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Published: April 5th 2008
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Birmingham to Nashville
Crossing from Florida to Alabama we picked up giant Gulf shrimp and other goodies at Shrimpy’s, a wonderful fresh fish market near Santa Rosa Beach. It was miles and miles before we caught I-65. Love being off the interstate. We passed incredibly simple homesteads all ablaze (just about gaudy) with gorgeous azalea and wisteria. Wisteria climbs almost 20 ft up trees and grows wild along the county roads Alabama. Using our Magellan, we found Oak Mountain State Park near Birmingham and set up camp. This is Alabama’s largest State Park and even has boarding for horses and bridel trails, a golf course, lake that accommodates power boats, trails, and more. Oak Mountain State Park is the southernmost part of the Appalachian chain. We had to skip the scenic ride to the top of Double Oak Mountain as it was in the clouds. State park camping while on the road is new to us and we like it - less expensive than the private RV resorts and amenities that we appreciate. We passed Birmingham via I65 - It looks like a fine town - we passed a church that will have a Lebanese cultural festival on the weekend
- Love local events - especially ethnic festivals and wished we could linger! I-65 from Birmingham to Nashville is very pretty - we were expecting to see redbuds in bloom in Kentucky, but they are all along the road in Alabama. Delicate light reddish purple blossoms clinging close to the distinctive almost black bark.
We’re in barbeque country and stopped for lunch in Athens, Alabama for ribs and pulled pork at Lawler’s - great food! On to Nashville and Nashville Country RV Park.
It was pretty wet the whole time we were in Nashville, but cities don't need bright sunshine. We visited three museums. The Frist Fine Arts Center had a wonderful Monet to Dali Show, a very dramatic show of the needle work of Angelo Filomeno, an Italian who now is a costume designer for Broadway shows, and one of the neatest, most creative Children's Centers we have ever seen. The Country Music Hall of Fame museum had a great little Marty Roberts exhibit and a huge exhibit on the Williams family. We had enjoyed this museum before - one thing we wish we had more time for is a video on the third floor showing the
history of contry music on TV - very fun! The Hermitage, Andrew Jackson's home, presented some serious issues. "Old Hickory," while interesting, was a scoundrel. He owned 150 slaves and had a generally brutal attitude toward Native Americans. To say something nice, he loved horses and was very loving and loyal to his wife AND he had a gracious home in the middle of what must have been nowhere. In his day he was either beloved or despised! There are very knowledgable docents at The Hermitage. The female guides must be either single, divorced, or widows! It is a tradition. Married women need not apply. Fine with me!
Grand Ole Opry is a must do in Nashville. The one hour backstage tour was very interesting. While we were there for a show on Friday night, Kenny Chesney made an appearance as did Terri Clark (our daughter had to tell us who they were). One of the hits for us was when the Del McCoury Band performed Rocky Top! GOO is set in a huge resort/entertainment/ entertailMALL / restaurant/ shopping complex. We had dinner in a restaurant with an aquarium in the center. The food was great. We had been
to a similar aquarium/restaurant at Epcot and would love to take little kids to dinner in this sort of place some time.
Downtown Nashville holds more charm for us. We had a fun lunch at the Wildhorse Saloon on 2nd Ave. where we watched a high school field trip group and others including families with cute little kids line dancing on the huge dance floor. We sampled a Nashville traditional food - deep fried dill pickles with ranch dressing. Interesting! Our favorite food is at the very unfancy, but wondeful, Jack's on Broadway. Some of our favorite lower Broadway clubs include Tootsies, Legends, Blue Grass Inn and The Stage. We just love walking down the street and being drawn into one of these and other clubs as the music becons us in. But, it was here that we had a virtual "run-in" with a giant off-shore based corporate conglomerate. This giant steel company "bought" our favorite side of the street and all of its clubs from 6-9 on Thursday night. They put up catering tents on the side street and alley, and all of our favorite clubs were closed for a private party - A WHOLE SIDE OF THE
STREET! There was a bouncer and volunteer women in matching logoed sweatshirts at each doorway "sanitizing" the clubs by keeping us un-wrist banded music lovers out. We grumbled, "If meeting planners want such sterile environments go to Disney!" What the honored guests were missing, of course, is that part of the real fun of these clubs is the interaction of diverse audiences. So the guests were left to "party on" in the safety of each other. The real irony, is that the corporate guests were all fashonably late, and great bands were playing to NO AUDIENCE for much of the time! What a waste. This all sounds a little whiney, truth is - we had a great time anyway.
Fueled by a great country breakfast - biscuits, gravy, etc. near the RV Park, we headed out toward Lexington. I have to look for a camera shop as my rechargable SONY battery is kaput!
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