Memphis Trip Report - late April

Just spent the day in Memphis as part of a cross country trip. Stayed at the Days Inn Graceland which lives up to every good review you will read, at a very affordable price. The pool was empty but still fun to photograph, but the hotel was very safe feeling and the staff friendly.

We headed into the city with a list of things we might like, but were still basically winging it. Parked the car by the Mississippi River, near the river boats, and walked to Beale Street.

We walked up Beale Street which was awesome. They had a Corvette car show which closed down the whole street. The Corvettes weren't just some toys the owners had picked up, as most of them were show cars that had been modified and arrived with trophies, lights and high heeled girls.

We walked up to Sun Studios where Elvis, Johnny Cash, and Jerry Lee Lewis, to name a few, all recorded albums. It was really cool to check out. We didn’t do the tour but it was fun to see the vinyls. As it was Saturday most of Memphis was closed, which was a recurring theme at some of the attractions (Rock of Soul museum was booked in the evening for an event, the top of Peabody was booked, and the factory workers weren’t at Gibson.)

After that we got some lunch at Dyers which was a soda-jerky type place, burgers and shakes. The food was amazing, the interesting part was they had a full bar which we then decided they must hand out liquor licenses like Halloween candy around here. While we are on that topic we also noticed that there must not been any open container law in Memphis because people were walking down the street drinking.

After lunch we went to the Gibson guitar factory and took the tour. It was pretty interesting but the plant was closed so we didn’t see anyone making guitars. The best part was the tour guide who was exactly what you would expect, an unusual guy who likes guitars and makes weird jokes.

We had about two hours to kill so we decided it was coffee time and find a place to sit down, so we did. After that we went to the Peabody to have a beer and wait for the ducks to walk down the red carpet. We snagged a spot near the jewelry cases as they go into the elevator. The whole production was worth the wait as the Duckmaster was very entertaining…and the ducks put on a little show of their own.

For dinner we went to Rendezvous which the place everyone says you need to check out. It was awesome. Memphis style barbeque and they serve the ribs dry which was interesting but really good. The weirdest part about this place is we think the owner must hire people on the streets to bring you there because over the course of the day at least three people came up to us and tried to bring us there. If we were in Boston we would have snubbed them and ran the other way, just not in our culture to have street people chatting us up.

After dinner we went for a nightcap at the Flying Saucer (a draft beer emporium, also recommended). We had some different beers from around the country (we though that was fitting). Nice place. It is a smoking bar, but it didn’t bother me at all.

After a cab ride back to the car (yes it was still there) and a short drive we ended up back at the hotel for the night. On the ride back to the hotel we listened to the Sox and they were winning, we decided that XM radio is one of the best inventions ever. Driving cross country with a standard FM radio would be unthinkable. Today we go to Graceland, but you can read everyone else’s post on how great it is going to be!

If you would like the address to the travel blog just shoot me and email at luckyculver@gmail.com..... And hopefully I’ll have enough wireless access to keep posting here!

Culver