Day Six; Thursday, July 5th , 2007
11:20am
Slept in a bit this morning, it was good to get some extra sleep time in. Woke up and watched some TV. I think maybe around 1 or 2 I will head downtown. Didn’t make it down there last night, just didn’t feel much like leaving the room after I got back here. That sun really drains you down here in the south. I think I’m slowly understanding why people are so laid back, they’re to exhausted to not be haha. This is the last day in Memphis. So if I plan to see a sunset on MS river it needs to be today!!
Got downtown and checked out a few sites.
Fire museum;
The fire museum was very interesting. Lots of old fire trucks and fire fighting equipment. They also had some modern stuff you could interact with. The upstairs of the old fire house has a history of the famous fires in Memphis. It was in this fire museum where I inquired about the police museum. Seems they closed it a few years ago, and were thinking of redoing the old police station right next door to the fire museum and making that it’s new home. Sadly they never did that.
Pyramid;
There is a large pyramid downtown, which is an arena for performances. On the first day here we encountered a gentlemen downtown and asked him about the pyramid. He explained that there is a Memphis Egypt, the sister city of Memphis TN. The pyramid was erected to honor that.
I was hoping for some good shots of the pyramid, butt sadly it was closed when we went there. I did manage to get a few pictures though.
Beale St. @ night;
The downtown nightlife is amazing. I have been on Beale during the day, but nothing tops the atmosphere at night. The neon signs of every building are lit up. The people are everywhere. Local blues musicians playing in all the bars, and on some street corners. It’s like Las Vegas but with blues music. Most the bars have street access walk up windows where you can order beer to go. I have never seen anything like that.
Started out with some food, hit up Blues City Café, which is right across the street from B.B. Kings Blues Club. I had heard they have the 2nd best ribs in town. So I just had to try them. And I would say they come in third out of the three places I have eaten ribs down here. The meat was def tender it fell right off the bone, but the flavor was just meh.
After a little roaming about and listening to a blues band in an open air bar, ventured into a pool hall to cool off and rest a bit. Played a few games of pool on an antique Brunswick table. All the tables in the pool hall were nearly 100 years old, it was kind of exciting for me to play on them. But the list of flaws with there tables goes on forever; old worn cloth, old stiff rubber on the rails, the slate seams had popped on a few tables, excessive table roll due to most likely an un level table. But it was still a great time.
The travels of Beale brought us to a bar where an Elvis impersonator was performing, not the best job though on his part. We soon left and ventured down the street to karaoke. That was fun. Performing on the famous Beale st. , like so many music legends had in the past. I did my usual “Devil went down to Georgia”, and followed it up with “Ghost riders in the sky” which I sadly did horribly. Angie sang Blue and Crazy by Patsy Kline. She has a great voice, but could have kicked up her volume a little bit. We also came across a bar that had goats, yup live goats, it was very strange.
The night came to a close as we were about to leave and I heard Johnny Cash, there was a tribute three piece covering Johnny Cash. The man signing sounded just like him, so much so that if you closed your eyes you’d swear it was Johnny there. His guitarist actually played with Johnny for a while. I had to congratulate him on a job more then well done. He told me “thanks, but that’s cause Johnny’s not here to make me look bad”. I also told the guitarist (who use to play with Johnny) how great they were, got to shake his hand. I tell yah I felt like a little kid again, sitting there listening to great Johnny cash songs, it was truly as if he was there.
Once their show came to a close I got a picture with them, and told them again how great they were. It was then time to head back to the hotel, call it a night and rest up for the morning. The few drinks of the night are sure to make sleep come easy for me. Beale St. was such a wondrous time.
12:45am (technically Friday)
Sadly some overcast this evening prevented me from getting a great picture of the sunset on the Mississippi river. I was hoping to witness that with my own eyes and not just through a postcard I bought. In all my last day here in Memphis was most definitely a great one. The people, the rich history, the music, it is such a great city.