9/30/10 – A Nice Day in Nashville

I truly enjoyed getting back the extra hour of sleep I lost several weeks ago. After dispensing with the customary 3 S’s, I took a short ride into downtown Nashville. The main drag is Broadway and it’s reminiscent of 6th Street in Austin, TX, with lots of clubs, bars and restaurants that all feature live music. The main difference is that all the music in Nashville is basically just Hillbilly music. Sure, it ranges from Bluegrass to Country Rock, but it’s all Hillbilly music. That said, Nashville is a very nice town and the glass skyscrapers have character that contrasts nicely with the old town brick buildings. It’s also a compact town with all the amenities within close range of downtown, including LP Stadium, where the Titan’s play. After walking around and getting a new pair of cheap sunglasses to replace the ones I broke yesterday, I enjoyed a nice lunch at the Big River Brewing Works. While eating lunch, I got directions to the Grand Ole Opry House from the barmaid.

It turns out that the Grand Ole Opry House is the only landmark in Nashville that’s not in the downtown area. I rode over there and found that it’s still being cleaned-up from the record flooding of the Cumberland River that occurred back in early May. Tonight is opening night for the first time since the flood and the nearby mall and hotel is still closed from all the flood damage. My take is that the Grand Ole Opry is neither Grand, nor Old, but it’s grounds are nicely manicured.

At about 3:00, I headed out for St. Louis. As I rode from TN into Kentucky and pulled into a rest stop to check my bearings. As I suspected, I was about 70 miles off-course and the friendly lady had a small slip of pre-printed instructions to get me back on track. It turns out that many users of Google Maps get into the same predicament so they have printed piles of tiny directions to get people back on course. Fortunately for me, the detour put me onto KY Parkways, which are really freeways that have no traffic and a 75 MPH speed limit. Riding into Indiana, there was a powerful roadside display of thousands of little white crosses in a harvested wheat field. In the middle was a huge sign with a picture of a baby that says “Pro-Choice? These Babies Had No Choice”. The anti-abortion folks here in the Bible Belt pull no punches. The number of brick churches with white gables and steeples is truly astounding. The myriad of different religious denominations is staggering, but the churches all look pretty much the same.


By the time I crossed into IL, it was getting dark and I was low on gas, so I pulled-off in Mt. Vernon, IL and filled-up both me and Bessy before finding a $33.99 motel that left the light on for me.

Tomorrow I’ll report on my exploration of St. Louis.