Elvis is King and Country Music is Everywhere!!!

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OK, I am writing this in August and this trip actually took place in January, but I just started this blog and this seemed like a worthwhile and memorable trip to include.

Ian and I were in Nashville for 6 days. I found out I was going for a work convention and Ian decided to join me and make the most out of "work" as there was plenty of downtime scheduled for us to explore!

We arrived on Friday night, Jan 6th. The flight was nice, we were on smaller planes than either of us had ever flown on before, but we were comfortable, and with just two seats on each side of the aisle we could snooze and lounge without worrying about drooling on a neighbor. We had a short stop-over in Cincinatti, just long enough to get a snack and look around in the bookstore.

Once we arrived at the Nashville airport, we located the shuttle to bring us to the Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center which was our home for the week. We found out the shuttles run back and forth throughout the day and they also have shuttles from the hotel to the downtown area and to the huge Opry Mills Mall next door. Even though the mall was next door to the hotel, the hotel was so huge it was over a 1/2 mile walk from the far entrance of the hotel! Downtown, however, was several miles, and pretty much unwalkable.

Opryland was just amazing! I have never seen a hotel like this, it was kind of like an amusement park without the rides. Inside there were bridges and gardens, countless restaurants and shops. Apparently they do huge Christmas celebrations, and since it was so close to the holidays, many of their decorations were still up. They included huge floating snowmen, animals playing instruments, and amazing lights and trees. It truly was a wonderland. Once we settled into our room, which was a pretty standard - 2 double-bed, couch and cable t.v. we decided to find something to eat. We were tired, so decided to stay in the hotel and ate at Rusty's Sports Bar and Grill and have a celebratory Grey Goose & Tonic (for Jasmine) and beer (for Ian). Later that night, we went to the Jack Daniel saloon, were we enjoyed a local country music band - even getting up to dance!! And probably having too many drinks for the first night of a conference!

The weekend took us downtown a couple of times via the shutttle (we bought a three day pass, which we took full advantage of). The shuttle to the mall was free, but we sometimes walked there, depending on the weather. We enjoyed a show at the Grand Ole Opry, and at the original location, no less, Ryman Auditorium. It was beautiful, but a little uncomfortable as all the seats were wooden benches, not too unlike pews. It was a three hour show broken up into half hour acts with advertisements in between, as it is still broadcasted on radio and t.v. Many of the acts we loved including a song called "Water" and the Del McCoury Band. A couple of the acts were a little over the top, including a man singing "Rub it in, Rub it in" wearing tight Gap jeans. Before the show we got a drink in a little bar called Legends, where we listened to more live, local country music. Ian got a beer and I got a bright blue drink called the Honkey-Tonk Lemonade, which was recommended by Rachael Ray in her $40 a day book, which I have and love...

We had dinner at a buffet restaurant in the hotel called Rachel's, which was delicious!! Buffet's can be iffy, but this one had so many options, and they were fresh and tasty! We were stuffed when we left and we had to run to catch the shuttle!! Yikes!

Monday and Tuesday were my two busiest conference days - so Ian made the most of his time by catching up on zzz's and visiting one of his favorite places - the Gibson Showcase!! This store is amazing for guitarists - walls and walls of fabulous gibson guitars!

One night we had dinner at a restaurant called the Aquarium (this might be a chain, but we certainly don't have them in our next of the woods.) Basically, the walls were made of tanks filled with tropical fish and other sea creatures. I have to admit I felt a little bad eating my grilled shrimp watching all the water-life around me. I think Ian stuck to a burger that day...

Another night found us downtown sampling more of the bars/music scene. We even visited a Coyote Ugly...it was fun, but we didn't stay long. We much prefered the vibe at the BB King Blues Club, which turned out to be one of our fave places the whole trip. Inside the decor was bright colors, paintings of many great musicians including Bob Dylan, BB King, Jimi Hendrix, and so many more. They had a fabulous band with so much energy playing a lot of blues and motown type stuff. A nice break from the country, I have to admit. The one bad thing, we service was slow for us, and they may have been because we were just drinking cheap beer, rather than having a full meal. There were even staff manning the restrooms, turning on the water for you, giving you towels, etc. There was a full array of toiletries if needed including lotions, perfumes, deodarants, moisturizers, etc. I did feel a little taken back by the service and had to remember to bring tipping money in with me.....

Our one scary experience was seeing a drunk homeless man getting arrested. It was about 11 p.m. and we were waiting for the shuttle to bring us back to the hotel, when we heard loud crashes down the street. This man was knocking over signs, trash cans and anything else that would bang. There was a large group of people waiting with us, which made us feel slightly safer - and he came along harassing everyone to give him a cigarette. Of course there were a couple of machos that kind of provoked him instead of just ignoring him. Eventually, a cop car came and put him in the car, but the weird thing was at least 5 more cop cars came just for this one man!! I think they were just bored. He couldn't have been considered too much of a threat because we saw him walking around town the next day, as well as almost every other time we were in town. The first time we saw him, I had been carrying an orange soda, and I heard him start talking about how good it looked and how he wished he could have it.

Another day, we spent the day going to shops trying on cowboy boots and hats and other western apparel. We had a hoot! But except for the super touristy stuff most of it was a little out of our price range. I settled for a bunch of cool postcards for my scrapbook. We also visited Gruhn Guitars, which is supposedly another pretty legendary music shop. It was neat, but we found it surprisingly tiny. I guess loads of stars have bought guitars there, though, so it was great to see.

One of our last days, we visited Tootsie's Orchid Lounge, a purple little bar, that apparently has seen almost all the greats that have seen their way through Nashville including Neil Young and Johnny Cash. Apparently they have live music all day and all night till closing. We saw a great band and stayed for a few beers and songs (even though it was only about noon). Although the history of the place and the music was fab, we thought it was horrifyingly dirty and the waitresses were snobby..but eh, for some people maybe that's part of the charm?? It was featured in the book 1,000 Places to See Before you Die, which is partly why I had wanted to go there. We followed our breakfast beer with lunch at the Hard Rock, which we pretty much had to ourselves. This particular Hard Rock was really neat, with lots of little rooms with only a few tables, giving it a more intimate atmosphere than some...We saw Eddie Vedders leather coat (my fave rock star) and Frank Black's guitar (Ian's fave - or one of them anyway).

Another of our fave memories, was one of the last nights there, we went swimming in the hotel - first in the huge indoor pool, then we were outside in the heated pool and hottub! It was just decadent sitting in the hot tub under the stars on a beautiful night in January!! Unfortunately I ruined my fave swimsuit because the tub was made of the rough rocks inside and as I was getting out, I rubbed my back against the stone, pretty much shredding my suit....oops! At least it was our last night there. For dinner afterwards, we went to a 50's style diner and had the old fashioned milk shakes and fries...yummy!

I am sure I am leaving out a lot, and am purposely leaving out all work-related stuff because in my down-time we tried to make it as vacationy as possible - but that is a brief summary of some of our favorite moments...

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