Tennessee Trip Part 5

Day 8: Gaitlinburg to Bedford

Pancake House! Decided on the Log Cabin Pancake House because I could walk to it from the hotel, and they had a lot of pancake variety. Surprising myself, I ended up ordering plain old ordinary buttermilk pancakes with a side of sausage. And ordinary they were, but that was quite alright. An ordinary pancake is practically unrivaled in deliciousness.

The drive out through Pigeon Forge was worse than the drive in, so I was extremely relieved to finally hit the interstate. Just a three hour drive to Bedford, so way shorter than any other trip I'd made so far. Actually fit one more BBQ sandwich into my trip when I stopped at Sheetz for lunch. This was trashy BBQ on a sub roll, drenched in sauce with a cole slaw smear. I liked it. I wouldn't put it in a category with any of the other sandwiches I'd eaten, but I'd eat it again.

Rolling into Bedford. I don't remember anything about this place other than the Peaks, but I certainly don't remember a Wal-Mart, any chain restaurants, any semblance of life in the area really. So, a few changes. But I headed straight up to the Peaks Lodge just to check it out.

You know, it's a pretty stupid thing to do when you're trying to avoid thinking about how old you are, to go revisit a place you haven't been in twenty years, chasing nostalgia. The Peaks area looks pretty much exactly the same, though the inside of the Lodge check-in area and restaurant had changed considerably.

Pretty much it for that day.

Day 9: Heading Home

Rough night of sleep. It was so freakin' hot in the room, and the buttons on the air conditioner just did not seem to be working. Laid there all night just trying to get over it, until about 5 in the morning it occurred to me to unplug the thing and see if that jolted the buttons into use. It did. Probably should have tried that a lot earlier. One of the main reasons I decided to stop in Bedford was the Peaks Of Otter Lodge Sunday Breakfast Buffet, which was one of my favorite things on Earth when I was a lot younger. But, tired as I was, there was just no way I was getting myself together in time to make that, so I skipped it and opted for the free waffle that came with my room. Oh well.

The other thing I wanted to do while I was there, again, idiotically chasing nostalgia, was take the hike up to the Johnson Farm that my family made a million times.

Man that hike seems a lot shorter now. It used to seem like the most arduous thing, but this time I was pretty much up and back in 45 minutes. Not even the length of Ys. (Soundtracking again, and once again perfect.)

Heading out, stopped at a gas station to fill up and ended up leaving with some ENORMOUS apples from the local orchard that were incredibly cheap compared to any grocery store. Amazing how much good stuff actually costs when there's no transport fees involved.

That's pretty much it. On the way home I stopped in Charlottesville for a sweet burger at Riverside Lunch and peanut butter/chocolate frozen custard from Kohr Bros. Awesome. Perhaps the greatest of frozen dessert concoctions. I kind of like Charlottesville. Great way to end it. Within an hour and a half after that I was home doing laundry, watching the Redskins lose, and dreading having to go to work the next day. The end.

Tennessee Trip Part 4

Day 6: Leaving Memphis

Sweet Potato Pancakes again this morning. Second time, just as good. Straight from there I hit the highway heading to Gaitlinburg. Drive was terrible. First, those fucking trucks. They love to get next to each other on a two-lane highway and see how even they can keep their speed. Then between Nashville and Knoxville it poured rain, so that slowed me down. Soooooooo ready to get out of the car.

This is sort of how things go. Between the interstate and the Smokies, there's three areas. Sevierville, Pigeon Forge, and Gaitlinburg. When I was choosing a place to stay, I was leaning towards Pigeon Forge or Gaitlinburg, Sevierville was just too far away. Pigeon Forge had a few places that would have been a better deal, but Gaitlinburg was so much closer to the Smokies that I had to pick that.

Thank. God.

Sevierville is indistinct. A bunch of strip malls and gas stations, progressively more souvenir shops as you move towards the mountains. Pigeon Forge is retarded. All I knew about Pigeon Forge was that it was home to the Dollywood amusement park. But Pigeon Forge is basically five miles of one road that is ALL amusement park, lit up like an arcade, crowded as an Indian market. Why on Earth is this place so crowded? Is it all for Dollywood? I had no idea, didn't care to know, I just wanted to get through it, and it took forever. Driving through, I noticed that people were setting up chairs on the side of the road, pointed at the road, and just sitting there talking to each other and staring. I could not understand why. And this was always the case. When I first came through it was the middle of the day, they were there. Had to go in later because it had the only grocery store I could find. They were out then too. Didn't go back in until I left two days later, but they were there then too. I was thinking, “Does Dollywood put on periodic fireworks displays throughout the day? Is something incredible going to happen on the skyline here soon? Or do these people just travel to Pigeon Forge to sit on the side of the road and watch other people travel to Pigeon Forge?” (I found out later that there was a car show going on, which I assume was Forge-wide. I guess that explains it? Kind of? Not really.) I was really scared that Gaitlinburg was going to be the same way.

About a six mile stretch between where Pigeon Forge traffic ends and Gaitlinburg becomes recognizable. Gaitlinburg is no small mountain entryway, it's definitely a resort town with plenty of tourist traps. It kind of reminded me of the Canada side of Niagara Falls. A lot. A bunch of Ripley's museums, famous car displays, stores full of crap that nobody wants but buys because it says Gaitlinburg on it. Anything to take your money. So, it was busy, lots of people always walking around and crossing the street with total disregard for moving cars. (Look, I understand that cars are supposed to stop at the crosswalks for them to cross in this town, but to just jump out into the middle of the street without so much as glancing to see if a car's on the way is still dumb.) But a MILLION times better than Pigeon Forge. (Though from what I understand if you want to go to the Smokies without any of those distractions, you stay in Townsend. I couldn't find any open rooms in Townsend, and didn't get a chance to check it out, but if I went back I would try for that.)

This hotel was kind of a funky place and I pretty much loved it. It feels old. Not mountain old, but architecturally outdated. Loved it. It's been so long since I've been in any kind of lodging that was not based around corridors, either on the inside or outside, where you enter the room from a hallway or balcony and have windows on the opposite side of the room. The room I had in this place, the windows faced the center of the hotel.

I know that's not a really rare thing, but it was such a change for me that it made me giggly. Entering the room, another oddity I encountered, most rooms I've stayed in have the main bedroom which goes into a sink area and then is separated by a door to the toilet/shower. This one had no separation between the shower and the sink, and seemed wide open to the bedroom. I actually didn't notice until the second day that there indeed was a door between the sink area and the bedroom, and I spent that day thinking it would be extremely awkward to be staying there with anybody. But yeah, there was a door. I'm an idiot. That's how distracted I was I guess. No coffee maker in the room, that was a disappointment. Especially since every description I read, from hotels.com to the hotel's own website, advertised a coffee maker. I got to have my decaf before bed or I'm incomplete!

Kept the BBQ train going by stopping in at a nearby place called Bennett's and getting a sandwich. Meat was good but unremarkable, but I really loved that they put it on garlic bread. That was very tasty. More sandwiches should be put on garlic bread.

Oh yeah, this was my birthday. Didn't think about it much. Mission accomplished. But I went and got some ice cream to have my own mini-treat. Blue Bell Snickerdoodle. It was really good. Ate that while catching up on Sons Of Anarchy and went to bed.

Day 7: Smokies Day

They love pancakes in this area. Like, combine the amount of Wal-Marts and McDonalds that are in our area, and that probably comes close to the number of pancake houses between Pigeon Forge and Gaitlinburg. But my room came with a free breakfast buffet, so I thought I'd give it a shot. Well, it's about as good as you'd expect from a free breakfast buffet. French toast sticks, eggs, bagels, bread, stuff that could be made en masse and wouldn't wither under heat lamps. A couple things I actually liked. The gravy on top of biscuits was good. And for some reason I have never gotten bad bacon on a breakfast buffet. It always a great compromise of crisp, firm, and chewy. Nevertheless, I decided the next day, I'd hit a pancake house.

Heading to the Smokies to take a hike. I wanted one that was going to keep me occupied for a while, moderately taxing, but most of all offering scenery. From the descriptions I'd read, the hike to Charlie's Bunion fit the bill. About 8 miles round trip, high elevation, and opportunity to touch rocks.

First was a drive to Newfound Gap. Starting to realize that any time I get in the car in this area, I'm going to be irritated. The problem here is that it's a very winding road going up the mountain, obviously, and there are people with trailers driving up there, I guess heading to campsites or something, and despite signs that say, “Slow Traffic Move Over And Let Other People FUCKING PASS YOU” I guess nobody considers themselves that slow. Maybe if they realized they're towing loads and it's slowing them down, but I think they're just trying to look over the side of the mountain. While driving. Jackasses. An extremely long 8 mile drive up the mountain.

All redeemed as soon as I stepped out of the car. When I got in the car at the hotel, I think about 9 in the morning, it was already muggy and warm out. Stepping out at Newfound Gap, I would say it was in the low 60s, overcast, breezy, absolutely the most gorgeous air I've felt since early last spring. It was almost shocking to get out of the car and feel that, just hadn't anticipated it. Very thankful I had thought to bring a flannel in my backpack. Made me so comfortable. So, off I go a-hiking. I had brought my mom's camera on the trip to take whatever pictures I could come up with, but this was out of control. A mountain is such an expansive thing, the way I imagine it, I would expect that you get a picture of one view, that's going to be the view for a while. Didn't seem like the case here. Every time I would pass one tree or make a slight turn, it felt like I was getting a whole new perspective on the scenery. The amount of pictures I felt like I had to take was getting ridiculous and eventually I realized I was going to have to change my goal from getting great pictures to just getting enough pictures to remind me of the experience later, or else I was never going to complete this hike.

Just beautiful. Enhancing the feeling was that I chose Ys to soundtrack it. I swear to God, that album just takes any great experience and amplifies it immeasurably. One of the overwhelming thoughts in my head at the time was that I'm really not sure why I ever try to find new music when this album is sitting there available for me to just listen to forever as many times as I can fit in. But the trek was longer than the album, next logical step was to go to Have One On Me for the remainder. And I realized that was probably the first time I've given that album a real concentrated listen. And now I plan on giving it a lot more listens, because it's remarkable.

The hike to it was a real delight, and the Bunion was a lot of fun. The hike feels like you're walking on this shelf that's attached to the side of the mountain. A lot of being able to look right off the edge on a downward slope. Not trying to suggest a straight drop down, but if you jumped off and hit that slope with some velocity you'd slide for a while and have a hard time trudging back to the trail. Lots of fun, very green and shaded. Then the Bunion is like a culmination, because you suddenly hit an open area and bare rock.

And what do you do with bare rock? You climb on it. And it reaches out over that slope, so it's a little thrilling. You have to watch your grip, and of course you naturally want to know just how far out you can go before the whole thing drops out. It doesn't, you can pretty much go out as it goes out and down, and eventually you have to stop yourself and realize you better go back before you're stuck. Especially when there's no one there to insist you're going too far.

And here's some smoke:

And that was sort of it. That fulfilled all my plans for the trip. But I still had two days left. First, went back down the mountain and straight to Corky's BBQ for my last sandwich of the trip. Corky's is a chain now that started in Memphis. They also apparently sell frozen ribs in supermarkets. Sandwich was pretty good, the star here was the sweet potato fries. First or second best I've ever had. So hard to get sweet potato fries the way I like them. Normally when I get them they are soggy and pretty greasy. These were crisp. Just like regular fries, but made with sweet potatoes, which is exactly how I love them. Only ones I've had to compete with them, oddly enough, I got at a greek restaurant in Lewiston, NY with a Beef on Weck. I might give those the slight edge. Didn't do much with the rest of this of this day. Walked the length of the tourist area of Gaitlinburg and went back to the hotel to make plans for the next day. I decided to split the trip home in half by stopping in Bedford, VA, closest town to Peaks Of Otter where I spent a lot of vacations as a kid.

Tennessee Trip Part 3

Day 4: Graceland Day

Back to the Arcade. This time I got the Eggs Redneck. I'm not sure why the eggs are in the name, the star of the show is definitely the sausage on biscuits with gravy. Oh man, I can feel my blood stopping. Very very good. Very very good going down, but found out a little later, doesn't make a stomach, or at least my stomach, so happy.

On to Graceland. Pretty much in all stages of planning, I assumed I was going to be giving Graceland an entire day. I hadn't been able to fit Stax in the day before, so I thought I'd get to that too if I had time, but I wasn't counting on it. It was kind of hard to tell from the descriptions I'd read to tell how much was involved in a visit, and how much time it would take, but I just assumed I would want to stretch it out.

I think I got there about 10, and as you pull in, first thing you see is the tail of the Lisa Marie, with a giant TCB symbol on it.

I'm in love already. Already a crowd when I arrived. Man, this is a Tuesday, so pretty much all the tourists were blue-hairs coming to relive their youth. They're kind of impatient if you get in their way and aren't moving quick enough for them. That's right, I wasn't moving quick enough for the elderly. I'm trying to soak it in here people! So you buy your ticket (unfortunately, it was about this time I found out what Eggs Redneck does to my digestive system. Went and spent a good 15 minutes indisposed, almost thought I'd miss all the buses) and proceed to get on a shuttle bus that takes you across the street, through the gates, and up to the house. Another audio tour. How was this one going to be? This one was going to be AWESOME. Redeemed the concept for me. Every audio track was of a length that easily fit into the time you needed to check out every room, so you never felt like you were skipping something or missing part of what you paid for. And, oh man, there was so much to take in. Just to be inside those walls. To think, “This is where Elvis took naps and acted lazy. (Although you don't get to go upstairs.) This stuff is what he thought was cool.” And the house just feels like another world compared to any home I've ever been in. Despite being an enormous mansion, a lot of the rooms have low ceilings and very little light in them. And some crazy accents. A room where the floors, walls, and ceilings all share the same carpet.

Sure, why the hell not Elvis?! I can't think of a good reason not to. I think my favorite part was the basement, with the TV room and billiard room.

Then out of the basement into the infamous Jungle Room.

The buildings outside of the mansion have mostly been converted into houses for collections of memorabilia rather than keeping them original to how Elvis would have used them. My favorite of those was what used to be a racquetball court. You walk into the building and it's like a room for entertaining. A piano, a sitting area, very welcoming. Then you walk into the area that used to be the court, which you can imagine is an enormous room, and it's been converted to house a ton of memorabilia.

Some of his jumpsuits, a TON of his records, a bunch of stuff. And, at the time I walked in, “Also Sprach Zarathustra” was playing, just like at the beginning of one of his concerts, so it seemed like even more of a colossal thing to walk into.

Onto the gravesite and the Meditation Garden. I took the obligatory pictures, but to be honest, that part wasn't as intriguing to me as the rest of the house. It was like the guy at Front Street Deli said to me, having lived there for 30 years, “Yeah, you gotta go to Graceland. It's interesting to see the way the man lived.” Yes it is. Much more interesting than staring at a granite slab and pondering bones.

After that the bus takes you back across the street and there's several more exhibits. One that displays stuff from his movies, one that displays his cars, one of the '68 Comeback Special, touring his jets, one of his clothes, maybe a couple others. None of these are really that overwhelming or majestic, I'm pretty sure they're meant to get you into the gift shops that they all end up in. I was happy to go through them though. I definitely get a kick out of seeing clothes that were on his body, checking out a house with wings. His guns. And I didn't mind at all the incredible amount of gift shops you have to walk through. I thought it was fun. There was one thing I was after, the Follow That Dream version of Elvis Country, which lucky for me was in the second to last gift shop I visited. Doing the whole thing, and I think I covered just about every inch of the complex, took me about 6 hours. Time for BBQ.

That day it was Marlowe's, about a mile down Elvis Presley Blvd. from Graceland, and I think this was my favorite BBQ had during the trip. Maybe the euphoria was a by-product of the great day I'd just had, but I think it was the sandwich. The meat was perfectly moist, a beautiful chew, and the sauce amount was just the greatest. I don't care what people say about it being “all about the meat.” I love BBQ sauce. It's so satisfying to my sweet tooth. It's one of the bigger restaurants I went to, but they don't open until 4 in the afternoon, so when I got there, there weren't a whole lot of people there. I was able to leisurely eat and watch some TV, the waitress was really nice and attentive, just had a great experience there.

Once I got out of there, it was too late to go to Stax. Could've figured as much, but that's okay, I have another day to fit it in. I decided to go down to Beale Street and have a look around. Okay, here's my take on Beale Street. Obviously the area is of HUGE historical significance, and there's lots of great stuff down there to see. For me personally, it didn't offer me a whole lot other than just being able to soak in the concept of standing in that area. It's really a night-life place, and I am not a night-life person. Lots of clubs, lots of bars, lots of shops, basically not for me aside from a couple pictures.

And the panhandlers are out of control. Though I will say, I liked dealing with these panhandlers a little bit more. The ones I met in the morning, I guess they were fresh and excited, they accost you and launch into long and drawn-out tales of woe or sidle up and start giving you tons of advice you didn't ask for then expect payment for it. And then they launch into a tirade of insults if you don't give them stacks of twenties, or tell you how you really didn't live up to their expectations of you. The guys at night, I guess they were tired. They just walked up to me and said, “Hey, gimme some change.” “I don't have any.” “Ach.” And that was it. Clean, simple, thank you for making this pleasant.

Day 5: Records

The plan all along for this trip was: Tourist, Tourist, Records. So this day was records day, and I was stoked. I never did put up the post on it that I wanted to, but I saw a documentary a couple months ago called I Need That Record which got me insanely pumped for records, combining that with a new found enthusiasm for 60s-80s country, and I picked up probably between 100 to 200 from thrift stores between July and August. (A new genre interest is always helpful for jacking up the numbers) Well, I knew I was going to want to visit record stores in Memphis, so for about the month before my trip I kept myself out of thrift stores and record stores, kept myself off eBay, off Amazon. So I was a-rarin' to go.

But first, what else? Arcade Restaurant. That day was french toast. Tasty enough, but a little underwhelming. I guess I'm so used to french toast being in the shape of your thick piece of average bread, that when it actually looked like french bread, I was a little baffled. It was good enough. Bacon was awesome though. Crispy crispy.

Out of there, ready for records. But before we hit the records, goddammit, we're getting in the Stax tour! I liked this one quite a bit. Lots of interesting displays. My personal favorite part was walking into the room where the music was played (well, a replica of course, the original building is no more) and then walking towards the exit door, you realize you're walking into a giant hallway where the walls are lined with records.

I didn't get confirmation that it was every record ever made between Stax, Volt, Watt, whoever else, but it was a fucking lot of records. Pretty much my dream house. I just want to live in a hallway like that. Basically awe-inspiring.

On to records. First stop, because it was open earliest, Spin Street Records. A really big big store, but only part record store. It's a used & new store. CDs, DVDs, records, clothes, magazines, and a bunch of useless crap. Sort of like part music store, part movie store, part Spencer's Gifts, but not quite as juvenile. The LP area was decent I'd say. Pretty much everything you would expect to find, with prices just the good side of a almost too high, with some above average stuff peppered throughout. So I really did have to go through it all, and I did. Managed to meet a few goals here. Found an Elvis record I didn't have (From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee. Fantastically appropriate). Got a Stax Record. (A Staples Singers best of) Couldn't leave Memphis without having met those conditions. Got several others, including a smattering out of the 5 for a dollar clearance bin (take notice other stores! That's a good thing.) Overall I'd give it a good rating. Don't know what the turnover is like, but I did see a couple people in there selling collections, so I bet it's decent.

Next was Shangri-La Records. Definitely my favorite of the bunch. This is it:

This is the parking lot:

It's in a commercial area, but it looks like a freaking house. I was expecting bad things from that appearance. I think the area it was in might be near a school, so I was expecting some college douches inside, and thin shelving full of whatever indie whispers they're trying to talk up but not talk up too much. Not. At. All. First of all, the place is PACKED with records, almost all used. There was no way I was going through them all, but I decided I was okay with that. The owner, or guy who was working there, whatever, just stayed out of the way and let me do my thing. So, this is in the first room, which would maybe be the living room of the house. The biggest room. Prices were what you would expect, not very impressive. Lots of good stuff in the soul and rockabilly sections (any store with a rockabilly section is going to get an A+ from me) if you wanted to pay for it. I saw a couple things I might pick up coming back around on a second stroll-through, but nothing that was blowing me away in a desire vs. price comparison. Kind of reminded me of the old Record Mart in Alexandria. I imagined the stock was pretty stagnant, and they were priced according to what somebody imagined a person who was looking for a particular record might pay for it. But, I'm a hunter, so they weren't really my kind of prices. Still, I was expecting an Orpheus-style shit head experience from this place, so I was pleasantly surprised. So then I went in the back room, which would maybe be a bedroom size room, in the middle of which was the all-mighty low-cost bin. My one and only true love, and I found some good stuff in there. Curtis Mayfield's first solo album, which got me SO pumped! Otis Redding Live at the Whiskey A Go Go. Al Green Can't Get Next To You (meeting another one of my conditions, leaving with a Hi Record). Several others, including Led Zeppelin II, the one Led Zeppelin record I had never picked up. I was so stoked I went back through and picked up several others from the average price area, including a couple Willie Nelson I've wanted for some time, and a couple Aretha's. Best experience at a record store I had on the trip, extremely happy about my purchases. I don't know how long they've been around or how long they will be around, but I hope they keep it up.

Next was Goner Records. Frankly, I had good expectations for this place. Read a lot of good reviews. But this was the shit-head experience I thought I was going to get at Shangri-La. There's a difference between letting the customer leisurely browse and do their own thing and almost seeming resentful that the customer is there. Did not feel welcome there at all. Almost felt like I was walking in on the employees business meeting for some bullshit venture they were excited about, like I was intruding. But whatever, I'd still look. Nothing I saw there totally blew me away. The prices were definitely nothing to write home about. And they commit what I would consider an unforgivable sin. The budget records are stacked vertically, between 4 and 5 foot tall stacks, rather than placed horizontally so they can be flipped through. Now, not even taking into account that that is HORRIBLE for the shape of the records, putting way too much pressure on them, it makes it absolutely impossible to browse them. Maybe if you made sure the spines were facing outwards you could at least get some idea of what was in there, but they didn't bother. I wasn't going to bother giving them enough of my time to break down these stacks into manageable sections and going through them, even though I would bet many many hundreds of dollars that there was some stuff in there I would have walked out with. I ended up buying a Little Milton and Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown record and getting the hell out of there. Good riddance. (I later found out that Rolling Stone put Goner on their Top 25 Record Stores in the country. Fucking figures.)

BBQ Time! None of these record stores were in close proximity to the others, so today was a driving day. So I figured I might as well go to the BBQ place I wanted to hit that was way out of the way, Leonard's. An old place with a really good reputation. My experience there was mild. Service was incredible, probably because I was very literally the only customer there. This was about 3pm, so the lunch crowd was out, and apparently they start a buffet at 4:30, so there was no one around for that. Kind of awkward. It's a fairly big place, big enough to fit an old car in and have plenty of room for diners, and I was the only person in there eating. Sandwich was pretty good, though I'd say a little dryer than Marlowe's. Awesome honey apples. The fries, I probably would've enjoyed them more, but I didn't feel like waiting for them to cool down, and they burned the hell out of my mouth. It's hard to complain about hot fries though.

Headed back downtown and thought I'd give Beale Street another quick go. Still just not that much for me there, but I did go to A. Schwab's this time. Oldest store on Beale Street, and man it felt like it. Felt a world removed from the rest of it. It's this weird combination of a souvenir store, a thrift store, odds and ends, and the most useless crap you never knew you wanted. It's pretty hilarious just walking through it. You want to buy one of everything, knowing you need none of it. Really enjoyed just browsing it. Such a fine line between the things I want to own and the things that could not possibly matter to my existence. Actually they seem to be all the same things.

Back to the hotel, because this is my last night, and I haven't made any plans for where I'll be staying the next couple days. Found a pretty good deal in Gaitlinburg, right near the entrance to Smoky Mountain Park. Feeling ready to move on, even though I know there's a lot of stuff I still haven't done. At least a few BBQ places I didn't get to, didn't get to Alcenia's, didn't have a peanut butter and banana sandwich (kind of voluntarily. The Arcade makes the most famous one, I could've had it any time I was there, just really wasn't sure I could handle it.), didn't get to the Zoo, didn't walk the waterfront park, didn't ride the trolley, didn't do the Gibson plant tour, etc. Plenty to check out if I ever decide to go back, but I hit all the really major stops I wanted to. Definitely feeling satisfied and ready to move on.

Tennessee Trip Part 2

Day 2: Erwin to Memphis

Got up early, found out the free continental breakfast was basically coffee and donuts, so I walked to a nearby Huddle House, which I had never heard of before, but when I got in there it made me think of a low-rent Denny's. That's right, low-rent Denny's. Got the strawberry waffle, which was easily three-quarters strawberry topping and whipped cream, and generously one-quarter waffle. Hopped way up on sugar and now ready for travel. Took off. First of all, I think Erwin was quite a bit further off the main trail than I thought it was. Second, Tennessee is long. This day of driving did wear me out quite a bit. I-40 reminds me a lot of I-81 in Virginia. The 70mph speed limit is sweet, but it's still only as fast as the slowest truck. And the exhaustion was not helped by the time change. Never, in all my planning, did the time change ever occur to me. Didn't occur to me until I saw a sign on the interstate that said “Central Time.” I said, Oh Shit!, and started looking at every clock available to me. Some of them changed automatically, some did not, and the ones that did not, I never bothered changing. Consequently, the time change messed with my head for pretty much the entire trip.

Getting in that night, I pretty much knew I wasn't going to get any tourist type stuff done, so I decided I was going to get some bbq (obviously) and then watch the first Redskins game of the season, which luckily was being nationally broadcast. So, after much deliberation, I decided on Central BBQ, because it was on my list, and also near a Kroger that I wanted to go to. The location of the hotel and the drive to food made it clear to me that navigating this place was going to be interesting. The hotel was in this weird area, about 3 blocks from Beale Street, it seemed like my block was kind of run-down. A bunch of empty buildings, a lot of slow-moving people just kind of milling around, not really well lit. But then you can go one block in one direction and you're at the Peabody Hotel complex thing. Go a block in another direction and you're in a public park. Yeah the park is full of homeless people, but still, it's a park. There's a statue. That sort of played out throughout the parts of the city I went through over the whole trip. Nice area, bad area, collapsed area, decent area, really nice area, bad area. All right next to each other. So when I picked a place to go, I never really knew what kind of neighborhood I was going to end up in. It was okay though, nothing too frightening. (Except the one homeless guy who, while I was stopped at a light at the end of a ramp, walked out of nowhere, stared straight at me with some enormous eyes and wild hair, and started yelling something at me, then sat down next to my door. Not going to lie, that light seemed really slow.)

Central BBQ was pretty good. A good balance of sauce to meat on the sandwich, and the baked beans actually were pretty incredible. Overall, a decent introduction to the BBQ scene. Went back to the hotel, realized I had missed the first hour of the game because of the goddam time change, and spend the rest of the night half watching the game and half trying to figure out how to spend the next day.

Day 3: First Tourist Day

One thing I knew, first thing I was doing that day was going to the Arcade Restaurant. Apparently a Memphis institution, from the moment I read “Sweet Potato Pancakes” on their website, I knew I was going to be spending some time there. The restaurant has such a reputation I was worried I wouldn't be able to sit down, but when I got there it was pretty empty. That's about when I realized that I guess I'm not here in prime vacation time. Getting excited. Walked there the first day, but decided after that that if I came back I'd drive. The walk was longer than I thought it would be, especially when there's breakfast at the other end of it. And the alternation of good to bad blocks was stark. And panhandlers seem to be most active and insistent in the morning. The sweet potato pancakes were amazing. How could they not be?

Just contemplate what they are for a second. (Sure, I could give you the "before"/uneaten photo, but these were delicious.) I pretty much decided then that all other breakfasts in the area were going to be voided, I was going to be at the Arcade everyday. (Even though I later found out there was a place right around the corner from my room that served what basically amounted to a pancakes version of the peanut butter and banana sandwich.)

A bunch of stuff I wanted to get done that day. My plan for the day involved Sun Records, Stax Records, a Mississippi River Boat tour, the Memphis Rock 'N Soul Museum, and, at some point, BBQ. First thing, walked to Sun. The tour begins upstairs with this little mini-museum, some interesting stuff behind glass, but I wasn't totally blown away. Still, it seemed a little rushed through. Tried to take some pictures of records, but didn't get all that I wanted because the tour guide kind of moved us along. So, anyway, after listening to the tour guide tell you all the stories you've heard before, you go back downstairs and into the Sun Studio. And I have to say, that really was pretty special. Records on the walls, instruments on the floors, the most special thing about it to me is that the room is all the original walling and flooring.

So, this is it. Elvis's shoes were here. Howlin' Wolf's shoes were where my shoes are now. And this:

This actually sort of took my breath away for a minute. A picture of Howlin' Wolf with a guitar under it that looked like one you'd see in pictures with him. So, I'm thinking, “That's genuine! I'm sharing air at this moment with one of Howlin' Wolf's guitars.” Complete and utter tourist fan-boy amazement. The worst kind of it. But then the tour guide picked up the guitar and played with it, basically calling me an idiot and saying “No, idiot! This is a prop.” I got all my wind back. But, honestly, standing in that room was something special.

So, after that, took the long walk to the riverfront and bought my ticket for the Mississippi tour. Thought it was later than it was (CLOCKS!) and realized I had over an hour to kill before it started, so I went to find some lunch. Knew of no BBQ around, but ran into a place that I had read about, the Front Street Deli. And that's what I was totally in the mood for, just a simple turkey sandwich. I guess the place is known for just being a little hole in the wall with a decent sandwich and a personable owner. Pretty sure, actually no question about it, I spent more time talking to the owner of the deli than I did speaking to anybody else the entire week. And it didn't feel like that, “I have a reputation for being personable so you're going to engage with DAMMIT” thing that I feel with a lot of business owners, but rather, “Well, we're the only two people here. What's up?” Much more enjoyable to me.

Mississippi River Tour. I might advise people to skip this. I don't know what I was expecting. I guess a guy dressed up like Mark Twain sword-fighting scoundrels with his cane and almost getting knocked into one of those big spinning paddle things. Paddles and steam and spinning of yarns. Not an hour and a half of one bridge for cars, one bridge for trains, and pointing out where Cybil Shepherd used to live, and making sure everyone knew exactly where the real state line was, and how the basketball team is a bunch of whiners. Oh, and making a point of telling everyone that the Mississippi is shorter than a lot of other rivers and not nearly as awesome in size as you might think. Yeah, let's make this trip as underwhelming as possible, tour guide. I didn't totally regret it. The weather was pretty nice. It's pretty hard to get genuinely aggravated on a boat. I'm just saying, it put me to sleep.

After that, walked to the to the Memphis Rock 'N Soul Museum. Sounds pretty expansive, that's a lot of ground to cover right? Well, in my opinion, this was the most disappointing display I went to. Before this, I'd never taken a self-guided audio tour, and I wasn't immediately impressed with the concept based on this place. Because there was a lot of audio, and not nearly enough to look at. So it was like the sync was off. The audio track might have five minutes left and there's nothing left in the section to explore. What am I supposed to do? Sit down, close my eyes, wait for the audio to end, and then move to the next one? Eventually I dispensed with the audio portion and just looked around for my own enjoyment. Much better. But there was some neat stuff there, like this:

And this:

At which point I realized, this was the first point my birthday had even entered my mind since leaving. (Your fault, BB King!) It's working! Went back to the hotel to make dinner plans, but upon reaching my room, my stomach was just screaming at me, “No BBQ! We'll do it again later but I just can't take it right now!” and my eyes and face were feeling the effects of being bludgeoned by sunshine all day. Plus, for whatever reason, a lot of restaurants are not open on Monday. Ended up just getting a pint of frozen yogurt and flopping on my back for some napping and planning, which ended up becoming a pattern the whole trip. Kroger had these really good pints of frozen yogurt, for a store brand they were really good and the stats on them were pretty fantastic. So I tried them all over the course of the trip. A nice little cap to the day back in the room.

Tennessee Trip Part 1

Pretty much every blog post I make now starts out with “I've been meaning to post this for...” because I just have very little zeal for blogging lately. And by lately I pretty much mean this year. But I do want to get this out before I forget it all. Went on a vacation a couple weeks ago, making the long flirted with trip to Memphis, and a couple other stops on the way there and back. First vacation I've taken in a long long time that was not centered around some big event or family obligation, which was really nice. Those events, no matter how benign they are in reality, always give me a lot of anxiety in the anticipation, and it makes it hard to me to have fun on a trip. Really nice to just go with an “I'll work it out when I get there” attitude toward the whole trip. So, the run-down.

The Pre-Go

Looking at what my summer work schedule was going to be from a vantage point of late May, it was pretty obvious that I couldn't realistically take any significant amount of time off. I wasn't too upset about that. No part of my family was planning a beach trip or a Niagara Falls trip or anything like that, so I decided early in the summer I'd be happier just working the whole summer and taking time off once school had started back up, my projects were over, the air was cooler, and I'd just go somewhere. Hadn't decided where or when, but in pretty quick succession it occurred to me what would be perfect. My birthday, a 30^th that I was definitely uptight about, was two weeks after the end of scholastic summer. Seemed like the perfect time to do it. I could take the entire week off surrounding it, and hopefully avoid even thinking about it. I'd just take myself completely out of the situation. No sitting around the house thinking about how depressing it is to be as old as my oldest memories of my parents. (Does that make sense? In my head, I guess I always think of my parents as 30 year olds. They're not 20 year olds, because when I was growing up that seemed too young for parents. My parents turned 30 when I was between 2 and 3, so I guess around the time I could make logical sense of who they were, especially in relation to other people. So, the way I think of it, if I'm 0, they're 30. Now I'm 30. That's a mess of crap to deal with. Yeah, that makes them 60, I should probably take that into account. But I have to deal with 30 first, and I'm not getting by that quickly.) Nobody around who has any idea who I am, or what's going on with me, and certainly nobody who's going to remind me of it. Seemed perfect, but where to go? Initially I thought, “mountains.” For a long time now I've thought I wanted to take a trip to some mountains somewhere and just hang out. But I realized pretty quickly that would probably get old fast, I doubt it would entertain me for a week. But, visit a city? As a general rule, cities of any size annoy the fuck out of me. Call that a generalization if you will, but it's true. So I wanted to find one that wouldn't annoy the fuck out of me, but what the hell city was that? I just kind of stared at a map and tried to figure it out. Maybe Portland? Just guessing, I've just heard it's kind of nice but there's no real particular attraction there for me. And now that indie rock pretty much annoys the shit out of me by default, let's avoid the capital. Maybe Atlanta? Why? I don't know, Georgia seems nice. Nope. Maybe Oklahoma City? You're really stretching now. Then I attacked it Kissick-Seattle-style, asking myself, What's a place that's held mythical sway over my brain for a long time, that I'm somewhat familiar with in terms of attractions, that will offer me plenty of alluring distractions?

DUH!

*SMACK*

Memphis.

And it just all sort of fell together. I could even break it up and include the mountains. Take a leisurely two days to drive to Memphis, stopping wherever along the way, do three days of Memphis, on the way back stop somewhere in the Smoky Mountains, take a hike, and take an even more leisurely two days to get from the Smokies back to Fredericksburg. Perfect. I'd even rent a car so I didn't have to worry about my truck handling the trip. Even more perfect. Summer goes by. Summer sucks. I don't like summer, don't want anything to do with it anymore. I pretty much worked for 10 hours a day, came home, filled 2 hours, slept for 9-10, got up and did it again. And was content to spend it that way. Moving on.

Day 1: Fredericksburg to Erwin, TN

Erwin seemed like it was smack in the middle of the line to Memphis, so that's where I made plans to stay. Picked up my car on Saturday morning and headed straight out. Was so thankful to get a rental with the auxiliary-in for the Zune I'd bought a few weeks before. One of the only things I spent my summer doing was compiling a crap-load of rockabilly, soul, blues, doo-wop, country, R&B, rock & roll, roots, and swamp. (Plus Joanna Newsom of course) Let me tell you, nothing's better than putting that mix on shuffle. Sustained me through hours and hours of driving with a lot of smiles on my face. More than one at a time. I'm really considering never adding or subtracting another thing to the Zune in order to preserve this perfect collection of wonders. Even more amazing because I spent all summer being mostly sick of music. I was saving those genres for this trip, so I was trying out other stuff while driving around. None of it stuck, and I basically ended up listening to a lot of podcasts. I took a separate mp3 player with me on the trip for podcasts, but as long as the battery was holding up, it was all Zune. Drive the first day was uneventful but not unpleasant. It didn't exhaust me the way these trips often can. Got to the Super 8 in Erwin, ready for something to eat. I pretty much knew I was going to be eating a truckload of pulled pork while in Memphis. I didn't see any way to avoid it, figured to pack it all in I'd pretty much be having it every meal. More on that later. So I figured I'd get started early in Erwin. Went to a place called Hawg 'N Dawg, whose specialty is a hot dog with pulled pork on top of it. I wasn't feeling that, not much of a hot dog person anymore. So I ordered the pulled pork platter, which was advertised as pork with bread and two sides. Gotta be beans and slaw. Now, “pork and roll” sounds to me like you're just getting the ingredients for a sandwich, which is why I didn't just order a plain sandwich. Cuz I wanted those sides. But the “roll” was more like a hot dog roll split in two, not really enough to pile pulled pork on. So, it was just okay. It did it's job though.

Fun fact about staying at the Super 8 in Erwin. If you try to go into town to get something to eat, there's a good chance you will be sitting waiting for a train to go by. And possibly stuck between two trains.

Stayed up a little later watching some MMA and went to sleep.