~~~ What Can I Say ~~~

Elmwood Cemetery

We love to visit cemeteries where ever we travel... Sometimes they are full of old headstones and ornate ones... Some extravagant and some simple... Sometimes they are full of historic information and sometimes just really old headstones you can barely read. We have visited many cemeteries across this country of ours and the Elmwood Cemetery in Memphis has been added to our list. Elmwood Cemetery is one of the most beautiful historic cemeteries in the South. Established in 1852 as a rural garden cemetery, it has 80 acres of rolling grounds, flowering dogwoods, crepe myrtles, Magnolia trees, ancient towering trees, and impressive memorials among winding paths and lanes. Elmwood Cemetery, the Office Cottage, and the Entry Bridge are all on the National Register of Historic Places.

When you arrive there you can purchase (for a small fee) a CD which takes you through the cemetery and narrates the headstones and significant ares. There is an area where 1400 people who died from the yellow plague are buried, then an area where Confederate and a few Union soldiers are buried, A Chinese section, and even a section of people who donated their bodies to research and science.

The one impressive monuments that we always see in old cemeteries are tree trunks with Ivy climbing up them. They were scattered all through this cemetery. Now I have seen these before but I didn't know that it symbolized something. The Ivy signifies - Immortality, Friendship, Faithfulness and because it is an evergreen that clings while climbing, it signifies the need for protection. Since it grows quickly, it also symbolizes regeneration, sensuality and revelry. ... Tree trunk signifies - Brevity of life ... A life cut short.

We took over 200 pictures. It was hard to choose which ones to share with you... Please enjoy the pictures of Elmwood Cemetery

After we left the cemetery we headed over into old Memphis to see an area they called Victorian Village ... Originally in it's hey day it was called Millionaires Row...I was pretty excited about seeing these huge homes but when we got there I was a little disappointed that the homes were in such bad shape. They are magnificent homes but in need of a lot of work... I later found out that the city has cut the budget for the homes... Here are a few pictures

The Harsson-Goyer-Lee House (ca. 1841) was once the home of riverboat owner James Lee. This striking eclectic-style Victorian had been unused for years,

Woodruff-Fontaine House is a beautiful French Victorian mansion which was built in 1870 along "Millionaires Row" & was the home to two prominent Memphis families.

The Massey House (ca. 1847), was built for

Benjamin A. Massey, an early Memphis lawyer.

The Mallory - Neely house was built in 1852, the 25-room home contains stenciled and hand painted ceilings, parquet flooring, and stained-glass windows purchased at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. The Mallory-Neely House is the only historic property in Memphis to retain most of its original furnishings. Once opened to tour it is now closed to budget cuts.

I hope you enjoyed some more of the sites you can see when visiting Memphis

We have move on to Hot Springs, Ar and will have more pictures soon!

Until Later

~~~ Barges on the Mississippi ~~~

Susan at A Southern Daydreamer is our wonderful host for "Outdoor Wednesday". If you are interested in this event head on over to Susan's place....There is a link on the logo picture....go visit more Outdoor Wednesdays and learn what it is all about. Join in the fun.....
Thank you very much Susan

One of the things we love to do the most while we are here at Tom Sawyer's Mississippi River RV Park in West Memphis is to sit by the bank and watch the tugboats go up & down the Great Mississippi... We see so many different kinds and wonder what are they hauling and where are they going. There are small ones and big ones and long ones and short ones. It doesn't matter to us we love them all! I hope you enjoy my pictures of all the different tugs & barges that we see each day while we are here.

Alyssah enjoying the view and a small tug unloading it's haul at the docks

After sitting around working so hard watching the tugs & barges we finally worked up an appetite. Well back to my list of Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives we chose to go to Uncle Lou's Fried Chicken... We enter the address into our GPS and off we go. We finally arrive and it is in a strip mall & looks kind of iffy to me BUT I say let's go in. Guy Fieri would not steer us wrong would he??? Well he didn't! First thing I notice when I walk in there sits Uncle Lou just a smiling and welcoming us to his restaurant (DIVE). I got so excited you would have thought I was looking at Johnny Depp. After we took a picture with him I got so bust chatting about his debut on TV and all I took no other pictures... He has his original and his spicy sweet love sauce that you can have on the chicken... you can even choose both and we did... all I can say is that was some of the best chicken I have ever had. If that wasn't enough his biscuits are baked to perfection and then dipped into a honey sauce... OMG! I thought I had died and went to heaven. SO if your ever here and want some fine fried chicken go there...

Do not be afraid it is so good you will not regret it.

Here are the only two pictures I took... That Uncle Lou had me all excited...

Isn't he just so cute and cuddly like a little teddy bear.

Here is a picture of the food but I got it off the Internet because I forgot to take one... DUH!

Also if you want to see Uncle Lou's on TV again he'll be on the Best thing I ever ate with my fingers on the Food Network August 11th at 8:30 pm

Well it was another great day and just look at the beautiful moon pictures I got...

See the barge in the first one and how about the beautiful reflection

on the river in the 2nd one

I sure hope you liked my barges and if you want to see them

closer just double click on any of the pictures

Until Later

~~~ A day in Memphis ~~~

We got up early and decided to go into Memphis and visit the city for the day... When we arrived there we decided to take the trolley around the city instead of driving our car. It was a lot easier this way. We choose to park our car at the visitor center by River Park. There are so many things to see & do... I took hundreds of pictures for you to see but when I wanted to add them I realized that there was a lot. So I put them into a slide show for you to enjoy the sites of the city... At the end of our day when we were heading back to the car they were having a concert over at Mud Island with Pat Benatar & Blondie being the performers... We could sit right there on a bench across the river and hear the music just fine.

A great ending to a wonderful day...

We are so thankful to the Food Network for putting on so many shows about places to eat around the country... Being people who are always on the go around the country we find it fun to try and visit as many of these places that we can. Our favorite show is Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives with Guy Fieri. We have a list of about 5 restaurants to go to in Memphis but sadly we will not be able to visit them all... However we will give it a good try:

Leonards BBQ is the first one we visited... Now you can order off the menu but there is a BBQ buffet which has all of his best dishes on it including Baby Back Ribs, Pulled Pork, White fish, BBQ'd Beef, Chicken Wings and much more... The food was delish and we enjoyed everything about this restaurant... The staff was friendly, the food was good and the price was reasonable... Guy did not let us down... Here are a few pictures we took while dinning at Leonard's

Entrance to Leonard's BBQ

Inside the restaurant are Grand Daughters Hannah & Alyssah

Inside of Buffet areas... They are set up in 2 rooms...

one with the all the meats & the other one with the sides

We sat in the back dining area... very casual

Were are a couple of our dinner plates... and all you can eat BBQ YUMO!

Well we sure had a ton of fun and I really hope you enjoyed the pictures...

Come to Memphis it is a great city to visit!

Until Later

~~~ We have arrived in Memphis ~~~

We're on the road again and heading towards Memphis... we pulled out of Twiltley Branch COE park very early in the morning, rolling down a country road until we headed out onto I 20 towards Jackson, Ms.. then hit I 55 north towards Memphis.

The skies were very cloudy and I was worried about us traveling in the rain. Fortunately even though the treat was there it never really rained hard... just a few sprinkles. While on the road we passed this tower... I am not sure what it was but it did remind us of a mini Washington Monument. This was a beautiful ride through rolling hills with lots of green thick forest.

Traffic was not very heavy and it made our ride very relaxing... My computer sits in the front window with the GPS program telling us just what roads we need to take and how far we still have to travel... She has helped us find a ton of great places but also has gotten us into some sticky situations... We always make sure we know somewhat where we are going and what our major turns will be... Bad directions can really cause us to have just a bit of tension... LOL LOL

My little angle was watching TV while we are going down the road... Her & I take turns sitting up front but when we are getting close to a highway change or heavy traffic Memaw always wins the toss for the co-pilot seat. Tiffy is always up front either sleeping by Ralph or in her little bed. She gets into the bed when the road gets really rough. Unless I am sitting in the back then she is with me...

Finally after about 300 miles we enter the city limits of Memphis . One of the first things we see is a huge oil refinery. Alyssah thought it was really cool seeing shooting fire out of the stacks

Our campground is actually over the bridge and 3 miles into West Memphis, Arkansas on the Mississippi River.

We finally reach the Tom Sawyer Mississippi River RV Park traveling down such a pretty little road. I loved how the trees made a little frame over the road for us to enter into the park. This road use to be dirt but thankfully they paved it.

This is one of my very favorite places to camp. The campground has nice pull throughs with concrete pads, water, 50 AMP electric and sewer. (YEAH!!!) Our phones, TV have great reception and the Internet is working with the highest speed since we left home... Our site is right on the mighty Mississippi River where we can sit and watch the barges go by all day long. Alyssah right away ran out to watch her first barge go by... Sometimes while you are watching they will honk their horns at you... This really excites the campers in the park

Arkansas is where my daughter Jennifer (Alyssah's mom) lives so I knew she would be driving the 250 miles over here to spend the weekend with us... We didn't tell Alyssah and boy was she ever surprised when Mom and sister Hannah pulled in.

Jennifer & I relaxing beside Tassie while we watched barges and caught up on everything... My little herb garden still surviving the rides... LOL

Alyssah already finding friends to play with in the park...

And the end of another perfect day with a pink & blue sky and the moon!

We have so many things planned this week...

Hope you come back and check out our adventures
Until Later