{"id":818,"date":"2014-03-17T22:30:50","date_gmt":"2014-03-17T22:30:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/?p=818"},"modified":"2014-07-02T21:15:01","modified_gmt":"2014-07-02T20:15:01","slug":"elvis-was-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/2014\/03\/17\/elvis-was-here\/","title":{"rendered":"Elvis was Here"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"RoadTripUSA5\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Tennessee when it rains, is wet. Very wet! We loaded up our car, and hit the freeway. The Parthenon look-alike will have to wait for another time. Nashville may be the heart of country music, but we had a long way to go, and music has little appeal when the sleet is dripping down the back of your neck.<\/p>\n

Forget Greece. This music comes from Vienna. By the many parts of a book.<\/p>\n

We could have have visited Clarkesville, but that would have been misleading. That is not one of my mystery tunes. After all, it was a song, not written by a famous group who did not perform the number. And it wasn’t about the place! We will come back to this point in a later blog.<\/p>\n

We did go to Paris. In the springtime. To photograph the Eiffel Tower. Not too bad, despite having to photograph it in the rain. Not quite as good as the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Texas, that is! We really must get round to doing the one in Paris. France. (I must confess that one with a Stetson on it, is my favourite).
\n.And, like Clarkesville, this is not a clue to a song. Oh, wicked me!<\/p>\n

On the other hand, this is a clue. A Tennessee place by Mr. And Mrs. Black. Oddly enough, .like so many songs, this was not the place but it sounded better.<\/p>\n

And this one. This is where Miss Bullock started, and despite the lyrics, it has no limits.<\/p>\n

Rain. Rain. Rain. You would have thought that Tennessee was green, but it isn’t. It is brown. Maybe it turns green in the week before the summer burns it brown again.<\/p>\n

The miles ground on. Spray from trucks and the ubiquitous pick-up trucks with huge tyres sticking out of undernourished wheel arches, made driving very difficult. Perhaps I needed some long distance information from the King.<\/p>\n

At last, we reached the city that is half in Tennessee and half in Arkansas. Thank heavens, we didn’t have to try this. By car is hard enough. By the man who wrote it.<\/p>\n

Just before we crossed the Mississippi, the freeway clogged up. Three lanes became one, and we inched slowly towards the river. Up ahead, we could see swarms of Emergency vehicles. Police, Fire, Ambulance. and Animal Welfare. A huge truck carrying livestock had overturned on the curve. I truly did not envy the Emergency Services. I have no conception of how bad the incident was – only the number of vehicles present. By that measure, very bad indeed.<\/p>\n

We foolishly thought that the last 100 miles to Little Rock in Arkansas, would be better. Till we saw the roadworks sign. ‘Lane closures ahead. Consider an alternative route.’ As if we could! Traffic at a standstill, 4 miles from the actual roadworks, is NOT a good sign.<\/p>\n

And it rained.<\/p>\n

Arkansas, between the Mississippi and Little Rock, is flat. And the wind grew stronger, and stronger. The windscreen wipers were starting to become visible in the side windows, as they reached the extremities of their sweep. I have never seen a contra-flow on a freeway before.
\nBy the time we reached our motel in North Little Rock (A different city from Little Rock, I am reliably informed), the rain had stopped. The temperature was down to 2 degrees C, and it was snowing!
\nHopefully a better motel than the one in Nashville.<\/p>\n

We off-loaded the car, did an eatery search on our Sat-Nav, found an Irish-style pub within walking distance. The Sat-Nav lied. No Irish pub, just an icy gale, and freezing sleet. The pub had gone bust, and was replaced with (as we finally discovered) by Bogie’s Bar & Grill.
\nDepressing bar, extremely limited grill (steak, catfish or burger). If you ever find your way to Bogies – choose the exit.<\/p>\n

Tomorrow, we have a full day to check out Little Rock.<\/p>\n

We have faith …<\/p>\n

The pics here (apart from the one of Paris, Tennessee) are from our previous trip to Memphis. Graceland is a terrible place to take pictures – no flash, so most shots inside are dim and blurred. But know you know where Elvis is!
\nOddly enough, the grave has no atmosphere. None whatsoever. But the building where Elvis died, has a very strange feel to it. Both of us felt it. If you ever visit Graceland, see what you think.<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Memphis10\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

Tennessee when it rains, is wet. Very wet! We loaded up our car, and hit the freeway. The Parthenon look-alike will have to wait for another time. Nashville may be the heart of country music, but we had a long way to go, and music has little appeal when the sleet is dripping down […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-having-a-say","odd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1171,"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions\/1171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tachras.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}