Nashville May 28-30

We stayed at the Alexis Inn and Suites just outside of Nashville. It wasn’t the greatest hotel, but it wasn’t the worst either. Even though they advertised having high speed internet at the hotel, it was as slow as or even slower than the connection in the Outer Banks (the signal came from surrounding homes). We began our day much the same as the others. Ed ate his standard southern breakfast – sausage, biscuits, and gravy (although the gravy was sub par). I had toast and cereal. We discovered that one of the wheels on my suitcase had fallen off. Therefore, we first went to Home Depot to pick up a screwdriver. On the way into the parking lot, we discovered that Home Depot sold gas in Nashville, and that is was reasonably priced (relatively speaking for the current price of gas). I got my oil changed at a Jiffy Lube while Ed went in Home Depot. After the car was ready, we headed down the road to The Hermitage, which is the home of Andrew Jackson, the seventh president of the US and Ed’s favorite president as he did a report on him in fourth grade.

The tour was actually pretty good. We were planning on taking a quick look, but ended up going in. The tour began with an informative film about the life of Andrew Jackson and how he came to Nashville after being orphaned during the Revolutionary War (his parents and siblings were all killed) and going on to law school. He became a general and kicked butt in the Battle of New Orleans. The people liked him and convinced him to become president. Although some people liked him, he was quite stubborn and was hated by others. After watching the film, we strolled the grounds leading to the house, which was built three times by Andrew Jackson. The first version was small, so he rebuilt a bigger house. This house was destroyed in a fire, and the third version, a Greek revival mansion spanning 8000 square feet was built. The house was nice and well preserved as it has been standing since the 1830s. The gardens outside were quite nice. There were also slave cabins on the property and a farm.

After touring The Hermitage, home of Old Hickory (Andrew Jackson’s nickname), we headed to the Grand Ole Opry. As Ed and I are not country music fans, we had no idea what to expect or what to do. We pulled into the parking lot of a mall, which is about on par with the hockey hall of fame, and followed the signs to the Grand Ole Opry. We took a picture in front, went to the information booth, and were informed no tours were available that day and that we weren’t allowed inside. Although it was kind of a bust, we can at least say that we’ve seen it (from the outside). The speed limit there was 24 for some odd reason. If anyone knows why the speed limit is 24, please feel free to share with us.

We then headed to Jack’s BBQ for some lunch as we had read this had the best BBQ food in the area. Ed had a pulled pork sandwich with coleslaw and turnip greens. I had mac and cheese. It was good, but definitely did not blow the Dinosaur BBQ away. After lunch, we drove to Centennial Park, where an exact replica of the Parthenon is built (except it is completely intact – and therefore an exact replica of what the Parthenon is thought to have looked like). We went inside where an art gallery is housed on the first floor. On the second floor, the Greek statues were on display. These were to show us what was on the outside of the building up close. In addition, there was a huge gold plated statue of Athena. The original statue of Athena in Greece has been missing for ages, but this Athena was recreated based on records of the original. Athena is the daughter of Zeus and goddess of wisdom and was known to protect her city. I actually did a report on her in fourth grade. After touring the Parthenon, we took a walk around the lake outside. We quickly drove through the Vanderbilt University campus and weren’t overly impressed with the architecture, but we may not have found the nice part of campus. We then drove to downtown Nashville. While driving, we listened to the Bluegrass and Nashville stations on XM radio. We’re trying to have an authentic experience (a little authentic anyhow).

The skyline was nice as we drove into town. The hockey rink, The Sommet Center, was pretty nice and looked like it was being renamed while we were there as there was a man sanding the metal where the old sign had been. We walked down the streets, by the river, and through the city green (park in front of the courthouse). There were some nice water fountains and water features there. The windows and doors were so tall in many of the buildings. It was really cool. We kept walking until we went into Mike’s Old Fashioned Ice Cream Fountain. I had mint chocolate chip and moose tracks with chocolate sprinkles. It was delicious and very filling. Ed had a white chocolate raspberry milkshake. It was really good. They filled us up so much that we didn’t need to eat a real dinner. After eating our ice cream, we proceeded up the road and passed some of the honky tonks. There was live music playing in about 6 or 7 places and they advertised having live music playing all day. We decided to stop at Layla’s Bluegrass and Country Inn because there was a sweet rock-a-billy band playing. They had a stand up bass and everything. They were actually really good. We stayed for about an hour and they played: Great Balls of Fire, Folsom Prison Blues by Johnny Cash, Secret Agent Man, a song from Pulp Fiction, some country songs, Johnny Be Good, and Elvis song, and more. It was really fun being in there.

After the live music, we headed back towards the hotel as the Lost season finale was on that evening. We first stopped for some pizza hut (personal pan cheese pizza) and failed miserably while attempting to fix our suitcase. We packed up for the next day and attempted using the wicked slow internet to plan our trip through Alabama. We then watched the awesome Lost season finale. Desmond is Ed’s favorite. Ed was right…Penny did rescue Desmond; even though I kept telling him Desmond was going to die. After Lost, we went to bed as we had a long day of driving ahead of us.

As usual, Ed had the only breakfast the hotel had to offer and I had a waffle. It was hard to find a table at breakfast as there was some choir from Tennessee that was on tour. They were all different ages and had even toured at our new found favorite place, Pigeon Forge. While eating breakfast, we watched another segment on Good Morning America, which again scared me. The segment covered a couple who was recently lost in the Grand Canyon for 11 days. If we get lost for 11 days, we will miss our flight to New Zealand, and who knows if we’ll survive? We’ll have to eat bugs and snakes and shimmy up canyons the way Bear Grylls taught us. Hopefully it won’t come to that.

We started driving at 8 and drove straight to Birmingham, Alabama. We stopped to eat at Jim-n-Nick’s based on the suggestion of Jason. Birmingham was a pleasant surprise and was very nice…at least the area in which we walked around. Jim-n-Nick’s is a barbeque restaurant. It was really nice inside with brick walls, exposed beams, nice wood tables, etc. Ed had a pulled pork sandwich, creamed spinach, and chili. I had a Greek salad and a loaded potato with cheese, sour cream, and butter. The corn biscuits were delicious! Everything was really good there. After lunch, we got in the car and began our long drive to New Orleans. We flicked off every Tuscaloser sign (Tuscaloosa) we saw, again, based on the recommendation of Auburn alumni Jason. War eagle. This is a tradition started by Ed while driving past Rutgers because they are the most horrible, miserable excuse for a university in the world (because they beat Syracuse on a half court shot the year Syracuse won the national championship…Ed is a sore loser…Syracuse beat Rutgers later in the year anyhow).

As we drive through Alabama, we notice that there are lots of exits, but no houses…lots of trees though. They call is Alabama the beautiful on the signs, and it looks pretty nice to us, although it is 90 degrees and humid at 1:35. After Alabama, we drove through Mississippi. Mississippi was green without much going on. One thing we noticed while driving through Alabama and Mississippi on the highway was there was nothing on the sides of the roads…no farms, no houses, no towns, not much. People are smart enough to not live near the highway there. We then headed into Louisiana and drove to New Orleans (or Nawlins as they pronounce it).