The best part of the trip was definitely Beale Street--the center of Memphis Blues, bars, and apparently of goats as well. Dad and I were wandering around to see what there was on Beale Street, and we saw ... read more