Nashville Rocks!

We arrived in Nashville, and it looked like a very interesting place, much bigger than Memphis. Nell drove a bit of the way and couldn't pull over before we hit the city, so had to drive us to our hotel! Thank God for the GPS we hired when we got the car!

After checking in we went for a stroll around the block to get our bearings and work out where everything was. We passed the Ryman theatre, and saw the Country Music Hall of Fame a few blocks over so the sight-seeing destinations for the next day were scouted.

Having figured out where all the restaurants and bars were we went back to the hotel room to get changed then we were off to the Wild Horse Saloon where we heard there's boot scootin!!!!!!!!!
The Wild Horse had some of the best ribs we've ever had, they literally fell off the bone. But that wasn't the only good thing there. They had a live band called Tell U Ride, who were very good and played a good mix of country rock and some more mainstream tunes. Nell knew a lot of the country stuff and was bopping away, so much so that she convinced the guitarist to come over for a chat. Imagine that! We also saw two people boot scootin - we're not sure they were all there, but it was very funny. It was a good night but caused a few sore heads the next day.

We still struggled through however and got up early enough to do a tour of the Ryman theatre, which is one of the original venues The Grand Ole Opry was performed in. Next was the Country Music Hall of Fame, which included a tour of RCA Victor Studio B, where many hits have been recorded, Nell was in heaven.

Next stop was the latest home of the Grand Ole Opry - Opryland. The place is massive, it includes a hotel, a shopping mall, theme park and of course the Opry House itself. We missed the last tour for the day, but managed to catch the first one the next day. The Opry House besides hosting up to 3 performances a week of the Grand Ole Opry, has also hosted many other shows and performances, such as; Britney Spears, Bruce Springsteen, Garth Brooks, Faith Hill, Kelly Clarkson, Robin Williams, Bill Cosby, Dr. Phil, Wheel of Fortune and most famously the first event to be hosted other than the Opry was a live cattle auction, as you do.

Fatefully we went for a walk through the shopping mall and the first thing we saw was a Fossil shop - you guessed it, another watch was purchased!

We then headed to Lynchburg to visit the Jack Daniels distillery. Instead of taking the freeway we went via some back roads and got a good look at some of the smaller towns along the way. It was much more interesting than flying along in four lanes of traffic with trucks surrounding us. The tour was interesting. We're not sure if our tour guide was really a true southern hick dressed in his overalls and talking so slowly it was painful, or if that was just part of the atmosphere they wanted to portray about good whiskey taking time to produce.

After some further driving we got back to Memphis to the worst hotel ever; The Heartbreak Hotel. Enough said about it really, other than don't bother staying there.

We're now once again waiting in an airport to head to the last stop on our trip, San Francisco.

The webcam video of the wedding is now up on the Viva Las Vegas site - http://archives.vivalasvegasweddings.com/ramgen/Archive/LButcher.rv

Keep the comments and emails coming, we love reading them.
- Luke and Nell