Day 7 of my road trip home

My children reminded me, that I haven't posted the final day of my road trip.

My last post summarized the first six days of my trek home. 

The morning of January 20th I headed off for the Columbus Zoo.

I like zoo's.  I even like how they smell in the summer. But a zoo in the winter is even better.  No crowds, and the animals seem to be more awake.

If you're of my age, you probably remember Jack Hanah bringing crazy animals to Johnny Carson.  The animal would inevitably poop, pee, or bite Carson.  Jack Hanah was the director of the Columbus zoo.  Under his leadership the Columbus zoo has become one of the best zoo's in North America.

It's very well set up, and has an interesting collection of animals.

This little arctic fox is beautiful.  A perfect white coat, button black nose, and eyes.  It looked more like a stuffed toy. 

 The cougar was stately and elegant. It was a joy just watching it walk around.

 The koala as always looking cute, cool, and slightly stoned.

 I actually did see some manatee's in Florida, but from the surface they're just a mass in the water.

 The highpoint for me was the wolverine.  For years I would take my kids to the Toronto Zoo.  We'd always stop at the empty looking wolverine cage.  If we were lucky we'd see a bit of fur in a hollow log. This guy at the Columbus zoo, was just going nuts.  Romping through the snow.  Marking anything that hadn't been marked in the last 10 minutes.

 

I must have taken about 20 shots.  A small crowd was gathering because this is the first time most of the other people had seen the wolverine active.

  

Finally he stopped for a photo op, a small ovation from the crowd, and then he was back to romping around.  

  

As I was leaving the zoo, I saw the first sign that I was almost home.  Look carefully at the decal on the doors.

 

 Lessons learned on this road trip:

Never pass up a chance to fill your gas tank, and empty your bladder.

Always take a break after about 4 hours of driving. Otherwise I end up walking around like a crippled zombie for 20 minutes. 

Never get so focused on your destination that you miss the neat stuff on the way.  This isn't actually a problem for me.  My problem is I'll be driving and then, "OOOH, that looks shiny", and I end up taking a 3 hour detour.

Your GPS is your friend.  It was handy even when I didn't have a destination plugged in.  It would show me the next exit or street coming up.  On the highway it would usually show me when there was a traffic problem or construction ahead.

Try to find a hotel just after lunch.  On the way down in November I usually started looking for a hotel around 8PM.  That usually meant I missed the night life at my destination.  I'm definitely stopping in Charleston again next year.  Because I loved Charleston, and because I only got to check out 1 music venue.

Which reminds me I should try organizing the  pictures of my trip down in November, and adding them to this blog.

But not tonight.

2 months of sun, surf, & sand, and then a week long road trip home.

Goodbye Florida
Goodbye Briny Breezes Beach house

Goodbye ocean sunrises

Goodbye Jake and Elwood

I've been here for 2 months. It's time to leave and head back to the frozen lands I belong in.  I did a quick check of the weather on Tuesday morning and promptly headed south.  

To Fort Lauderdale, to the Bahai Mar Marina. They have a literary landmark for the boat slip of the 'Busted Flush'.  Travis McGee's houseboat.

The boat was fictional, but the boat slip did exist until they extended the parking lot.  They now keep the plaque in the Dockmaster's office.

From Fort Lauderdale I went west to St Petersburg, to visit the truly excellent Salvador Dali Museum. This is one of the neatest art galleries I've ever gone too.  Even the park benches are neat.

The gallery itself is beautiful, and the collection of Dali paintings is fabulous.  The gift shop alone, is worth the trip.  I managed to limit myself to a small selection of gifts.

I spent a great night at America's Best Inn in St Petersburg

A lovely historic inn downtown.  Then I actually did drive north.

To Memphis.  

I made the obligatory stop at Graceland.  The mansion is perfectly maintained, with many displays and exhibits, on the surrounding property.  There are also many gift shops.

You too can own a 'Burning Love' jump suit, (just like Elvis wore) for only $3050.00.

I really was quite impressed with breadth of the displays, and the curatorship.  Someday this may become a fitting memorial.  But.  Right now it felt more like I was looting a corpse, than celebrating a life.

My day belonged to Graceland but my night belonged to Beale Street

A street devoted to great music venues:

Silky O'Sullivans where a funny looking woman with horrible mic technique, belted out some amazing blues

Then over to Flyns, where a solo man with guitar and looper paid homage to R&B

The Jerry Lee Lewis bar, with a Jerry Lee Lewis tribute band.

At BB Kings, the BB King All Stars rocked the night away.

My favorite was the Blues Hall Juke Joint.  A small venue, with the best band on the street that night

If you look closely at the picture below, the sign above the window on the left says, 'BEERS TO GO'

You can stand at the window, order a beer, and then enjoy the beer while watching the band from the street.  No crowding required.  

A nights sleep in Memphis and then it was on to Nashville.   My first stop was The Grand Ole Opry in the original Ryman Auditorium

Then another great night of great music venues.

  The Orchid Lounge, Layla's, Legends, The Stage, The Wildhorse Saloon.

My favorite was a hole in the wall called The Wheel.

I walked in, saw a trio that included an upright bass.  That's a good thing. They finished their song, and the leader announced, 'We don't play the new shit, just the old shit', and launched into a Hank Williams standard at triple the normal speed.  The group was called, 'The Eskimo Brothers', and they had a great time playing music.  You got the feeling they would have done the same show without an audience, but they loved that we loved them.  It was a synergy thing.

I had 2 more stops to make in Nashville.  First to the Parthenon

Back in 1897, the good citizens of Nashville, decided that the best way to celebrate their centennial was to build a life sized replica of the Parthenon, with all the busted bits fixed.  They even took direct casts of the Elgin collection in London to replace the sculptures.  They built the whole thing out of wood and plaster.  After a couple years it started to look shoddy, but the people of Nashville so loved having their very own Parthenon, they rebuilt it, in a more enduring fashion.  The center now contains an art gallery, and a 42 foot statue of the goddess Athena, just like the original Parthenon used to have.  This is what happens when you educate cowboys.  It's wonderful.

My next stop was to President Andrew Jackson's plantation.  The Hermitage.  The mansion is very nicely preserved and maintained. Most of the rooms still contain pieces of original furniture, and even some the original wallpaper.  They even kept one of the slave cabins, with several active archeological digs happening on the property.  Next time I come south I will have to tour some of the even better preserved plantations outside of Charleston and Savannah.

Last night I slept in Corbin, Kentucky.  I wanted to stop in Corbin to visit the Harland Sanders Café and Museum

This is where KFC was invented.  I picked up a nice box lunch of fried chicken, and then back in the car to Columbus, Ohio.

In the morning I'll visit one of the finest zoos in North America, and then it's a 5 hour drive back to Niagara.

See y'all soon.