Day 7 - Pistol Packin' Mama

            We awoke bright and early in our luxurious St. Louis pad to snap some obligatory photos of the gateway arch before hitting the road towards Memphis. 

  The long straight stretches of southern highway have been exceedingly scenic; the land is so open and cars so scarce that it’s easy to lose track of time and speed.  We spent a good leg of the trip on the historic and illustrious Highway 61, making sure to listen to some Bob Dylan along the way.

            Before we hit Memphis we decided to make a detour to Elvis Presley’s mansion, Graceland.  Having failed to research the price of a mansion tour, we realized it was far outside of our budget.  Instead, we meandered through the mass of Elvis themed gift shops to marvel at the sorts of items and trinkets someone thought to adorn with Elvis’ face.  After Jackson picked up yet another collectible spoon, we left for Memphis. 

            Memphis is a large sprawling city, and on first sight it was pretty depressing.  Our motel was located a couple miles away from the downtown area, and although it was in a relatively safe area, the expanses of abandoned industrial buildings and broken windows created a pretty bleak atmosphere.  We checked in, and decided to go look at the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King Jr. was shot, which has since been turned into a Civil Rights Museum. 

            After the museum, we pigged out on some good Memphis ribs and headed down to Beale Street, the music hotspot.  As soon as we got close to the downtown area we could hear the blues and funk blaring, and we started to get the real feel of Memphis.  We hopped between nearly empty bars (it was a Monday night) and got to hear several different bands, all with a distinctly awesome flavor to them, and none were shy to ask for donations.  My personal favorite was “The Dr. Feelgood Potts Band.”  The doctor himself was an older man wearing a belt containing no fewer than 20 harmonicas.  Between songs, he described his inspiration for one of the tracks on his new CD – “I was downtown one night…  And I just thought to myself… Pistol packin’ mama!  And so… I named this song…  Pistol packin’ mama!”  To which a member of the audience replied “SOUNDS LIKE MY EX-WIFE!”

            Memphis was awesome, tomorrow we roll out for Pensacola. -L

On a side note, we need a good Internet connection to add photos, so there will probably usually be a delay between posts and the pictures that go with them.

The Worst City in the World

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Leaving Nashville, we got on the road early and hit the long, straight, flat highways that permeate Middle America. We hit 4 states along the drive: Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, and, of course, Missouri. Our first destination was the Anheuser-Busch factory for a free tour. This was much harder to get to than I expected, because apparently St. Louis doesn’t believe in having drivable streets or working stoplights.

Whoever created this road system must have consulted in the Northern Virginia area, because getting lost seems to immediately take you across the river to the very seedy East St. Louis, in the same way that every wrong turn in Virginia seems to lead to PG County. Several of the stoplights were just flashing red, which to the people of St. Louis apparently meant to tentatively inch fully into the intersection and then finally go through when it’s obvious that nobody else will. It is hands down the least navigable city that I’ve ever been to.

Once we finally found it, the Anheuser-Busch factory was a fun place. The tour itself was very mechanical, mostly a list of large numbers and historic events. The factory was a mix of old timey robber-baron industrialism and modern assembly lines, giving the feel that we’d just won a golden ticket to Willy Wonka’s beer factory. The best part was the end, where each tour member got to have 2 free beers at the bar. Definitely worth the price.

In the evening, we went out on the town and happened upon another group of road trippers from Brooklyn. They had a much different strategy from us, having left New York the same day they decided to do the trip. They were interesting characters, one of whom claimed to be a prolific graffiti artist who tagged things “EM.” He at one point considered tagging “that big arch thing over there” until we informed him that it might not be a very good idea. They were also on their way to Memphis, and we exchanged numbers, so we may well see them again on the trip.

Thanks again to the Priceline Negotiator®, we scored a hotel room that was without a doubt the best we’ve stayed in thus far, located as close as physically possible to the Arch.

It was 4 stars, so everything was very high quality, though there were fewer free amenities than some of the other places we’ve stayed. The highlight of the night was definitely when I made two ball-in-a-cups at once, amazingly caught on film in its entirety (coming soon to youtube). Overall, St. Louis was able to overcome the bad first impression, but if I never return here, I’ll be satisfied. Memphis tomorrow should be better. -J

Music City Madness

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Nashville somehow managed to be even more fun than Savannah. After departing the Smoky Mountains, we made our way to Nashville by way of the Jack Daniel’s distillery in Lynchburg and Alex’s old house just outside Nashville. We took a free tour of the distillery, which was highly informative and entertaining. Our tour guide was a 30ish bearded guy in a cowboy hat and boots, who talked with a deep cowboy drawl, sort of like Sam Elliott. They can’t legally sell alcohol on the premises, but at the end of the tour, the guide instructed us that we could take advantage of a loophole and buy a “commemorative bottle” that happens to also have whiskey in it.

Once we got to Nashville, we went out to the main drag, Broadway, which was busy all night.  Our friend and future president John Rice just graduated from Vanderbilt so he gave us some recommendations for places to go, so we walked around to those places and tried to find one that we enjoyed . There was music playing wherever we went; many intersections had tiny speakers attached to the telephone polls that played music continuously. We enjoyed some live music at a couple of the bars and had a good time mingling with the other patrons, then headed back to our room after a quick stop at the best hotdog stand I’ve ever been to, run by a lady who Alex fell in love with at first sight.

Nashville showed us a great time. Next stop: St. Louis. -J

Day 4: Big Smoke Candy Mountains

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Our fourth stop on the trip had us pumping the brakes a little bit and driving out to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park for a night of camping. Saying goodbye to Savannah was tough, but we’ve got a schedule to stick to, so tough decisions had to be made. Luckily, we started the day off with complimentary waffles, so by 9:00 AM it was already a good day.

We spent most of the day on country roads, with a quick stop in Asheville, NC to walk around and look for any commemorative spoons that were available to be had (which there weren’t for some reason).

Leighton and Alex in Asheville

After we got into Cosby, Tennessee, we started looking for a market of some sort in order to buy hot dogs, since we have to buy perishable items as close to their time of use as possible. After stopping at several closed shops with prominently displayed OPEN signs, we stopped at a small shack with a few locals milling about outside and a sign that said GROCERIES. We asked the people outside, who were the proprietors, if they had any hot dogs, and it turned out that they didn’t sell any groceries there at all! Apparently they place little value in accurate signage in Cosby. The store owners convinced us to stay for a minute to try their recently cooked barbecued pork (served out of the window of the small, separate “kitchen” by a woman who had what appeared to be track-marks up her right arm), and they asked what we were up to for the night. They pointed out that since the campgrounds were federal property, we should make sure we weren’t up to anything illegal, then offered their backyard as a potential alternative. I’m pretty sure they were implying that we could do drugs with them (very likely meth). Suffice it to say, we turned down their offer and immediately left, seeing as we all knew how Deliverance turned out (and Wrong Turn, and The Hills Have Eyes, and Requiem for a Dream for that matter).

 After all that excitement, we drove around for a while, got our hot dogs, and set up camp. Camping was fairly relaxing after our time in the city, but we are still fairly inexperienced, as evidenced by the crunchy, undercooked rice we mixed with our chili (plus several secret ingredients). By the end of the trip we'll have a pretty sweet chili-and-rice recipe. As for the next stop, I’m excited to hit Nashville Saturday evening. -J

Savannah vannah bo bannah banana fannah fo fanana mee my mo mannah, Savaaaannah

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Savannah is sweet. The amount of fun that is available to be had here makes every other city I’ve ever been to look like an instructional video for a toothbrush. To start the day, Snides set an alarm for way too early in the morning, which, upon threat of violence, was then reset to a much more acceptable 9:00. We left the room at around 10 or 10:30 and hit the Charleston market as soon as we could find it. After some light trinket-shopping and the best Arnold Palmer I’ve ever had, we did a bit of walking around the city and then set off for Savannah, a little over 100 miles away.
On the way we saw a super dope tree.

Once you get into the midtown area, Savannah is a beautiful city. The many parks are all perfectly manicured and covered in old statues and picturesque benches, though we felt gypped when we went to the location of the Forrest Gump bench only to find that there is no Forrest Gump bench!

Original location of Forrest Gump bench

Walking around the city, we found a giant chess board with three-foot chess pieces and a guy named Mark who challenged us to a friendly game. We had Mark on the ropes for a while until we made a few costly mistakes, which Mark took advantage of to quickly bring the game to an end. Downtrodden from our defeat, we took comfort in a nearby happy hour, where the Barcelonés bartendress provided us with some free shots and quality conversation. Amaya tried a little flirtation but she was clearly too much woman for him. After grabbing our all-important to-go beers (which is apparently a normal, legal thing here!), we found a nice pizza place to eat at, then perused River Street, the city’s strip of shops, bars, and restaurants along the river.

We walked back up to a park area to watch a basketball game on a giant screen, and an older, possibly homeless guy wearing camo pants and an open vest, showing a full field of chest hair, came up and started talking to us about where women hang out in the city. He then gave us an amazing long speech to say to any women we came across (which we unfortunately didn’t catch on video). Then, when I compared him to Martin Luther King, Jr in his speaking abilities, he recited (paraphrased) a full King speech, much (all?) of which we did catch on video. We all held hands at one point in the speech; it was a moment. He gave us two palm fronds folded into roses, told us one more foolproof line to say to the ladies, and then asked for “donations,” which we gladly provided in exchange for all the entertainment he provided. If I remember correctly, the line was something like “Please excuse me for invading your privacy, but I just have to tell you, girl, you have eyes that hypnotize, here’s a rose, can I please have your name?” Then we were supposed to give them one of the palm roses (which he must constantly have been carrying around in his pockets) and then we had to take it from there.

After that whole experience, we called it a night and retired to our hotel room (which had amenities this time!) to get up early for some complimentary continental breakfast (fancy!) before the long drive to the Smoky Mountains. –J

We've created two separate accounts of our day in Savannah because why not.

5/31/13-Day 4

On I-95, leaving Savannah to Smoky Mountains National Park

This morning we left the little hotel we were staying in on the outskirts of Savannah, Georgia. Back on the road again, headed to the Smoky Mountains on the Tennessee side. Let me tell you, Savannah is a hell of a town, with large houses and hanging Spanish Moss lining the streets, it feels more like you are coming into a garden instead of a City on the water.  A place so alive that it seeps into your pores. Everywhere you go in Savannah something is happening. The four of us managed to get spanked in a game of jumbo chess against a kid a few years younger than us. When the hunger set in, there were too many places to choose from, many of them had live music, even in the early evening. We settled on a little pizza place at the end of the City Market section that did its best impersonation of New York style thin crust. Our outdoor table offered a great view of all the passersby and happenings of the area.

The older gentlemen with their straw hats and golf shirts mingled with the pretty young women in their flowing summer dresses. Things in Savannah just seem to flow in a natural fashion, everything happening at a perfect pace. Cars stop to let groups cross the street and folks smile at you and ask “How y’all doing?”

                We made our way to one of the nearby bars, and after having a nice chat with the beautiful Spanish bartender, we took advantage of one of the best practices we have experienced, the “to-go cup.” Drinks in hand, we made our way down the steep stairs to River Street, another jewel of the Savannah downtown. The long river walk is so vibrant, it feels almost like a movie. The Man with the saxophone provided the atmosphere and as the boats floated on upriver everything felt right. A breeze so sweet, fat cigars and good company in a city that is bustling, but never crowded.

                I think we all could have stayed there for a few more days, but the road and many more undiscovered gems out west were waiting for us. Savannah will still be there and we will be back eventually. -A

Chapter Two: Charleston Chew

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            The journey to Charleston was delayed due to a requested detour to a historic plantation, which turned out to be a bit too expensive for our budget.  The detour wasn’t entirely fruitless, as we caught a glimpse of some rare specimens of quail, or possibly pheasants.  On the way we found a nice place to enjoy some good old Carolina BBQ and hush puppies.

            The Priceline Negotiator® was able to secure us a very decent room at a desirable rate for one night outside of Charleston, and we got to enjoy the rest of the evening in the city, which we decided is kind of like a more southern version of Old Town Alexandria.  We got to experience the local fare at a town hotspot where we enjoyed half price burgers and $4 pitchers of PBR.

            Tomorrow we are checking out the downtown market in Charleston before heading out towards Savannah, GA.  Apparently Savannah is nice, but more importantly it is the location of the bench from Forrest Gump.  -L

The Maiden Post

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The first day of the road trip has taken us from Alexandria, Virginia,  along the better part of  Skyline Drive, down to Boone, NC, where we are crashing for the night with our long-time friend Isaac. We left at 3 AM Tuesday, May 28, 2013. We took the scenic route, around 10 hours to get to Boone, but we got some beautiful pictures out of it so it was well worth it. After we got here, we spent a few hours hiking the mountain trails and absorbing the landscape, which built up the appetite for some $0.40 wings at a spot near Isaac’s apartment.

Tomorrow morning (at a more reasonable hour this time) we leave for Charleston, where we still need to figure out what exactly we will be doing and where we are staying for the night. That isn’t how we want every location to be, but it’s nice to leave some places a little bit up in the air, so we can find our way to anything cool that is going on in town. It should be fun. -J