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Walking in Memphis....
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Fred & I started the day by having our morning coffee outside on a bench, watching the Mississippi flowing past. The sun was just coming up in the sky, birds were wheeling around overhead...magic. Later when I sat down in the 5th wheel to have breakfast, a little hummingbird came right up to the window where I was sitting, and hovered there for about 10 seconds. We drove across the other Memphis bridge today (to the sounds of Mark Cohn singing 'Walking in Memphis') and got a great view of the Memphis pyramid and bridges crossing the Mississippi river. A quick stop at the Memphis Visitor centre to grab some information, and for photo opportunities with Elvis & B.B King!
We had to walk across the bridge to the Mud River Island as the monorail that goes over there wasn't operational. Mud River Island has a scale model of the Mississippi river that you can walk along or walk in - of course Fred & the kids opted to walk in it! After we'd followed the fake river along to the Gulf of Mexico, we stopped at the tuck shop for some fries, which were the nicest we'd had in the U.S.A so far. Then back across the bridge to catch a streetcar down to Beale St - we ended missing our stop so we went on a longer ride until we'd done a loop downtown and then up to Beale St again. Most of the less touristy area of Memphis is very poor and run down - abandoned buildings, broken glass etc. Beale St wasn't what we thought it would be - it was really short (part of the street had been blocked off and it was this area where the bars & restaurants were) and not that many people around. Though it is more popular for it's nightlife, I had thought that being a major tourist spot in Memphis, that it would be a lot busier. We walked up & down Beale St, trying to find a restaurant that served BBQ ribs (always wanted to try them), looked suitable for a family, and that didn't have loud music blaring - harder to find than it sounds! Quite a few of the restaurants/bars had people outside trying to convince you to come in. In the end we got sick of walking around (it was HOT) and settled on a place called 'Superior Bar of Memphis'. It was dark & cool inside, with a stage for live music (none while we were there) and the guy outside assured us they had the cheapest ribs on Beale St. The kids shared a grilled cheese sandwich & fries, Fred had the Elvis special - fried Peanut butter, Banana & Honey sandwich with slaw (homemade yummy coleslaw, not KFC rubbish) & fries on the side, I had my BBQ ribs (smothered with real Southern BBQ sauce & falling off the bone). This came with fries, slaw and Southern baked beans. For those who have never had American baked beans, they are like our baked beans, but they are done in a sweeter, savoury BBQ sauce, often flavoured with maple syrup or brown sugar, and sometimes with added bacon - once you have had them, you'd never want to back to boring Watties in tomato sauce again! After lunch we drove across town to the Memphis Children's Museum. Both Josh & Kate had a fabulous time here - so much to do and all hands on stuff. There was a plane cockpit with the original controls and a link that you could talk to someone else in the adjacent 'control tower'. Quite a few of the exhibits had dress up clothes for the kids - like surgeons, firefighters, policemen, pilots etc. There was a mannequin with body parts (heart, liver, lungs etc) that you could remove and then put back in the correct places, a mini supermarket - complete with kid sized trollys, real packaged food (most packets were empty) and real checkouts that you could scan barcodes and print out a receipt - Kate loved that exhibit. Also a real fire engine, police car and police bike to climb on. Both kids put on an impromptu play at the theatre - there was stage with a curtain and lots of dress up clothes. Great fun. We left just on closing time, having spent 2 hours there, we could have easily spent another 2 hours there. We drove down to Graceland and had our photos taken at the gate. We decided not to do a tour, as Kate has no idea who Elvis was, and although Josh does, it was expensive for all four of us to go. We were surprised at all the graffiti that covered the brick gatehouse and the stone wall (people leaving love notes to Elvis). There was a single red rose tucked into the cast iron fence which features a figure of the King... even now people want to show their love for him.
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