Trips with the Sibs

Of late, I have been remiss in chronicling our little jaunts to elsewhere.  I like to write about our trips while we're doing them, because I'm old and forget a lot of junk.  I've not done this on our last two little trips, because I was too busy both times.  I also didn't take my camera on either trip, except for the one in my phone, so I didn't take as many pictures as I usually do. 

In October, we joined The Husband's siblings - a younger brother and a younger sister - and their spouses for a weekend trip to Hot Springs, Arkansas.  Because we'd heard of a traffic jam on the interstate east of Little Rock, we took the long way, down to Mississippi, crossing the river at Helena, and detouring through Stuttgardt, Arkansas so that the menfolk could check out a store for game
hunters. 

 

 

We rolled into Hot Spring at about 2 p.m.  We checked into our hotel (The Arlington), then set off on foot to find food.  Just up the street from the hotel was a micro-brewery - I forget the name - that sold "artisan" beer and sandwiches.  After we ate, we wandered across the street to the Ohio Club and commenced to drinking (I highly recommend the Cadillac Margarita).  "A good while" later, after making our pictures with Al Capone, himself, we - um - "moseyed" on back to the hotel and spent a pleasant evening sitting on the patio by the pool. 

There was a band playing in the hotel lobby that night, and eventually we went down to check them out.  When the elevator doors opened, we were barely able to get out of the elevator for the crowd that was gathered in front of them.  I thought, "Dang, this band must be great!" but it turned out that what had drawn the crowd was the rumor that Bill Clinton was about to enter the premises.  Sure enough, in a few minutes, the man strolled in, shaking hands and workin' the crowd like a pro.  :) 

After a bit, the crowd disbursed, and we turned our attention to the band, 4 "mature" guys playing easy-listening stuff.  The band was ok.  More than watching them we enjoyed watching the dancers.  There was a "mature" couple on the floor for most of the songs.  They were smooth as silk, but I could not help but cringe at the get-up the woman was wearing:  a leopard print shirt and flesh-colored leggings. 

I do not recommend flesh-colored leggings for women of any age or build.  And that's all I'm going to say about that.  ;)

The next day, we had breakfast at a nearby pancake shop, then The Husband and I went to one of the bath houses for our first professional massage.  I am torn between thinking it was the best thing that ever happened to me and thinking that it was a completely impractical and frivolous expenditure.  When it was over, I'd have given anything if I'd had somebody to tote me back to the hotel and dump me in the bed.  As it was, we made it as far as the front porch of the bath house, where we plunked ourselves into rocking chairs until we could work up the gumption to walk back to the hotel.

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering through the many shops on the "main drag."  Dinner on the patio at Ronaldo's that night was good.  Drinks in the hotel lobby afterward.

There was a film festival in process at the hotel that weekend.  We caught glimpses of "Mr. Sulu" from Star Trek, and my sister-in-law cornered him for a photo as we were on our way out the door to go home.  It was a fun weekend.

This past weekend, we went to New Orleans with the sister and brother-in-law.  They have a son who plays in the University of Memphis marching band, and since the UofM was scheduled to play Tulane in New Orleans on Saturday, we drove down on Friday, went to the game on Saturday, and came home today.  (Memphis won!)  We stayed in a hotel in Metairie and drove down to the French Quarter for dinner at Oceana Grill on Friday night before venturing onto Bourbon Street for a while.  We met up with some cousins at the game on Saturday, and when the game was over, we all went back to Bourbon Street.  When our feet and ears and noses couldn't take it anymore, we called it a night and ransomed our vehicle from the riverside parking lot.  This morning, we stopped for breakfast at a little diner in Hammond, then headed home.

Places like Hot Springs and New Orleans are fun for a little while, but I do not enjoy traffic and  crowds, and it is really good to be home.  :)

Joe Wheeler Camping Trip - July 26, 2014 - Homeward Bound

The last day of camping sucks, for not only is it the last day of the vacation (a bummer in itself), but we have to get the camper ready to roll.

This means washing up the dishes, cleaning the counters, sweeping the floors, and putting away everything that might shift when the camper moves.  It means emptying stinky plumbing tanks, storing the lawn chairs, sweeping and folding and putting away the exterior rugs.  It means retracting awnings and hoses and cords, folding up steps, hitching up the truck, and attaching sway bars and such.

Both The Husband and I are always tired, grumpy, and sopping wet with sweat by the time we're finished.  We pulled out about 10 this morning. and, thankfully, had an uneventful drive home.  The drive took almost 5 hours, with only one quick stop for a potty break. 

And then, once we got home, we had to unhitch the camper, set it back up in its usual spot, and haul everything into the house - dirty laundry, clean laundry, food items, and electronic toys - and put it all away again.  Since I took my sewing machine and a bag of sewing projects, we had even more lugging to do this trip. 

But we have about got this thing down to a science.  In less than thirty minutes after we began backing the camper into the driveway, we'd emptied the camper and were inside the house, resting under the air conditioning.  The washing machine is running with the first load of laundry.  As soon as the sheets and towels come out of the dryer, we'll take them out to the camper, make up the bed, put away the towels, and our rolling motel will be ready to roll again.

One more thing:

I finally got a picture of the "shoe tree."  This tree is on the north side of Hwy. 72, just inside the Alabama state line, around mile marker 4 or 5.  You might not be able to see them very well in this picture (they're more visible when the leaves fall), but the tree is full of shoes.  When I see things like this, I always wonder how they got started.  Who flung the first pair of shoes in that tree, and why?  It's a mystery.  But one of these days, I'm going to try my best to hurl an old pair of my tennis shoes up in that tree when we go by.  ;)

Joe Wheeler Camping Trip - 7-25-14 - Sheffield





 



On our first night at Joe Wheeler, as we were going to dinner at the lodge, we picked up a handful of local attraction brochures, one of which was a schedule of events for W.C. Handy Week.  Handy was born in the Shoals area (Florence, I think), and there were music events, all day, every day, all week, somewhere in the Shoals.  We nearly wore out that brochure trying to decide what to do.  On taps for Friday was a concert on the lawn at the City Hall in Sheffield from 12 to 1:30.  A band called "Doctors, Lawyers, and Such" was playing, and we wanted to see them, so after a leisurely breakfast, we headed to Sheffield.

Let me take a moment to talk about the towns of Florence, Muscle Shoals, Tuscumbia, and Sheffield.  I suppose that in "olden days," these towns may have been far apart, but these days urban spread has made them virtually one big ol' town.  But for city limits signs, you'd hardly know when you'd left one town and entered another. 

We got to Sheffield a little early, and for about 30 minutes listened to the band's sound check.  The weather was absolutely perfect.  A little after noon, they took up their instruments and started playing.  They were an absolute delight.  Talk about variety!  They eased out cowboy songs ("Drifting Along With The Tumblin' Tumbleweeds"), show tunes ("Summertime (and the Living is Easy)"), Eagles songs, Kansas songs, a Pure Prairie League song, and a bluegrass song called "Moonshine."  We loved it. 

It was almost 2 p.m. when they quit, and we were hungry.  We walked down the street a bit so that I could take a picture of a statue I'd seen from the City Hall lawn.  On the way there, we spotted a restaurant called "Brimstone."  Their sign said they were open until 2.  We sneaked in just under the wire.  They call the place "Brimstone" because many of the menu items are spicy.  There was a bottle of Louisiana Hot Sauce on every table.  They serve wraps, burgers, hot wings, etc.  The Husband had the A-1 Onion Burger.  I had the Cajun Burger.  Both were delicious!   There were also three burgers on the menu that I was scared to try - I believe they called them Hellfire I, Hellfire II, and Hellfire III, because they came with habanero, ghost, and (some other insanely hot) pepper, respectively. 

After lunch, we moseyed on back to the camp site.  A Tina Turner impersonator was scheduled to perform on the patio at the lodge that evening.  We intended to go see her, but after lounging around a bit, we were too lazy to get out again, so we spent the rest of the evening fooling with our electronic toys (the campground has Wi-Fi).  Since we ate lunch so late, we just snacked on left-over cheese dip and chips, and called it a night.

Going home tomorrow.

Joe Wheeler Park - July 24, 2014

Genealogy research is one of my hobbies.  I've been searching for some of my mother's maternal ancestors for years, and my best guess is that this family lived in Franklin County, Alabama during the Civil War.  Unfortunately, the Franklin County courthouse burned - and all the official records with it - in 1890, and I have been unable to locate more than a smidgeon of information online about this family.  Since we are camping in an area that adjoins Franklin County, today's mission was to peruse the Franklin County Archive in the hope that someone had donated some information about my family.

It was about an hour's drive down to Russellville, where the Archive is located.  We arrived at 11 a.m., fully aware that the lone volunteer, Miss Chris, would be closing for lunch from 12 to 1.  She pulled out a couple of books and a folder, and we had time to thumb through them before noon.  As the lunch hour approached, we asked her to recommend a good place to eat that was not a chain restaurant.  She recommended "Too Fat Sisters" on Hwy. 43.  We'd seen the delightful sign on our way in, and knew just where it was.

The parking lot was full of cars when we arrived - always a good sign.  The lunch special was a meat and three vegetable sides - things like meatloaf, country fried steak, grilled chicken, white beans, fried okra, turnip greens, and macaroni and cheese.  (Are you hungry yet?)   Everything was delicious, and the wait staff was friendly and attentive.  We left there so full that we could barely move, all for $15.

Back at the Archives, we quickly realized that we were out of luck in finding any more family information.  As we were preparing to leave, Miss Chris asked if we liked fried pies.  Of course, we said, "Yes!"  She went back to her office and returned with a brown paper bag that held several fried peach pies, and she handed them to us, explaining that a friend had brought them to her, but that she was diabetic and could not eat them.  We gratefully took them off her hands.  As soon as we got in the truck, The Husband pinched off a piece of one of the pies and shared it with me.  Mmmmm!  Heaven!

Our next stop was the Coon Dog Cemetery.  (Cross one entry off my bucket list!)    This cemetery is located about 12 miles down Hwy. 247 (from Hwy. 72), and then about 5 more miles down another country road.  We were surprised at how many graves were there, and how neatly kept it was.  We were also surprised when we looked at the guest register and discovered that nearly 300 people had visited the cemetery in the month of July alone. 

Only first-class, A-1, top coon dogs are accepted for burial there.  It's a very exclusive club!

Wonderful epitaphs on the stones.  This one said, "If he treed in a mailbox you'd better open it and look."

After leaving the Coon Dog Cemetery, and following Miss Chris's suggestion, we went to the Colbert County Courthouse in Tuscumbia to search for my long-lost ancestors among that county's records.  Colbert County was formed in 1867 and had originally been part of Franklin County, so it was possible that the records we wanted were in Colbert, rather than Franklin.  We struck out again.  After that, we hurried to the public library in Florence, Alabama, where Miss Chris said there were old newspapers on microfilm and a professional genealogist on staff to help us find records.  Strike three.  Either the family tree chart entries for these people will remain blank, or I will have to make up something to put in the blanks.

We probably would not have made the trip to Florence except that this week is W.C. Handy Week in the Shoals - there's music all day, every day this week, somewhere in the vicinity - and we wanted to hear a choir that was to perform at a church in Florence at 6 p.m.  We had just enough time after the library visit to walk the downtown area a little bit and have a drink at a local pub before the choir performed.  Downtown Florence is very pretty and trendy, and the choir - the Quad Cities Mass Choir - was AWESOME.  We were glad we'd made that detour.

It was almost dark by the time we made it back to the camper.  We were tired and hot, but we had a fun day. 

The Husband suggested that we "rest" tomorrow in preparation for our trip home.  However, before the evening was over, he discovered that a group called, "Doctors, Lawyers, and Such" will be performing in Sheffield, Alabama at noon tomorrow, and we may have to go see them.  Tomorrow night, there will be music here in the park and we will definitely see that.

Until tomorrow!

Joe Wheeler Park Camping Trip - July 23, 2014 - Huntsville Day Trip

Not long after breakfast this morning, we set out on a day trip to Huntsville, Alabama, about 50 miles away. 

Our first stop was Monte Sano Park.  We almost took the camper there instead of Joe Wheeler, but opted for Joe Wheeler because it was closer and has more full hook-up sites.  A note for would-be Monte Sano campers:  don't try to tow a camper through the "northern" route that your GPS or phone map app will show.  This route goes right through residential neighborhoods with narrow streets and hairpin curves.  Instead, go the "southern" route, down highway 231/431/Governer's Blvd, and up Monte Sano Road.  It's a much straighter, less congested route.

"Monte Sano" means "mountain of health," so named because of the mineral springs in the area. 

 

The camp sites at Monte Sano were very nice.  Most of them were level and clean, and a number of them had full hook-ups.  The park has a planetarium and observatory, which is open only on Saturdays.  The park was built in the 1930s as a part of the Civilian Conservation Corps.  At the overlook there is a tiny "hut" that serves as a CCC museum.  It is not normally open on Wednesdays (the day we were there), but a park volunteer was working on an outdoor classroom for elementary students, and he was kind enough to let us in the museum.

 

This park is somewhat strange, as it is right smack in the middle of Huntsville.  Near the park is the Burritt Living Museum, which we did not visit but is apparently a sort of village that shows how things were done in days gone by.  

The overlook at Monte Sano

 

We did not stop at Burritt because we had another destination on our list, the Constitution Village.  This, too, was right in the middle of Huntsville, nestled between the courthouse and the hospital complex, in the actual location where 44 delegates from the 22 Alabama counties in existence in 1819.  The buildings are reproductions but were built from plans of the original buildings that were on file.  If you go, opt for the guided tour, which will give you far more details/knowledge than you'd get just touring the place on your own.  There is a cabinet shop (the building in which the delegates met), a post office/law office/surveyor's office, a blacksmith shop, a print shop, and a family residence.  Unfortunately for us, a thunderstorm came up during the middle of our tour, and the village manager came out and said that they could not allow their tour guide to be out walking around during a storm.  She passed out umbrellas and said that we were welcome to tour the remaining buildings on our own. 

It was almost 2 p.m. by the time we finished our Constitution Village tour.  We were hungry but wanted to get out of downtown Huntsville to eat, so we headed back in the direction from whence we had come.  Finding some place to eat was difficult because of our self-imposed travel rule:  we don't eat at chain restaurants when we're traveling.  This is kind of tough when you're driving down major highways.  We drove all the way back to Rogersville (where Joe Wheeler park is located) without finding some place we wanted to eat.  We ended up stopping at a grocery store for food to eat back at the camp site.

I'm not sure what's on the agenda for tomorrow, maybe the much longed-for visit to the Coon Dog Cemetery near Russellville, Alabama.  ;)

Hernando Point at Arkabutla Lake, Hernando, MS - July 18-22, 2014

Our son and daughter-in-law invited us to join them and our grandchildren on a weekend camping trip to Hernando Point campground at Arkabutla Lake in Hernando, Mississippi.  It was an easy 2-hour drive from our house.  We stayed in campsite 18, which was very level and had a view of the lake.  The only drawback was that none of the campsites had full hookups - we had water and electricity, but no sewer. 

After setting up camp Friday evening, our kids fed us our supper, so I didn't even have to cook that night.  Bonus!  It was extraordinarily cool for the middle of July.  Evidently, however, some Alaskan mosquitoes flew down to join the party.  They nearly ate us up all weekend.

On Saturday, some of our daughter-in-law's friends and relatives joined us.  It seems like we ate all day.  Hot dogs.  Corn on the cob.  S'mores.  The kids fished, played Uno and checkers, rode bicycles, caught baby frogs (of which there was an abundance).  My son brought his guitar and serenaded us by the campfire that night.

Sunday, everyone left, except us.  We grilled steaks and had a leisurely afternoon and evening.

Monday, The Husband had to go to work, but I didn't, and both of us had the remainder of the week off.  Our plan was to stay at Hernando Point until Tuesday morning, then hitch up and move to Joe Wheeler park in north-central Alabama.  So, Monday morning, I kissed The Husband goodbye and settled in for a long day by myself - no car, no internet, no fishing gear, no bike....  What's a gal to do in a little camper all day by herself?  Fortunately, I'd thought to bring along my sewing machine and some fabric for a sewing project that I started a couple of weeks ago but had not had time to finish.  While The Husband was at work, I sat at the "kitchen table" sewing, stopping only for stretching and bathroom breaks.  I was still sewing - but about to get tired of it - when he came "home" later that night. 

This morning, we cooked breakfast, packed up the camper, and drove to Joe Wheeler park.  This park has over 100 camp sites, most of which have full hook-ups.  Some of the camp sites are short and fairly close together, but most of them are shady and fairly level.  We checked out all of the camp sites and chose site #12.  It is plenty long for our 31-foot camper AND our truck.   

Tomorrow, we'll be out and about, checking out things to do in the area.  Huntsville, Alabama is about 50 miles from here, and there is plenty to do there.  We also want to check out Monte Sano park, which is just outside Huntsville, for a future trip. 

We've been to Alabama several times this year, to camp and do genealogy research.  In Franklin county, there is a Coon Dog Cemetery (no kidding), and every time we pass the signs, I say, "We've GOT to go there."  And, dang it, this trip, we WILL.

J.P. Coleman State Park Camping Trip

The destination:  J.P. Coleman State Park, on Pickwick Lake just inside the Mississippi state line.  The plan was to leave on Tuesday morning and come home Saturday.

But it rained on Monday, with more rain predicted for the next few days, and we backed out.  I cancelled my trip to the grocery store for camping food and road snacks.  We spent most all day Tuesday looking for other places to go where it wasn't raining, or even places where we'd stay in a hotel instead of camping, but we couldn't agree on an alternate destination.  Finally, we decided to go with the original plan, so Wednesday morning we loaded up and headed out for Mississippi.

Wednesday:  We'd reserved camp site #28, which was on a hill overlooking the lake.  The Husband backed the camper into the camp site.  It was barely long enough to accommodate our camper, but we finally got it in there.  The camp site was not very level, and it took all of the leveling blocks we owned to level the camper.  After putting down the legs and unhitching the camper from the truck, we discovered that the sewer hose would not reach the sewer pipe.  We hitched everything up again, raised the legs, and moved the camper so far back into the camp site that the rear legs of the camper were off the asphalt pad, and the sewer hose would still barely reach.  The ground sloped off so steeply past the pad that we had to build up support for camper's rear legs with rocks and boards that we found at the camp site.  We leveled the camper again, and then discovered that a tree on the front side of the camper was too close to enable us to extend the camper's awning (which we figured we'd need, since more rain was on the way).  As we were standing there, scratching our heads and trying to decide what to do, I was about to tell The Husband, "F* this camping trip," when I noticed that camp site #27 was longer, more level, had no trees to get in the way of anything, and was EMPTY.  We called the office to ask if we could switch to #27.  When they said we could, we hitched everything up AGAIN, moved to #27, and repeated the leveling process.  We were plumb worn out by the time we finally got the camper parked, leveled, and hooked up to the utilities in #27.  Whew.  We rested a while, during which time it rained, then the sun came out, then it rained more, then the sun came out WHILE it was raining, and a rainbow shot up out of the lake.  We just sat under the awning and watched it glow.  Later that evening, we drove to the closest town, Iuka, to raid the grocery store for camper food and supplies that I would've bought on Monday, had we not wavered in our plans.

Thursday:  After breakfast, we drove to Corinth, Mississippi, to look around.  Corinth is a small, old, historic town, but it has surprisingly good shopping and restaurants.  When we were researching things to do in the area, we read about an old drugstore on the town square (Borrum's) that served handmade milkshakes, and we headed there first.  By then, it was almost lunch time, and the place was PACKED, with a line nearly out the door.  We decided to look around a little more, and come back for milkshakes later.  We'd heard about Corinth's famous "slugburgers," which feature thin, deep-fried patties made from a mixture of beef and pork (we did not inquire about which parts of the cows and pigs went into the mixture) and a vegetable or grain filler.  No slugs.  (Back in the early 1900s, they cost a nickel, hence the term "slug.")  We bravely tried them.  They were not bad - tasted sort of like a truck stop hamburger (pickles, onions, and mustard).  Afterward, we toured the Crossroads Museum, drove around the old part of town to see the stately old homes, did a little shopping, and then went back to Borrum's and ordered milkshakes (yum).  On Thursday nights in Corinth, folks gather on the square to play bluegrass music.  The "regulars" noted our "new" faces and were very friendly.  One guy, the spokesperson for the group, asked our names, and then welcomed us by name from the microphone before the music began.  We waved and said "hey" when he called our names.  ;)  The bluegrass music was awesome!  But storm clouds started to gather.  My sister texted me from her home, "Batten down the hatches, a storm is headed your way."  We kept watchful eyes on the sky, not wanting to leave, for Wayne Jerrolds, an amazing fiddler from Savannah, Tennessee, was supposed to perform with his group later in the evening.  As the skies grew darker, the crowd virtually disappeared, and the musicians began packing their instruments into their cases.  I commented to one of the musicians who had performed earlier that I regretted not getting to see Mr. Jerrolds play.  I saw her walk over and speak to Mr. Jerrolds, and to our delight, he and his group unpacked their instruments, settled down on the courthouse steps, and played (to an audience of about 10, including us) some of the best bluegrass we'd ever heard.  When a few fat raindrops began to fall, we all skedaddled.  It rained on us all the way back to the park, but we'd had a fun day.

Friday:  My sister and brother-in-law drove over from Memphis to hang out with us for a few hours.  We drove around Pickwick Lake, had lunch, and did a little flea market perusing before they headed back home.  By then, the weather was perfect for camping - sunny and warm, with a cool breeze coming off the lake.  We cooked our supper outside on the Coleman stove, ate outside, and sat outside until long past dark, enjoying a surprisingly bug-free evening.

Saturday:  Going-home day is always a busy day for a camper.  It always seems to me that we have to pack up, unhook, and re-hitch far more at the end of a camping trip than we'd unpacked, hooked, and unhitched at the beginning.  But we took our time over a leisurely breakfast cooked and eaten outside, and then set to work readying the camper for the trip home. 

As always, it was good to get home, especially since our next stop would be to visit a brand new granddaughter (8 lbs,, 1 oz.) who was born while we were gone.

Lake Guntersville Camping Trip

Wednesday morning we hitched up the camper and pulled it down to Lake Guntersville State Park in northeast Alabama.  This part of the country is so beautiful, even though the late winter has delayed the trees from leafing out.  It took us a long time to get here because the wind was blowing at seemingly hurricane force and tried several times to snatch the camper right off our bumper.  We finally arrived at about 4 p.m. and started setting up camp.

We were not particularly thrilled with the campground area.  A tornado tore through here a couple of years ago and uprooted or damaged many of the trees in the campground.  They've re-planted trees, but they are just getting established.  Consequently, most of the campground has no shade.  The campsites are pretty close together.  About 40 or 50 campsites have full hookups (water, electricity, and sewer), and wi-fi is available.

Because we arrived in the middle of the week, we pretty  much had our choice of camp sites.  We picked one very close to the edge of the lake, where we could sit under our awning and enjoy the view.  Ducks, geese, herons, cranes, and coots came and went.  Boats zoomed by.  Folks fished from the shore and the docks.  It was pretty good viewing.

Once upon a time, my father's ancestors lived in this part of the country.  We made a quickie trip down here last October so that I could do some genealogy research, but I didn't get far.  Part of the plan for this trip was to go back to courthouses and archives to do more digging.  We got up Thursday morning, cooked and ate breakfast, then hit the road to St. Clair County, 50 miles or so down the road.  On the way we made several detours, one to an area in Etowah County where I believe some ancestors lived, and one to the John Looney House, a pioneer house in St. Clair County that was built around 1820.  When we arrived at the Looney House, the gate was locked and posted with a "No Trespassing" sign.  We waited around a little while, thinking perhaps the attendant(s) had gone to lunch, but nobody came, so we drove on down to Ashville.  We ate some good barbeque sandwiches at The Lunch Box, a tiny restaurant a block from the courthouse, before heading to the archive building.  That day's research went well, but I'd love to spend more time there.

The Looney House, built around 1820, the oldest structure in St. Clair County, now open only on special occasions or by appointment.  Note the double-decker "dog trot."

By the time we got back to our campsite, the campground had grown more crowded.  We had neighbors, fore and aft...neighbors with multiple children...and dogs.  The noise level had gone up a tad.

Yesterday, we needed to run a few errands.  It took half the day.  We came back, ate some lunch, sat around a while, and then drove up to another park about 15 miles from here called "Buck's Pocket."

The campground at Buck's Pocket is AWESOME.  It is situated along a rushing stream.  The camp sites are shady.  Some of them have full hook-ups.  All of them are beautiful.  The thing is that the roads in/out of the campground are narrow, steep, and curvy.  There were two fairly large campers set up in the campground, but they appear to be "permanent" guests.  It may be that they got in there and couldn't get out!  It surely was beautiful, peaceful, and quiet there.  If we come this way again, we may try to stay there, after we talk to the park ranger about the best way to get in/out!

The stream beside the campground at Buck's Pocket.

Lake Guntersville park has a big lodge/hotel overlooking the lake, and on Friday nights the restaurant in the lodge puts on an all-you-can-eat seafood buffet.  Neither of us was in the mood to cook last night, so we drove up the hill to the lodge.  The food was okay.  Just okay.  Fried catfish, baked perch, fried shrimp, fried clam strips, boiled shrimp, crab legs, and some steamed vegetables.  $19.95 per person.  We thought it was a little pricey for no more than we ate.

I don't know what's on the agenda for today.  We go home tomorrow.

I'll let you know if anything cool happens between now and then.  ;)

Blues Trail - February 14 - 16, 2014

 Friday, February 14 - My friend Elizabeth planned a weekend trip to Clarksdale, Mississippi as a birthday surprise for her husband Bill, who is a huge blues fan.  She invited us to join them.  They drove west from Atlanta, and we drove south from Memphis.  We planned to rendezvous in Clarksdale around 5 p.m.  Rain was pouring down when we left Memphis.  We thought it an auspicious start to a blues weekend.




Elizabeth had reserved a two-bedroom cabin at the Shack-Up Inn just outside Clarksdale.  This place is a wild conglomeration of old buildings - an old gin, some sharecropper cabins, etc. - fixed up with enough modern amenities to be reasonably comfortable.  The buildings are grouped around a common yard, with picnic tables and park benches scattered around.  The cabins are named for blues artists or blues themes.

Our cabin was called "Legends."   It was a typical southern "shotgun"-style cabin - one room wide, three rooms long, with entrances at both ends.  Joel and I arrived about 3:30 p.m., got the key from the office inside the gin building, and drove around to the cabin.  We parked our truck so that Bill could not easily see our Tennessee license plates when he arrived, as Elizabeth had kept both the destination and our joining them a secret from him.  We unlocked the door and stepped right into the cabin's rear bedroom.  The center room was divided into a kitchen and bathroom.  The front room held a bed, a sofa and chair whose better days were long ago, and a TV that offered nothing but blues music.  Pictures of blues artists decorated the walls. 

Nearly every wall and door surface in every room was covered with graffiti of past visitors (we added our own names and the date to a bedroom door).  The floors were creaky, and the walls shook with every step.  Our bed had been leveled with a stack of magazines and phone books under one leg. 





 



 

But the cabin was warm, and the sheets and the bathroom were clean.  There was a coffee pot (with coffee and fixin's), a dorm-sized refrigerator, and a microwave.  We stashed our luggage out of sight, started a pot of coffee, set out a loaf of banana nut bread that we'd brought from home, and then high-tailed it to the gin lobby so as not to detract from Bill's initial cabin experience when he and Elizabeth arrived.  We bought ourselves a beer in the lobby and browsed the gift shop.  About 45 minutes later, our friends arrived and joined us in the lobby.  Bill was still in shock.  ;)

 

"The Crossroads" in Clarksdale

Not wanting to waste a minute of our blues vacation, we piled into our truck and headed straight for the Ground Zero Blues Club to eat supper and listen to some blues.  A band called "Sweet Tea Jubilee" was the act that night.  We ate hamburgers (they were really, really good!) and fries, had a couple of drinks, and listened to the band's first set (they were good, too!).  But we'd all gotten up early that morning, and Elizabeth and Bill were tired after their long drive, so when the band took a break, we headed back to our cabin for the night.

 

Ground Zero Blues Club by day

 

Saturday, February 15 - Road Trip Day - We got up pretty early this morning, drank some coffee, ate banana nut bread and pound cake, and talked about what to do.  Elizabeth had made a list of attractions in a reasonable radius.  Since Bill was the honoree of this trip, he picked our destinations this day.  He loves tamales, so we decided to make it a blues trail/tamale trail day.  After a late breakfast in Clarksdale, we drove out to Ms. Ervin's house for two dozen of her amazing, delicious tamales, then we drove across the river to Helena, Arkansas to sample Pasquale's tamales.  While in town, we toured the Delta Museum, the site of the King Biscuit radio show.

 

On the way back to Clarksdale, we hunted up the place were Muddy Waters' cabin used to sit (the cabin, itself, is now inside the Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale). 

 

Muddy Waters

A cool tree in the Mississippi delta





 

After our road trip, we went back to the cabin for a while.  Bill's sister and brother-in-law, Rosemarie and Al, were driving down from Memphis, and we planned to go out to dinner and then go to Red's juke joint to listen to some blues.  We'd heard that they served bbq ribs at Red's, and that sounded fine to us.  When they arrived, Bill showed them around the place, then we all headed for Red's. 

 

If we had not heard good things about Red's, we might not have been brave enough to go in.  Glitz and glamour, it ain't.  The lounge was about the size of our cabin.  There was a bar along one wall, and a tiny stage on the opposite wall.  It was drafty, and there were portable electric heaters all around the room.  There were a couple of comfy recliners at one end of the stage, and a couple of tables with stools at the opposite end.  The place was pretty well packed.  We paid our cover charge and scanned the room for a place to land.  At the far end of the room, there was laughter from a group of men huddled around a laptop computer.  We asked the guy at the door what was going on.  He said they were doing an interview with a Hollywood producer who was interested in doing a reality show about Delta blues clubs.  We threaded our way through the crowd and went to the back of the room where we could hear what was going on.  Several people in the crowd - the club owner, the deejay, and some of the "regulars" were giving their take on life in Clarksdale and what blues music meant to them.  They even interviewed Al!

 

When the interview was over, the music started.  The featured artist was a 15-year-old guitarist named Chris "Kingfish" Ingram.  (He, too, had given an interview.)  This kid was freakin' INCREDIBLE.  Look for him on YouTube; he's going places, if he plays his cards right.

 

I kept looking around, wondering where the ribs were. 

 

When the first set ended, Rosemarie and Al said goodbye and headed back to Memphis.  The rest of us grouped up and decided to go look for something to eat.  When we stepped outside, Red was grilling ribs on a large grill on the sidewalk.  They were done, and he was offering samples, hot off the grill.  We could not resist.  They  were delicious.  Red offered us more, but we hated to be pigs.  We walked back to our truck licking our fingers.

Unfortunately, most every restaurant in Clarksdale was closed by the time we left Red's.  We had to break our travel pact (no eating at chain restaurants) to get something to eat.  We hit the drive-thru window at Burger King and took the burgers back to the cabin.  We ate our burgers standing up in the "kitchen," then everybody hit the sack.

 

Sunday, February 16 -
 



We got the blu-uuuues...
OHHHHHH, we got the blu-uuuuues....
We got them early Sunday morning'
Cain't get no hot biscuits blu-uuuuuues.

Fo' sho'.

Evidently, they don't eat breakfast in Clarksdale.  At least, they don't eat it in restaurants.

After a leisurely early morning of Bloody Marys on the back porch, we went into town in search of breakfast.  We wanted a sit-down breakfast at a place where the biscuits were hot and a waitress kept the coffee coming.  We went north.  We went south.  We went east.  We went west. 

We found no such place in Clarksdale. 

We looked for breakfast for so long that it got to be lunch-time, and we pulled in to a bbq restaurant called "Abe's" and had ribs and barbeque with baked beans and slaw. 



Heisenberg

After that big brunch, we stood outside in the sunshine, trying to decide what to do next.  When Bill said it would suit him to go back to the cabin and chillaxe with a cigar on the back porch and maybe take a nap, we seconded, thirded, and fourthed the motion.  Back at the cabin, we had a photo shoot, then sat outside in the sunshine at a picnic table outside our cabin.  Eventually, we moved inside, fired up the computer (there was a wi-fi connection) and watched a couple episodes of "Breaking Bad." 

Although we could've stayed another night, Joel and I were missing did our bed.  About 4 p.m., we packed it up and came home. 

Grabbed a pizza on the way home.  Came in, put on the house pants, and settled down to watch "Downton Abbey." 

We had a great time, but it's good to be home.