Day 6- 11/17/12 Graceland

Neither of us are necessarily Elvis fans, but we had the chance to pass through Memphis and visit Graceland. Why not? Now, I'm a bit of a cheap-o. Reasonably so given the expenditures on outfitting the truck and then driving it cross-country with the frequency at which I do. Well, for an adult it is a minimum of $32 each to walk through the house. So we decided to just see what we could see from the road while we awaited my good friend Lumumba's availability to meet us for lunch. Now, probably 90% of my friends on facebook were probably like "Yo, Will is blowing up my newsfeed posting his every move". Part of that was so I could have a quick reference for updating the blog later. The second added benefit was that people could let me know if I was in there vicinity for the chance to meet up. Well, we did get to meet up with Lumumba and tour some historic areas along the way. Here are some of the photos of the day:

 It wasn't too long from here before we made it into Arkansas.

 This was another scary roadside, but fortunately Jenn did not cause me to go into panic mode like what happened in Arizona. Not my finest moment.

The natural state.

 I don't want to make this up, but I think this is the Arkansas River. And it is beautiful. Everyone talks about the Mississippi, but I'd like there to be more conversations on this body of water. Whatever it's called.

 

 We drove through the night and arrived in Little Rock early in the morning. Just in time for breakfast at a Burger King. I stumbled in there, go breakfast, sat down. Jenn freshened up some in their restroom and also got breakfast. I had hoped to go to their bookstore on campus, but it is closed on the weekends for anyone else who might have made plans and been on the verge of a similar mistake. So I had to settle for this shot instead.

 I bought a sticker at a rest stop, only for it to turn out to be a paper sticker and not a vinyl one. As soon as I washed my car upon returning, that thing curled up like bacon frying in a griddle. Disappointing.

 This is Jenn driving back towards me. In setting up that prior shot, the light turned green and she had to leave me behind. That was her only chance to get rid of me. The fact that she came back with the truck to get me means that she loves me.

 Kampgrounds of America, you have once again saved me in my travels. I love, love, love, that travelers can do a day rental of their shower facilities for $5/person. Sean and I discovered this on the return leg of the Utah trip. I inquired about this again for our purposes such that Jenn and I could shower before heading into Memphis. This is the "Memphis" KOA which is actually in a neighboring town just across the border in Arkansas off of Interstate 55. Maybe Marion, AR. Can't remember. There are so many KOAs across the US and they generally are right there along major arteries and thoroughfares. In the spring, I'd like to do a shorter trip and camp at one of their campgrounds somewhere. TBD.

 This is us crossing the Mississippi which borders Tennessee.

 We've seen a sign like this before, haven't we, Rufus?

 Riverfront drive, I believe.

 Beale Street runs right down to the water. We went to Beale first but got there way in advance of when Lumumba was going to be freed up. So then we made the drive out to Graceland. There was a parade of some sort and we were driving all around Robin Hood's Barn to find an alternate way to get to Graceland. Just as we were ready to give up and head back, Jenn just asks the officer what are people supposed to do who want to go to Graceland. To that, he just stepped out of the way and let us drive up the road 200 feet to the parking lot. Are you serious?!

 I guess I got ahead of myself with the narrative up there. This is the Sun Recording studio. I read on Wikipedia about some of the sights. So as we headed to Graceland, it turned out we got to see a lot of them along the way. Some I missed as I wasn't expecting to catch so many on the same stretch of road.

 This is part of the parade that had everything shutdown along Elvis Presley Boulevard. I got so angry because there was like this terrace sign right along the roadway. I had just cued up my camera as we were passing through the intersection when this lady in a beater car rolled up and blocked the view while waiting to make a turn. Nobody told her to pull that darn far forward and ruin my shot in her busted vehicle. Uggghhhh.

 The tourist area of Graceland. Two guys immediately left their wives and made the pilgrimage over to my truck for photos with it. I thought it was really cool to be in Graceland, and have people stop taking pictures of Elvis to come get photos of my truck instead. My truck has arrived.

 Playing some mean Air Guitar outside of Graceland

 Jenn got right up near the house without paying. This is as close as us cheap-os can get.

 The dude had two jets. Who has two private jets?! The King does. We were debating this with Jenn's cousin when we got to her place outside of Nashville. I reasoned you might be in Abu Dhabi, chilling, eating freshly imported sno cones made from the tips of icebergs when one of your boys calls you up on your satellite phone. And he's all like, dude, I wish I was there. And then you're like, hold up, I'll get you here; get on my OTHER private jet. That's when you have transcended from merely "balling", to "balling out of control."

You know, the crazier thing is that now there's just two jets there chilling. Are they still operational? Could I buy one of Elvis' jets and start my own mini-balling enterprise myself? I may have to look into this.

 Alright, so we left Graceland and made our way to Beale street to take up residence in BB King'ss Blues Hall for lunch.

 Live Music

 Elvis Presley park

My camera was dying, but we had just enough juice to memorialize our rendezvous with Mr. Sroufe. It was really cool having him reach out and be like, "You're in my backyard; let's link up" based on having seen my facebook posts. As much as I can sometimes be anti-FB as I feel I might be a bit too old to still be on there, moments like this that enable you to reconnect with folks seems to make it a worthwhile tool more so than a necessary evil. I just wish it hadn't become quite so heavily commercialized. Brothers got bills though, I guess; so, I can't be mad at that.