Linda's Travel Blog

Chattanooga – After the pleasant 75° temperatures in the Great Smoky Mountains, we weren’t ready for the 100°+ we found in Tennessee.  Luckily, the Camping World RV Park had a swimming pool to cool us because the power was terrible and we had difficulty keeping our air conditioner working.

We found an indoor flea market that had everything you might need for motorcycles and thousands of used VHS tapes.  As my Harley days are behind me and our VHS recorder stopped working years ago;  we found nothing worth taking home.

We enjoyed the short ride up the Incline Railway – 72.7% straight up the one-mile hill to a viewing platform at Lookout Mountain where we could see for miles into the Chattanooga valley below.

We drove into the historic downtown and found the Chattanooga Choo-Choo.  Although we had heard the song since we were kids, we had assumed the Chattanooga Choo-Choo was a specific train.  We learned that on March 5, 1880 the first passenger train leaving Cincinnati, Ohio bound for Chattanooga, Tennessee was nicknamed the “Chattanooga Choo-Choo.  This historic event opened the first major link in public transportation from the North to the South.  The Chattanooga Choo-Choo route was operated by the Cincinnati Southern Railroad, America’s first municipal railway system.

There is, however, a representation of a train locomotive in the Victorian gardens outside the old Union Station depot that is now a hotel.  Also in the same courtyard is an antique New Orleans trolley car.  Mike loves trolley cars as much as he loves trains, so even though it was 105° with a humidity level that made us feel like we were in a sauna, we took the short ride around the track.  The vintage trolley stalled at least 10 times during the 1/2 hour ride and our trolley driver/conductor/brakeman, Wes, had to run to the back and reset the wire repeatedly.  But, Mike loved the hum of the motor, the clang of the trolley bell and the wood interior of the car.

Lynchburg – From Chattanooga we headed northwest to the little town of Lynchburg specifically to tour the Jack Daniels Distillery.  A beautiful visitor center, an informative video, and a private tour with our guide, Chris, on a handicap accessible bus was well worth the time and cost (OK, it was free).

We learned that this is the oldest registered distillery in America and started by Jasper Newton “Jack” Daniel when he was in his teens.  Mr. Jack found Cave Spring in the hollow near his house where the mineral-free water was so good he decided to set up a still to make whiskey and eventually established his distillery in the same spot using the same water source.  His process has been used for over 100 years and the motto is “Every day we make it, we’ll make the best we can”.

We toured the rickyard where 4′x2″ lengths of hard sugar maple are stacked into a ‘rick’ and burned to make the charcoal used to filter the whiskey.  A mash consisting of corn, rye and barley malt is cooked and fermented in huge vats with yeast from a previous batch, similar to the way sourdough bread is made; thereby producing “Sour Mash” whiskey.  The freshly distilled whiskey (140 proof) is slowly filtered through 10 feet of charcoal for mellowing; this is the distinction between bourbon and whiskey.  The whiskey ages for years in new freshly charred white oak barrels.  As the barrels expand and contract with the seasons, the whiskey works in and out of the wood, giving it the dark amber color.  Testers determine when the whiskey is ready for bottling; the barrels in the top of the warehouse where it is warmer mature and mellow faster than the barrels on the colder floor level.

Now that we have had some time to enjoy the smell of the whiskey aging in the casks, we were offered a glass of lemonade!  Lynchburg is in a dry county and although the whiskey can be made here (and most of the people in town are employed by Jack Daniels), it can’t be sold here.  There are a few bottles of special decanters (that means VERY expensive) that are sold at the distillery but we decided we would find a ‘wet’ county to buy our whiskey.

Nashville – Also known as “Music City” and clearly, the focus of the city is on Music-Music-Music.  All the stores, restaurants and honky-tonks have country music playing and you just can’t help tapping your feet as you walk down Broadway.  This is a lively town and the business owners have a strong determination to clean up the damage from the devastating floods of early May 2010.  Thirteen inches of rain fell over a couple of days and many businesses sustained some damage; however, most are still open and providing tourists with southern hospitality.   The huge complex, Opry Mills, that has a hotel, restaurants, shopping, a golf course, the General Jackson Showboat, and the Grand Ole Opry was hard hit with several feet of water and is closed until at least December for repairs.  The beautiful new Schermerhorn Symphony Center sustained $40 million in flood damage and won’t re-open until 2011.

We met up with Casey, a musician and Willie Nelson look-alike while we waited for a sightseeing trolley to show us downtown Nashville.  He gave us a few hints on what to see while we were in Nashville.  Even though Willie recently cut his long hair, Casey says no amount of liquor would get him to cut his!

While on the trolley we learned that Nashville was founded in 1779 by Englishman James Robertson who named the settlement Fort Nashborough.  However, when the French took over the city, the name was changed to the current Nashville.  The main industries in Nashville are 1) medical (there are more hospitals in Nashville than we normally see in a whole state); 2) tourism; 3) printing (mostly bibles); and 4) music.  There are almost as many colleges in downtown Nashville as there are hospitals — 10 colleges and universities.  Two of the most famous women of Nashville are Dolly Parton and Sarah Cannon.  Everyone has heard of Dolly and she has a store on 2nd Avenue.  Sarah Cannon, however, may not be a familiar name to most.  When Sarah and her husband died, their will specified their money was to be used to build a childrens’ cancer research hospital.  The Sarah Cannon Hospital has helped many children and their families in Tennessee; her stage name was Minnie Pearl.  Another generous resident, Dolly Parton, learned that her high school had only 48% of students graduate; she offered $2000 to each student who graduated and the next year the rate went up to 98%.

Our trolley tour took us by Music Row where so many Nashville legends recorded their music, including Hank Williams, Chet Atkins, Willie Nelson, Elvis Presley, Beach Boys, Everly Brothers, Jimi Hendrix and Kenny Chesney to name just a few.  The RCA Victor Recording Company came to Nashville in 1944 and many more companies followed.

We strolled the Music City Walk of Fame with plaques and sidewalk stars of famous songwriters and performers on our way to the County Music Hall of Fame.  This beautiful building has a piano keyboard design across the entire front and thousands of gold records on the walls inside.  The members who have been inducted into the Hall of Fame have plaques placed randomly in the 5300 square foot rotunda.

As Mike isn’t too interested in country music, we took a break from music and toured the Lane Motor Museum with over 150 unique cars including European cars, microcars, amphibious vehicles, alternative fuel cars and one-of-a-kind or prototypes.  All the vehicles are maintained and are kept in running order – definitely not a typical car museum.

We toured the Charlie Daniels Museum as he will be headlining at the Grand Ole Opry we will be attending later in the week.  The small museum was filled with memorabilia from Charlie’s years of performing.

We spent an evening listening to a band and watching line dancing at the Wildhorse Saloon and enjoyed some music at Legends in the Honky Tonk district.

For those that believe that Elvis is buried at Graceland in Memphis, we discovered he is all over Nashville.

We did a drive through Bicentennial Mall Capitol State Park with the giant map of Tennessee in the concrete plaza, the Tennessee World War II Memorial and listened to the 95-bell carillon play the Tennessee Waltz.

Next we drove to Centennial Park, specifically to tour the Parthenon that we had glimpsed during our trolley tour of Nashville.  The Nashville Parthenon is a full-size replica of the Parthenon on Acropolis in Athens, Greece.  This Parthenon was originally constructed as a temporary building for the 1897 Tennessee Centennial.  The city loved it so much that in 1920 the city constructed the popular building with more permanent materials.  The 42-foot high statue of Athena, the goddess of wisdom dominates the center of the Parthenon with Nike, the 6′4″ goddess of victory, stands on Athena’s right hand.  The original Athena and most sculptures have been lost in the rubble of the Parthenon in Greece; however, fragments recovered in the early 1800’s by the British were used to make casts that replicates Athena, Nike and the pediments on the Nashville Parthenon.  This very impressive building represents Nashville as “the Athens of the South”.

On our last evening in town we traveled from our RV park by shuttle bus to the Historic Ryman Theater in downtown Nashville for a performance of the Grand Ole Opry.  The Ryman, built as a church in 1892 with funding by riverboat captain, Thomas Ryman, later became a theater with performances by Caruso, Orson Wells, Sarah Bernhardt and May West among others.  From 1943-1974 it was the home of the Grand Ole Opry.  While the current Grand Ole Opry theater is being repaired from the flood damage, the country’s longest running live radio show is back in the Ryman.  With the announcer, Ed, doing live commercials between each 2-song act, we better understand the radio show that has broadcast since 1925.  It wasn’t as corny as we had expected from our perception of the Grand Ole Opry, even though today’s version of Minnie Pearl and Ray Acuff were at the door shouting “How-deeee” to greet visitors and pose for photos.

The display cases around the walls of the theater had playbills, sheet music and costumes of famous performers.  The seating was hard wooden pews; however, the concession booth sold stadium cushions along with hot dogs, popcorn, candy and soft drinks.  And unlike typical theaters (or churches!), there was also a bar with hard liquor, wine and beer – and they encouraged you to take it back to your seat.  As the announcer said, “it’s okay to take food and drinks into the theater; it’s not okay to spill them”.

The lineup of acts included little Jimmy Dickens, 84 years old and recognized in some of Brad Paisley’s music videos, some very good bluegrass bands, and the only other name I recognized, the Charlie Daniels Band.  The only song I had heard from this band was “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” and both Mike and I thoroughly enjoyed the fiddle playing that Charlie did in this number.

Although the week in Nashville was unbelievably hot with very high humidity and  at least one thunderstorm every day with huge downpours and scary lightning and thunder, we had a great experience.  Thanks, Nashville, for keeping the country’s music alive.

We had one last stop to make before leaving the Nashville area – the famous Loveless Motel and Cafe that has been serving up fried chicken and biscuits from scratch since 1951 in the little house owned by Lon and Annie Loveless at the northern entrance to the Natchez Trace.  This famous cafe has been featured on the Food Network and in USA Today  and Bon Appetit Magazine and visited by Martha Stewart, Conan O’Brien, and Willard Scott.  And, at least today, hundreds of other tourists!  It was 2:30 and we mistakenly thought that the lunch rush would have ended; it was a 2-1/2 hour wait to get seated.  And, that was after we had parked the motorhome five miles away, disconnected the Jeep and drove back to the Cafe (yes, because I insisted!).  Even I have some limits so we drove back to the motorhome, ate our own home cooking, connected the Jeep and started the drive down Highway 100 – the Natchez Trace.

The Natchez Trace has a very long history:  in prehistoric times, mastodons and giant bison carved the original path, then came the first hunters, followed by the Chickasaw and the Choctaw Indian tribes.  The conquistadors arrived, then the trappers, and the Kentucky boatmen who walked home on the Trace after floating their goods down the Mississippi River to New Orleans and selling their goods and the flatboat as it was difficult to maneuver the boat back upriver.  Then came the mail carriers and highwaymen by horse; Andrew Jackson marched his army town the Trace to the Battle of New Orleans.  After the steamboats began running the Mississippi River in 1820, the Natchez Trace was no longer needed.  Over a hundred years later, interest in preserving the Old Trace Road resulted in the National Park Service beginning to build the Natchez Trace Parkway in 1937.  The Natchez Trace Parkway is also designated an All American Roadway; it has all six categories:  archeological, cultural, historic, natural, recreational and scenic.  The Natchez Trace begins at Natchez, Mississippi and ends at Nashville, Tennessee – a total of 444 miles of beautiful scenic two-lane road with blooming dogwood trees, tupolo and oak trees, and beautiful wildflowers including lupin, coreopsis and tiger lilies.  We stopped to take a short walk on the original Trace Trail — more like the original than the paved highway we’ve been traveling.

At Milepost 385 we stopped at the monument to Meriweather Lewis who died at the age of 35 from 2 gunshot wounds at this site, Grinder’s Stand, an inn run by the Grinder family.  His mysterious death in 1809 was ironic as he had fought in the Whiskey Rebellion, explored over 8000 miles of unknown territory with William Clark and the other members of the Corps of Volunteers for Northwestern Discovery (better known as the Lewis and Clark Expedition) and endured political tensions after being appointed as Governor of the Upper Louisiana Territory by President Thomas Jefferson.  The memorial was established in 1848, is a broken column to represent a life cut short.  When the Natchez Trace Parkway was established, this site and a pioneer cemetery of over 100 early settlers, was preserved along the Trace.

We left the Trace to travel to the Memphis area and on the way, found ourselves passing through Shiloh National Park.  We stopped to learn about the Battle of Shiloh and the significance of Pittsburg Landing.  Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and his Army of the Tennessee were camped to wait for Maj. Gen. Buell and his Army of the Ohio; both armies would be needed to sever the rail communications to the Confederate Army.  The 44,000 man Army of the Mississippi under the leadership of Gen. Albert Johnston and later Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard, attacked Grant’s troops on April 6, 1862.  The next day, Buell and reinforcements had arrived and the combined forces of the Army of the Tennessee and Army of the Ohio attacked Beauregard’s Army of the Mississippi who withdrew to Corinth, Mississippi.  The 2-day battle resulted in the loss from both the Union and Confederate sides of 23,746 men killed, wounded or missing. This battle is thought to have played a key role in Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s successful 9-month campaign to capture Vicksburg and control the Mississippi River.

Gen. Grant was quoted as saying, “The Battle of Shiloh or Pittsburg Landing, fought on Sunday and Monday, the 6th and 7th of April, 1862, has been perhaps the less understood, or, to state the case more accurately, more persistently misunderstood than any other engagement during the entire rebellion.”

We arrived at the Hollywood Casino in Tunica, MS to find beautiful RV sites with grass, trees, excellent power (always a plus in very hot weather), full hookups and all for $11 per night!  A great relaxing place to stay just 30 minutes south of Memphis plus a good dinner buffet at the Casino just a very short walk away.

Our first day touring Memphis had to be to Graceland. Although I’ve never been a screaming Elvis fan, as I was just a kid when he first appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1956, I’ve wanted to visit Graceland for a long time.  So, another item checked off on my ‘Bucket List’.  We found Graceland in a rather rundown area of south Memphis and got in line for tickets.  Amazingly, when we lined up for the shuttle bus to drive across the street to Elvis’ home, there was no wait.  A 3-minute ride on the beautiful 13-acre estate and we are standing on the front steps of this National Historic Landmark (designated in 2006).

Our audio headsets enable us to hear Elvis’ voice from old interviews talking about his love Graceland, his parents and his time in the Army.  His daughter, Lisa Marie provided her recollections of living at Graceland, although she was only 4 or 5 when she moved to California with her mother.  We found out that Elvis bought the mansion in 1957 for $100,000 from a family who had named the house and estate after their daughter, Grace.  Elvis moved his parents and grandmother into the mansion and married Priscilla Beaulieu in 1967; Lisa Marie was born in 1968.

The house has 3 floors with the upstairs bedrooms unavailable to tourists.  The main floor and the basement are said to look exactly as they did at the time of Elvis’ death.  The 1970’s quirky decor is evident and not grand by today’s standards.  Elvis had the 1935 house remodeled to fit his lifestyle with a pool room, music room, jungle room, outdoor pool and the meditation garden.

We toured the outdoor buildings, including Elvis’ father’s office, Lisa Marie’s outdoor play yard and the stables.  We found the Hall of Gold to be filled with gold records, album covers and displays of the many movies Elvis starred in along with the costumes he wore.  I was pleased to see that all of Elvis’  jumpsuits on display were from the slim period in his life.

We walked into the meditation garden near the swimming pool and saw the graves of Elvis’ mother, father, grandmother and of course, Elvis.  Difficult to believe he died when he was only 42 years old and in August he would have turned 75!

After our short ride back to the Visitor Center, we spent some time in the car museum.  The turquoise Cadillac in front of the car museum was a good place to trade cameras with other visitors and get our photo taken.

Mike did enjoy the vintage cars including the two Stutz Blackhawks, motorcycles, and tractors and the old gas pumps.  I liked the red MG Elvis drove in the movie, “Blue Hawaii” and the pink Cadillac that was Elvis’ mother, Gladys’ favorite.

Now that my need to visit Graceland has been satisfied, we are ready to move on to downtown Memphis, the City of Blues.  Beale Street is our first stop as we are both hungry and ready for some good Memphis-style BBQ.  The music coming from the Superior BBQ Restaurant caught my attention and we popped in to have a delicious pulled pork BBQ sandwich while listening to an acoustical guitarist sing the blues.  As we walked down the 3 blocks of Beale Street we stopped to hear a street musician entertain the crowds with his trumpet.  It was a hot and quiet day on Beale Street today.

We learned that in the 1850’s Beale Street was a mix of roustabouts loading cotton on the Mississippi steamboats and businessmen with offices near the Cotton Exchange.  By the 1920’s this area became a mecca for musicians, politicians, gamblers and bootleggers; a wild and dangerous area of Memphis.  In the 1960’s the civil rights movements and urban renewal wiped out the bawdy street of sin and today it is a cleaned up tourist-friendly area known for good music and good food.

We got an education in some of the founding fathers of music in Memphis.   W.C. Handy is known as the “Father of the Blues”; Rufus Tucker is called the “Ambassador of Soul”, B.B. King (born Riley B. King in 1925) is “King of the Blues”; and Elvis Presley is simply, “The King” for his contribution of taking his gospel and blues music to a different level and introducing the world to rock and roll.

It was 102° in Memphis and a ride on the Mississippi River seemed like a good idea; however, by the time we walked the 4 or 5 blocks to the river and pushed Mike the last 200 feet over the cobblestones to the loading dock, we looked like we needed to jump in the Muddy Miss to cool down.  Some of the riverboat staff ran up the hill to help and promised a smoother return trip (and they did open up another ramp that kept us off the cobblestones).  We boarded the Island Queen in the Port of Memphis and settled into the air conditioned room with tall drinks to watch downtown Memphis, Mud Island, and the expensive homes on the bluffs drift by.

We had just enough time after leaving the riverboat to walk the 4 or 5 blocks back up to the very old and dignified Peabody Hotel.  Like all of today’s visitors to Beale Street, we gathered in the lobby of this beautiful 4-star landmark hotel (rooms $260-2500/night) to watch the 5 ducks leave the fountain, shake off the drops of water on spectators and waddle down the red carpet to a John Philip Souza march.  We felt a little silly crowding in the lobby and upstairs gallery for 1/2 hour to watch 5 ducks walk 20 feet to the elevator and their penthouse suite for the evening.  It is a tradition that has been happening for many years and we did our best to support that tradition.

We then make our way back to B.B. King’s for a close seat to the stage for the blues band that will start soon.  We spent a fun hour listening to some good music, some fair jokes and stories from the singer/harmonica player, and enjoying a cool drink before leaving the area.  Tonight the motorcycles roared into town for a street show and shine – Beale Street is anything but quiet tonight.

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