Back around the turn of the century (wow!!) I traveled to Memphis often because my hometown BFF lived there. (And she still does, more on this later.)
But I hadn’t been there for about 20 years (again, wow) so I invited myself along while suggesting that my mom finally make her pilgrimage to Graceland.
And by the end of the trip, I found myself to be just as big of an Elvis fan!!
We traveled with Timi’s Tours out of my hometown. You may know from previous posts that I love planning my vacations and obsess over every detail. I will admit, however, there were some nice things about having someone else do all of this for me.
First of all, Timi’s put us at the Guesthouse at Graceland, which I loved. This hotel is situated right next to Graceland but is actually across the street from the “Graceland complex” where you have to park, buy your ticket, and where most all of the Elvis exhibits are, including his two planes. The hotel had several Elvis music and movie channels that play 24/7. I ended up catching “Aloha from Hawaii” a couple of times, which I think as much as visiting Graceland made me an Elvis fan during this trip. I dare you to watch this (just one of the songs from the show) and look away:
The arm motions! Then the tear!!
And my second favorite song from this concert:
Timi’s also set us up with the VIP passes here so we could go into any exhibit all day long. So while waiting for our turn to go across the street to see actual Graceland we were able to visit the airplanes and start through the back of the museum exhibits. There is SO MUCH to see here that I actually need to go back and see some of it again with even more time. I think most people would probably say one day is plenty though- ha!
By the time I got through all there was to see at the house and grounds, when I saw the graves, I truly felt emotional.
Back at the complex we headed through the exhibits but ran out of time because our tour was leaving to go to another awesome place…
Sun Studios
Here they play for you the first recording of Elvis ever. Did you know it was the secretary, Marion Keisker, not Sam Phillips who first recorded Elvis?
Central BBQ & Bookstore
After this part of our tour, I was kidnaped by my BFF and taken to get some drinks and dinner at the best BBQ restaurant in Memphis, Central BBQ, which she and her husband own. I had dreamed about those pork nachos since early 2000. Their downtown location is next to the Civil Rights Museum.
The next day she took me around Memphis and showed me what was new and pointed out old favorites. A highlight for me was this bookstore, Novel, that has a restaurant in it.
I bought the new Emily St. John Mandel book…this is why.
It was a busy couple of weeks for me with this Memphis trip after also going to Jamaica in March. It took me both trips to finish an epic book I was reading!
And now this book is next up, but I almost don’t want to spoil my new fandom:
Whew! That’s a lot about Memphis but doesn’t come close to covering it all, and I need to go back soon to go to the Civil Rights Museum plus I feel like I want to go to Graceland again.
Thanks to my parents for letting me invite myself along!!