After a good night of sleep, we packed up and grabbed fresh pastries with Barbara at Le Boulangerie. We enjoyed the breakfast outside, next to the local bar owner that told us, “Isn’t it great that you can buy a beer at a bar at 7am in New Orleans and not have anyone look at your funny?” We all smiled…and realized, I guess its 5 o’clock somewhere?
We hit the road to see the King’s home…in Graceland. The beginning of our trip consisted of driving through swarms of lovebugs. Apparently it is mating season this time of year and these bugs waste no time finding partners and flying around together. At our gas stop in Amite, LA Dermot scrubbed the bugs off the windshield so that we could actually see out of it. The car was completely covered in them. After filling up our gas tank, we decided to take Johnny Cash’s advice and go to Jackson, Mississippi. Our Garmin had some issues finding the restaurant we wanted to go to in Jackson. This issue resulted in 3 hours of silence between Jackson and Memphis . . . and in the words of Forrest Gump, that’s all I have to say about that.
We pulled up to Graceland, got our tour passes and headed over to the mansion with our very stylish self guided tour headsets. An Elvis impersonator was in the group in front of us. He asked if we wanted a picture with him and we declined. (I think we may have hurt his feelings)
Graceland was more or less what we expected only a little smaller than anticipated. All of the décor was very 1970s with an animal/jungle-theme twist. Seeing all of the gold records and awards that Elvis won in his relatively short musical career was amazing. His old garage and racquetball court were converted into trophy rooms and were filled from top to bottom with awards. We also got to see most of Elvis’ stage costumes, car collection and two airplanes. It was definitely worth the $25 ticket.
After our tour to Graceland we drove over to our friends Will and Ginny’s place in Memphis. We met their two chocolate labs Annie and Lily, had a drink, caught up on some college football scores and then grabbed our stuff from the car. Will and Ginny had to go to a “Stock the Bar” party, so we decided to head to downtown Memphis for some BBQ. All the reviews recommended a place called Rendezvous, so we decided to give it a shot. The pulled pork sandwich Katie ordered was great, but the “world famous” ribs that Dermot ordered tasted like they had been sitting around for about 4 hours before they were served to me.
After dinner we went to Beale St to listen to some music and check out the scene. Beale St basically felt like Bourbon St. lite. Right when we felt like we had had enough of Beale St., Will and Ginny called. Their party was over, so we headed back towards their place to meet up at an Irish pub near their place. After 1 round of drinks we were all ready to head home. Back at Will and Ginny’s place, Dermot and Will found out they were both into the same music and they were both golfers, so they would have someone to talk to when their women were participating in bridesmaids duties at Heather and Moses’ wedding next week.