The Great (North) American Road Trip: I See, You See, We All See, Tennessee

Nashville, TN

Driving into Nashville we noticed that something wasn’t on our side, and that something is known as the weather. It was rainy and overcast the whole day. We didn’t have much of an execution plan for Nashville, but I had hoped to see the Grand Ole Opry along with the other famous music related sights in the area. Due to the serious flooding they had in the not so distant past, the Grand Ole Opry was closed. This wouldn’t be such of a bad thing if the building was just closed, but the whole street that it resided on was closed off. We couldn’t even drive by the place and snap a picture, as everything on the block was shut down. It was saddening as I had hoped that Nashville was going to be a fun stop, but we were left with a decision to make. We looked at the sky in between rain showers and decided that there was not much of anything to do so our stop in Nashville turned out to be a very short stay.

On our way out of town, we figured that today would be a good day to do some laundry. It was a good way to maybe dodge driving through the rain and it was at a point where we had maybe one pair of underwear left for each of us. Little has to be said about the smell of our laundry bag that was full of hot, sticky, humid drenched clothes, other than the obvious notion of them being rather rank. We came upon a machine that was a quadruple load commercial washer and was fairly cheap. We decided to give it a try. We packed all of our clothes into the one washer and let it roll. The washer even had a sweet red wooden balled lever that was used to lock the front load window shut. It looked like something out of a cartoon, but it sure did get our clothes clean.

While the laundry was being done, we made a few phone calls and caught up on some reading. Doing our laundry in a laundromat has been something that we have become to enjoy. Not only do we get to take a little time to ourselves and read or check up on stuff and people via our phones, but it also forces us to fold and pack away all of our clothes. In Vegas we always had a washer/dryer in our house or apartment so we never had to visit the laundromat. It has become a nice break from driving, where we could sort of just slow down time and take an hour to ourselves. Who knew that doing laundry could be so relaxing?

As we did our laundry we were introduced to the characters of Tennessee. The people of Tennessee that were walking around the laundromat reminded me of characters in movies and cartoons. King of the Hill was spot on when they picked up on the touches of southern/redneck/hillbilly type of persona. I overheard a couple of conversations that were as if Joe Dirt were having a conversation with himself. They were all nice enough people, but those accents just made it hard for me to take them seriously. There was a bunch of “dang olds” and “I reckons” and “damn rights” thrown around like they were footballs on Sunday. This was our first real taste of that type of person and we were excited to get deeper down into the south to experience more of it.

Memphis, TN

We drove towards Memphis in hopes that the rain would die down a bit for us to camp, because there is nothing worse than setting up a tent in the rain and then having to sleep in it. We found a campground in a state forest. We checked out the park and went to the visitor’s center. As I stepped out to look at the bulletin board to see what was going on in the park, I noticed out of the corner of my eye a couple of cages set up off in the distance towards the woods. After grabbing a little printed out map of the forest, I drove the car over towards the cages. I stepped out of the car and walked over to the cage and was pleasantly surprised that there were two owls in the cage. They were so cute to look at, as they followed us with their giant eyes everywhere we went. One of the owls was a giant and the other was either a different species or just a baby, as it was about a third of the size of the other. We hung out talking back and forth with them and listening to them make sounds before we decided that enough was enough, as we could have spent all day just hanging out with the owls. We checked out the campground and it seemed nice enough, but we had gotten to talking and decided that a bed sounded really nice. It had been a good while since we slept in an actual bed. We thought about it and it wasn’t since Portland, Oregon that we had slept in a real bed.

So we drove a bit on the highway and found a Knights Inn motel that was set at a reasonable rate. It felt like such a luxurious place compared to sleeping on the ground for the majority of the last few weeks. We showered up and made some sandwiches and soup in the room with our little burner stove. It was really a nice little detour that allowed us to be pampered for a bit. We were excited that the motel had a sign that read free breakfast, so in the morning we hot stepped it up to the office to grab some food. We arrived to only be disappointed, as the motels idea of breakfast consisted of two small bottles of Sunny D, some Little Debbie honey buns and muffins, rice krispie treats, and some coffee. Despite being let down we filled our pockets with most everything that was laid out and headed back to the room. If we didn’t eat it for breakfast at least we had some free snacks to grub on.

With our amazingly disappointing breakfast past us, we headed towards Memphis. We arrived in Memphis a little before noon and decided that we needed to fulfill the empty space in our stomach. We had been wanting to eat some good Memphis BBQ and this was a perfect excuse. We looked online and found a place that had great reviews. Payne’s Barbeque was the name and making delicious food was their game. We ordered up some chopped pork sandwiches, because in the south it isn’t called pulled pork. We ordered two sandwiches, two drinks, a side order of baked beans, and a bag of chips, which all totaled the much welcomed price of ten dollars. When the food came out I was a little taken aback as the sandwich had a very curious looking green slaw piled on top of the pork. I should have known not to doubt the sandwich, because the chopped pork was amazing and the green slaw was tangy and so damn delicious. It was easily the best chopped pork sandwich I’ve ever eaten and probably the best pulled pork as well. The place looked like a dive, but the food made up for it. After thanking the cooks for a great meal, we headed down to the waterfront so we could devise a plan of attack for the city.

First on our list was to hit up Beale Street. We headed down to the area and parked the car so we could walk around for a bit. Even at such an early time in the morning, the area was hopping with people playing guitars out on the street and a pretty decent band playing in a little park. It was great to see such vibrant music coming out of every corner. We walked up and down Beale Street and when we returned to where we started we noticed the Gibson guitar factory. Unfortunately, the factory was shut down for the day and tours were not being given. As we walked up to the factory we were greeted by a gentleman by the name of Jeff. I was a little apprehensive to talk to him, assuming that he was a homeless guy, but he seemed harmless enough and was very polite. He told us that if we poked our heads up against the glass of the factory, that we would be able to see into the building. We glanced in and looked at all the tables set up and were looking at all stages of guitars from skeletons to ones that were just lacking the finishing touches.

We chatted with Jeff for a bit, as he told us that the motel where Martin Luther King Jr. had been shot was just around the corner. He then proceeded to let us know that he gives walking tours to people, and then came the proof that he was indeed homeless as the back story came out. He told us of his hardships and that he did the tours to make a couple bucks here and there as the shelters in the area charged money to stay. We would have loved to give the guy a couple bucks, but we had no cash on hand. He was understanding enough, and told us he was going to head over to the Elvis statue to try to earn a couple bucks by taking pictures of tourists.

It was at this point that we started to understand why the blues came out of Memphis. Unlike other cities that seemed to put blame on everyone but themselves, the down and out people of Memphis just seemed like they were trying, but just couldn’t get over that hump. From driving through the streets of the city, we got the impression that most of the town was living paycheck to paycheck just barely getting by. There was never a sense of neediness, just a real hard look at reality. It is a hard thing to put into words. It is not that I felt a sad for them, but I could really feel a great deal of empathy for the area.

We then drove over by the historic Orpheum Theater and the proceeded to head over to the Lorraine Motel.

The Lorraine Motel is the sight of Martin Luther King Jr’s assassination. Since the shooting the motel has been made into a civil rights museum. Turning the motel into a museum has been the subject of great speculation. We met a lady by the name Jacqueline Smith who has been protesting outside of the Lorraine Motel for over 22 years. We talked to her about why she was protesting and just how she has kept up with it for so long. After the assassination, Jacqueline, who had been a resident of the motel, was kicked out along with many others to make way for the museum. She had been and still is protesting, because she feels that the motel should be put to use in a way that is more in the spirit of Dr. King. Part of me sides with Ms. Smith, but another part of me is glad that the motel is being preserved for its historical significance. Either way we couldn’t find it in our hearts to visit the museum despite the fact that it would probably be very interesting.

Graceland was next on our list of things to see and the fact that the cheapest ticket onto the grounds was around thirty five bucks, we were strictly in the business of just driving by to see the place from the street. The house was huge and as we drove by, we had hoped to get a picture of the famous gates with the musical notes on them, but they were propped open and we were left without the chance of snapping a picture. We did however see the wall surrounding the grounds that had all sorts of notes and signatures to the king scraped on written on the bricks. It was quite beautiful to look at. Had we been bigger Elvis fans, it may have been worth the money to visit and if we ever come back with some extra cash, I think it would definitely be fun explore. Tennessee on the whole was surprisingly a really fun and beautiful state, to which we definitely want to visit again.