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“Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.” (John Howard Payne)

As they say, all good things must come to an end. And so it is that our four-week road trip is now over. For the first time during the trip, we were actually delayed by traffic yesterday, as the drive from the Outer Banks north to Ellicott City took more than seven hours (including stops for lunch and gas). For a good part of the trip through Virginia, there was stop-and-go traffic, with no apparent reason other than the sheer volume of vehicles on the road.

Although we had a terrific time on our vacation, it is nice to finally be home again. This was by far the longest vacation we’ve ever taken, and after sleeping in a dozen different beds, it was great to get a good night’s sleep in our own bed. Not surprisingly, the various hotel beds left something to be desired, with the sole exception of the Best Western in Marinette, Wisconsin, where we were able to upgrade to a room with a Tempur-Pedic mattress.

Looking back at the weather over the four-week span, I could have easily used Martha and the Vandellas’ “Heat Wave” as the title for any of my blog posts over the second half of the trip. However, I’m happy to say that at no time during the entire trip would “Stormy Weather” or “Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head” have been appropriate. So, although the rain never interfered with any of our plans, we did on several occasions refrain from some outdoor activities due to the uncomfortable heat and humidity.

Our Prius did well, more than meeting our expectations for gas mileage over the course of the road trip. Here are the final fuel statistics:

Total gallons purchased…. 99.927
Total cost…………………….. $412.61
Average cost per gallon….  $4.129
Total distance traveled…..   4,656 miles
Average miles per gallon..   46.6 mpg

I don’t think we had a favorite stop along the way. We enjoyed all of the sites that we visited. However, I would say that the Thousand Islands was the most scenic area, while Mackinac Island was the most relaxing and probably the place to which we would most likely return on vacation again some day.

I’ve enjoyed posting my blogs each night, keeping everyone up-to-date on our trip and leaving behind a recorded journal of our vacation. Presumably you’ve noticed that all of my blog titles represented the name of a song (some more well known than others), but just in case you missed that, here’s a recap, along with the artists who sang the tunes (note that many of these songs have been recorded by other artists as well).

• A Little Traveling Music Please – Barry Manilow
• The Long and Winding Road – The Beatles
• Bright Side of the Road – Van Morrison
• Islands In The Stream – Dolly Parton & Kenny Rogers
• Yesterday – The Beatles
• On The Road Again – Willie Nelson
• Skating Away (On The Thin Ice of a New Day) – Jethro Tull
• I’m Sittin’ On Top Of The World – Al Jolson
• Drive My Car – The Beatles
• Roll Out The Barrel (The Beer Barrel Polka) – traditional German song
• Living In The Past – Jethro Tull
• Peaceful Easy Feeling – The Eagles
• Travelin’ Thru – Dolly Parton
• Old MacDonald Had a Farm – traditional children’s song
• Shop Around – Smokey Robinson & The Miracles
• It’s A Beautiful Day – Queen
• The Lion Sleeps Tonight – The Tokens
• The Farmer In The Dell – traditional children’s song
• Summer In The City – The Lovin’ Spoonful
• Sweet Soul Music – Arthur Conley
• Song of the King – from “The King And I”
• Listen To The Music – The Doobie Brothers
• Old Nashville Cowboys – Hank Williams Jr.
• Grand Ole Opry – The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
• On Top Of Old Smoky – The Weavers
• Up On The Roof – The Drifters
• Downtown – Petula Clark
• Take The Highway – The Marshall Tucker Band
• Fly Me To The Moon – Frank Sinatra
• Home – Michael Bublé

I hope you’ve enjoyed traveling along with us over the past four weeks. It looks like my blogging career will come to an end now (at least for a while… who knows what the future holds?)

As Porky Pig always said… “Th-th-th-that’s all folks!”

Stu

Fly Me To The Moon…

… Or at least ten feet off the ground, as Orville Wright did on December 17, 1903, at Kitty Hawk in the Outer Banks, when he flew 120 feet in twelve seconds. Today, we visited the Wright Brothers National Memorial, a tribute to the accomplishments of Orville and Wilbur Wright in making the first successful airplane flights. The memorial includes a monument to the brothers, along with a statue depicting the first flight at Kitty Hawk, as well as various exhibits detailing the efforts leading up to the successful flight.

Before visiting the Kitty Hawk memorial, we spent a good part of the day exploring the Outer Banks, driving south as far as the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse (we decided to forego the ferry ride over to Ocracoke). The lighthouse, which is the tallest in the US at 208 feet, was actually moved from its original site nearby in 1999 due to fears that the ocean water would erode the base of the structure, causing it to collapse. We also stopped by the Bodie Island lighthouse, which stands only 156 feet tall.

We enjoyed the views of the beaches and dunes along the road, as well as the many colorful houses (built on stilts). For the most part, cars are allowed to drive on the beach, so I guess parking is not a problem. People just park their vehicles right by the water, set up their blankets or beach chairs and umbrellas, and enjoy the sand and surf.

As for wildlife, the most exotic sighting of the day was a four or five foot-long black snake that slithered across the road in front of our car as we were driving away from the Bodie Island lighthouse.

Today was another hot and humid day, although it did cool off this evening, making for a pleasant walk around the waterfront area of Manteo before retiring for the night.

This pretty much brings our vacation to a close. Tomorrow we’ll be heading home, with a five or six hour drive ahead of us.

I’ve enjoyed keeping everyone up-to-date on our travels… I’ll be back in the next day or two to provide some final thoughts on the trip.

Stu

Take The Highway

Today was a travel day, so not much to report (and no new photos). The drive from Asheville to the Outer Banks took about seven hours (excluding stops for lunch and gas). We arrived at the Tranquil Inn (our home for the next two days) in Manteo (on Roanoke Island) in time to take a quick walk around the nearby shops (and managed to spend some money too) before dinner.

The plan for tomorrow is to drive south along the islands and check out the beaches, dunes, wildlife, lighthouses, etc. and possibly take the ferry from Hatteras to Ocracoke Island.

More to come…

Stu

Downtown

The downtown areas of Black Mountain and Asheville, North Carolina, are probably not what Petula Clark had in mind when she sang her hit single many years ago, but that’s where we spent most of today.

We began the day with a visit to the Folk Art Center in Asheville, a crafts showcase (and store) run by the Southern Highland Craft Guild. After viewing some pretty neat (and of course expensive) crafts – quilts, furniture, art, sculpture, etc. – we continued on to the small town of Black Mountain, about fifteen minutes east of Asheville. We walked around the small downtown area, which has a nice collection of craft-type stores. From what we could see, there used to be a fair number of restaurants as well, but for some unknown reason (since the town seemed pretty busy) most of these establishments are now closed, while the remaining businesses seem to be doing well. This made it a little tougher finding a place for lunch and resulted in a wait of 15 or 20 minutes to get a table once we chose a restaurant.

Following our visit to Black Mountain, we returned to Asheville and spent the remainder of the afternoon walking through its somewhat larger downtown area. A bit more spread-out than Black Mountain, Asheville also sports a nice collection of interesting shops. There were also several interesting wall murals painted on some of the buildings (see photos).

That pretty much wrapped up our time in Asheville. We also made a quick stop to look at the McDonalds restaurant in Biltmore Village… probably the only McDonalds that contains a grand piano as well as a fireplace, tiled floor, nice wallpaper and other decor not typically found in a fast food restaurant.

The anticipated cold front did not really materialize today. Although temperatures may have been a few degrees cooler than the past several days, the weather continued to be hot and humid.

Tomorrow, we’ll be heading east to the Outer Banks… just about our longest one-day drive of the road trip, we can look forward to somewhere between seven and eight hours in the car.

Stay tuned,

Stu

Up On The Roof

The Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina… Built by George Vanderbilt between 1888 and 1895, the 250-room Biltmore mansion (with 43 bathrooms) is the largest privately owned home in the US at 175,000 square feet. This was today’s destination, as we spent pretty much the entire day on the estate grounds.

We began our visit with the “Legacy of the Land” tour, a 90-minute motorcoach drive around the estate during which we learned about the history of the land on which the estate stands, along with the various different structures and also the former residents of the mansion, starting with George Vanderbilt. In fact, the mansion remains in the family and is owned by the Biltmore Company, which is controlled by Vanderbilt’s grandson, Bill Cecil II.

After the motorcoach tour, we entered the mansion and took a self-guided tour of the house. The tour takes you up through the four main levels of the house, then back down to the basement and finally returns to the main floor. Millions of dollars have been spent to restore portions of the mansion to its original state and restoration continues throughout the building (which is not completely open to the public).

Later, I went on the “Rooftop” tour, which is a guided tour that takes you up to the roof of the mansion, as well as out onto several balconies, which are not accessible to the general public (i.e., without going on this tour). The tour also takes you through other “closed” portions of the house, where some restoration is currently underway. Despite the many steps and the heat up on the roof, the tour was well worth it for the views from the roof as well as the additional access to the mansion.

Following our time inside the house, we visited some of the Biltmore’s gardens and the conservatory, before heading back to our B&B for a brief rest before dinner.

The heat wave continued today, although it is expected to break tomorrow, as temperatures are forecast to drop into the mid-80’s. We’re hoping they’re right, but we’ll have to wait and see.

More to come…

Stu

On Top Of Old Smoky

This will be a short post, since today was basically a travel day as we headed from Nashville (TN) to Asheville (NC). We opted for the scenic route, driving through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The  trip through the park did provide a number of scenic views, although nothing spectacular. However, we did not deviate off the main road (i.e., US-441) and due to some on-and-off problems with Caren’s knee we decided not to risk taking any of the hiking paths to some of the more scenic waterfalls or other vistas. We did consider taking the Appalachian Trail to Katahdin, Maine (see photo), but figured we’d have a hard time getting back from the 1,972 mile hike before it got dark. The highlight of the day was seeing the car’s thermometer register 79 degrees for the outside temperature as we reached the higher elevations in the park… a significant drop from the 102-degree temperature it showed earlier in the day. We enjoyed the short-lived coolness while we could, but it didn’t last long.

The pace in Asheville should be a bit slower than some of the bigger cities we’ve visited recently. Depending on the weather, we will most likely go to the Biltmore Mansion tomorrow, the biggest attraction in the Asheville area.

Stay tuned,

Stu

P.S. – My apologies to Caren, who came up with the wonderful suggestion of “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” for today’s blog title. I had planned to use her suggestion until I came up with the more appropriate (at least in my mind) title above.

Grand Ole Opry

“There’ll be guitars and fiddles, Earl Scruggs and his banjo too;
Bill Monroe singing out them Old Kentucky Blues;
Ernest Tubb’s number ‘Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right’
At the Grand Ole Opry ev’ry Saturday night“
- from Grand Ole Opry by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band

Today began with a trip to the Belle Meade Plantation just outside of downtown Nashville. Before heading to the plantation, however, we had planned to have brunch at the Loveless Cafe, a Nashville landmark opened in 1951. However, after arriving at the cafe, we found that there was a wait of about an hour twenty minutes, so we visited a couple of craft stores next to the cafe, then decided to move on and ate elsewhere. We then made our way to Belle Meade, where we took a one-hour tour of the Mansion, where we learned the history of the plantation and the families that lived there. The tour focused on the late nineteenth century when the plantation functioned as a stud farm, breeding and training championship thoroughbred horses. In fact, many great horses, including Secretariat, along with recent Derby winners Funny Cide and Barbaro, can trace their bloodlines back to the Belle Meade stables.

Following our visit to Belle Meade, it was time to return to the music theme which has dominated the past four or five days, as we traveled over to Opryland. First, we took a backstage tour of the Grand Ole Opry House. Although neither Caren nor I are country music fans, the tour was interesting and it was fun to go out on the stage where so many famous artists have performed over the past thirty-plus years. The Grand Ole Opry is the longest running radio show, having started in 1925, with the format of the show having changed little throughout its history. However, the Opry has continued its growth over the many years, having frequently outgrown its venues. After some thirty years at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, the Opry opened its own auditorium back in 1974, where it still performs today.

Down the street from the Grand Ole Opry House stands the incredible Opryland Resort. With almost 3,000 rooms, the hotel is huge, but it’s the interior of the resort that is so amazing. The building features three separate glass-enclosed sections (the Cascades, the Garden Conservatory, and the Delta), each of which is filled with plants, fountains and even waterfalls. The Delta atrium contains its own “river,” where they offer a fifteen-minute boat tour of the atrium. A large fountain in the Delta atrium is the site of a water show (music with “dancing” fountains shooting water as high as fifty or more feet in the air), which we enjoyed during our visit. Many of the hotel’s rooms overlook one of these atrium areas, which makes for a great view.

Tomorrow, as we continue the final week of our road trip, we’ll leave Music City and head east to Asheville, North Carolina. The drive will take us through Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

More to come…

Stu

Old Nashville Cowboys

A Nashville cowboy himself, Hank Williams, Jr. sang “...old Nashville cowboys will sing for a dime… and hard times are cheap at the end of the line.” As we later learned at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, the Williams family did, indeed, encounter many hard times.

Following in Elvis’ footsteps, today we traveled from Memphis (where Elvis recorded his first hit at Sun Studio) to Nashville (where Elvis recorded more than 250 songs after his contract was sold to RCA for about $40,000) along the “Music Highway” (i.e., Interstate 40).

Arriving in Nashville (a.k.a. “The Music City”) in the early afternoon, we headed over to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, which is across the street from our hotel. Our visit to the Hall of Fame began with a bus ride down Music Row over to RCA Studio B for a one-hour guided tour. Studio B was the recording studio of choice for many country (and rock) stars after opening in 1957.  In addition to Elvis, artists recording at Studio B included Chet Atkins, Eddy Arnold, the Everly Brothers, Dolly Parton, and Roy Orbison.

Following the tour of Studio B, we returned to the museum and viewed the various exhibits which track the roots of country music from its early days to the present. A special exhibit reflects on the hard-luck story and the lasting legacy of the Williams family, while listening booths throughout the museum play a variety of country songs. The Hall of Fame rotunda contains plaques for each inductee of the Hall.

After dinner, we walked over to Broadway, Nashville’s somewhat tamer version of Memphis’ Beale Street. Similar to Beale Street, this strip of Broadway consists primarily of restaurants/bars with musicians performing in most of these venues.

On the weather front, the heat wave continues as temperatures have remained in the 90’s since we were in St. Louis, and the humidity has continued to be uncomfortable. As a result, we have focused on finding attractions that are primarily indoors and air-conditioned.

Tomorrow will be our final day in Nashville, with our current plans being to visit a few sites outside of downtown Nashville, including Belle Meade Plantation and the Opryland Resort.

Updated fuel facts: Through our 8th stop for gas…

Total gallons purchased…. 62.815
Total cost…………………….. $265.25
Average cost per gallon….  $4.223
Total distance traveled…..   2891.9 miles
Average miles per gallon..   46.0 mpg

Stay tuned,

Stu

Listen To The Music

Our final day in Memphis provided more of the music theme that was common on Wednesday and Thursday. We started the day with a bus tour of the city, which focused on the musical roots of Memphis. However, this was no ordinary bus tour. The “Memphis Mojo Tour” (from Backbeat Tours) is a unique way to learn more about the city’s deep musical history. The tour guide is a local Memphis musician who, in addition to relaying various stories about the sites we passed on the bus, also provides entertainment by singing (and playing guitar) throughout the ride. The audience (in our case, just a small group of six people) can join in as well, with tambourines and shakers provided at the beginning of the tour. Performing from a repertoire of Memphis-recorded songs, we heard various tunes from Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Elvis (of course) and others. The tour included a one-hour stop at Sun Studio, where Elvis recorded his first song (“That’s Alright Mama”) and numerous early rock and roll stars had their start (including Lewis, Cash, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, and others). The tour was definitely a lot of fun.

The next stop for the day (after lunch on Beale Street) was the Gibson Guitar Factory, where we had booked reservations for the 2:00 tour. The tour takes you through the factory (one of three Gibson factories in the US) where you can get fairly up-close-and-personal with the life cycle of a Gibson electric guitar. From cutting and bending the initial pieces of wood to gluing on the neck to sanding and painting and finally adding the electronic components and testing the finished product… you get to see it all as the workers go about their normal day-to-day activities. Even for non-guitarists (such as ourselves) it was fascinating to see the progression of the instrument. (I think Josh would have loved it.) And unlike a number of the sites we’ve visited recently, there were no restrictions on photographs (although no videos were allowed) within the factory.

After completing our tour at Gibson, we headed across the street to the Rock and Soul Museum. Created by the Smithsonian Institution, the exhibits at this museum focus on the birth of rock and soul music. After a brief introductory film, the museum is self-guided through the use of an audio tour guide. Having already visited the Stax recording studio and Sun Studio, some of the museum’s presentations were redundant. However, the overall visit was interesting, and the audio guide provided the ability to choose songs from a “juke box,” which was fun. Unfortunately, unlike the Gibson factory, the Rock and Soul Museum does not allow any photography at all within the exhibits.

That pretty much finished off our visit to Memphis… we now know more about the history of rock and roll, soul and other music than we ever thought we would. With our next stop being “Music City” (i.e., Nashville), we’ll probably be able to add country music to the list as well.

More to come,

Stu

Song of the King (from The King And I)

Today was a tale of two kings.

We began the day with a trip to Graceland, home of Elvis Presley… the King of Rock ‘n Roll. The Graceland visit starts with an audio tour of the mansion and continues with self-guided tours of Elvis’ Automobile Museum and his custom jets, along with exhibits of Elvis’ many stage costumes and an exhibit focusing on his time in the Army. The tour of course includes numerous audio and video recordings of Elvis performances, and also many photographs. Although we are not huge Elvis fans, the visit was interesting and we both enjoyed it.

From the King of Rock ‘n Roll to Martin Luther King… Our next stop was the National Civil Rights Museum, located on the site of the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, where Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated in April 1968. The museum chronicles key activities of the American civil rights movement through a wide variety of exhibits.  The museum also includes a separate location across the street from the hotel, in the boarding house where James Earl Ray allegedly fired the shot that killed Dr. King. A special exhibit focuses on the investigation into King’s murder and discusses the various conspiracy theories and the doubts raised over whether Ray was the actual assassin and, if so, whether or not he worked alone.

After finishing our tour of the civil rights museum, we headed back downtown and walked over to the Peabody Hotel to see the famous “marching ducks“. Each morning at 11:00am, five ducks head down the elevator and march along a red carpet over to the fountain in the center of the Peabody Hotel lobby. They spend the day in the fountain and then, at 5:00pm, the “duckmaster” leads the five ducks back from the fountain to the elevator, where they head back up to their “duck palace” on the hotel roof.  Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? Well, we had to see it to believe it, so along with a hundred or so other people, we crowded into the lobby and waited for the spectacle to begin. They make quite a show out of it… obviously a great marketing gimmick for the hotel, as it brings several hundred extra people into the hotel each day, with many of them buying drinks at the bar or spending money in one (or more) of the hotel’s various gift shops.

After the ducks completed their march, Caren and I moved on to Peabody Place, a nearby downtown shopping area that we had read about. We were surprised (and disappointed) to find that many of the stores (as well as the indoor mini-golf course and the 22-screen Muvico theater) in the mall had gone out of business and were closed up. From what we’ve seen over the past two days, it looks like downtown Memphis is in pretty poor economic shape right now.  With the exception of the main strip of Beale Street, where the restaurants, bars and gift stores seem to be thriving (or at least attracting crowds of people), the other streets we’ve walked through are almost deserted, with many businesses closed and gated.

Coming up tomorrow… a bus tour of Memphis, which includes a visit to Sun Studios… a tour of the Gibson guitar factory… and a visit to the Memphis Rock ‘n Soul Museum.

Stay tuned,

Stu