We pulled up to the home of The King and did not recognize it at all. We were sad to see that they have built it up into a theme park type of atmosphere. You still get to go through the house but there are now about 5 gift shops, 2 restaurants and various "museums". We ended up spending about 3 hours there and visited everything our tickets would get us in to. We saw the Pink Cadillac, and the various other cars he owned. We also saw his 2 planes (which will be going up for auction soon), a few of his jumpsuits and so many of his gold records. What a gift to our country and the world he was! Not only his silky voice but he was also a huge philanthropist. Truly humbling.
Memphis is another town known for music so we visited Sun Recording Studio where Elvis got his start. We got to go into the actual recording studio where his first hit was recorded and then later on various other artist recorded as well. Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Roy Orbison just to name a few. The studio is still used today by acts such as Maroon 5, U2 and Elle King, who want to be a part of history. We then went to the famous Beale Street and over to the Rock and Soul Museum, which was kind of a let down. It was created by the Smithsonian so I was excited but I thought it lacked quite a bit. Oh well! We were pleasantly surprised to see the Gibson Guitar Factory right across the street from the museum so we walked in hoping to take a tour. They were sold out for the day but we managed to secure the last 2 spots on the afternoon tour the next day. Who knew it would be so busy in October?!
On our last day in Memphis we wanted to see the Peabody Hotel Ducks. If you're ever in Memphis you must go see the ducks! :) It started in the 1940's or so when the manager of the hotel and his buddies had a little too much of whiskey and thought it would be funny to let their live duck decoys splash around in the fountain. The next morning they woke up to a a crowd watching and fawning over the ducks. A tradition was born and every day at 11am the ducks board the elevator on the roof, ride down to the lobby and "march" on the red carpet to the fountain at the center of the lobby. They spend the day swimming in the fountain and then everyday at 5pm they hop out of the fountain, "march" on the red carpet back to the elevator and go back to their penthouse on the roof. SO CUTE! While driving around Memphis we kept seeing this pyramid structure with "Bass Pro Shop" and "Ducks Unlimited" on one face of the triangle. We had to go check it out. It is the biggest Bass Pro Shop I have ever seen! The pyramid turned out to be their "lodge" or hotel on the premises. They also have a mini museum dedicated to duck hunting. So cool! After satisfying our curiosity, we drove back to Beale Street to do our Gibson tour. We learned so much on that tour! They only make electronic guitars at the location but they are the only location to give tours so if you want to see how they make their instruments, you'll have to go to Memphis. Since their guitars are only made by hand, they only produce 60 guitars per day. It is an incredible process, we saw each step along the way, including a few of them being painted and then played. It was really a treat but alas, they didn't allow any pictures. :(
No comments:
Post a Comment