Day 4 - 11/12/08

GRACELAND, home of the King himself. That's right, day 4 was allll about Graceland. I woke up around 11 and got the day off to a slow start. I made the decision to leave Memphis after Graceland, so I spent some time online trying to set up where I was going to sleep in Nashville. After that was all done, I got showered and such, got directions from Google, and made my way towards Graceland.

Ahhhh, the hell that is the Memphis road system. Let me tell you about how many Memphis roads work. A three lane highway will suddenly become 2, or even one, without any warning. There are very few "Left (or right) Turn Only" signs, but apparently you're just supposed to KNOW that the lane your in only goes left of right. Even though sometimes the outside lanes continue across the intersection, some of the time they don't.

Anyway, in one such intersection, I wanted to go straight, but could not. I then tried to navigate the many random one way roads and angled intersections to try and find my back on course. I ended up in Arkansas. That's right, Memphis is so fucked up, I went from trying to get to Graceland, to Arkansas. A completely different state altogether. But not before seeing the pretty badass Pyramid Arena. I'm pretty sure it's the Memphis basketball arena, but it looks like a big pyramid....hence the name Pyramid Arena. I'll post the link to the photos of my trip at the top of the blog sometime soon.

So anyway, after stopping at the Tennesee welcome center for directions, I finally found my way to Graceland around 2:30 or so. I bought my Platinum tour package, and went off to see the mansion of Elvis Presley.

Now, by size standards, it's nothing to gawk at. Don't get me wrong, there's a reason they call it a mansion, but Elvis doesn't have anything on Shaq when it comes to sheer size (of the home). Now the decorations on the other hand, were the shit. I'll let you look at the pictures yourself, but let me assure you, they don't do the house justice. Especially the basement. Elvis had a bitchin basement.

There's also a 100+ foot hallway lined floor to ceiling with gold and platinum records and other various awards. Lots o lots of gold. Among the other highlights of the tour were the bedroom in his private jet, his car museum (complete with pink caddy) and an entire room full of studded jumpsuits.

After the awesomeness of Graceland (and the dodging of too many gift shops) it was on my way to Nashville. I braved torrential rains and pitch black stretches of highway to arrive in Nashville by 10. I met my new couchsurfing hosts, we chatted for awhile, and then it was off to bed!

Turns out my hosts are all muscians of some sort, so we had fun swapping music stories and favorite bands and such. Good times. I ended up konking out halfway through Hot Fuzz (good movie).