Licia & Pete's 2012 RV Odyssey: The Grand Old Opry

Here we are right where Johnny and June Carter Cash stood to sing so many times.

Nashville cats, play clean as country water,
Nashville cats, play wild as mountain dew,
Nashville cats, been playin' since they's babies,
Nashville cats, get work before they're two...

John Sebastian/Lovin’ Spoonful 1967

July 16^th

Today was primarily a travel day as we come down to the touring end of our trip. By Tuesday evening we will be on Lake Norman for the rest of the week working on some painting in our new home and supervising the unloading of the PODS container we sent down there before we left Nashua.

Our 5.5- hour (320 mile) drive today from Memphis to Crossville, TN (incidentally the Golf Capitol of Tennessee) took us through the music city of Nashville. We plan to spend some time in Nashville once we have moved to NC permanently, but we couldn’t resist a lunch stop at the venerable Grand Old Opry just outside the city. We had lunch and then explored a bit before going to the Opry House for our All Access, Backstage Tour.

Little did I know that right in the area around the Grand Old Opry is a store/museum with the country’s largest collection of memorabilia from the 1979-1985 TV series The Dukes of Hazzard. We HAD to stop in! The gift shop was a vast wonderland of all things ‘Hazzard’ and the store-keepers were quite taken with our name. We did some gift shopping but it would spoil several presents if I elaborate any more on our purchases.

The Opry has been on radio since 1927 and the tour of this amazing theatre/facility was very detailed. It was very sobering to see the line on the wall inside which marks the height of the water from the Spring 2010 floods which hit the area and made the national news. It is amazing that they were back using the theatre in October of that same year. You would never guess there had been any issue at all; the place is beautiful. We got to be on stage and I got to see where all the musicians sit and look over the house instruments. Our readers who are musicians may be interested to know that while the Grand Old Opry’s 4-6 shows each week are always “live” on radio and sometimes TV, the bands/artists who appear on the show do so without any rehearsal or sound check.

Hi All,

Pete and I have really been tourists the last two days as we completed the music venues on our bucket list. Graceland was amazing! I highly recommend that anyone who lived through the Elvis years go visit. It was like going back in a time machine to see the interior of his home. The whole complex is expertly managed and we had a great time. We did some gift shopping there as well.

Today as we drove over to Nashville, we travelled on Route 40, also known as the “Music Highway”. I tried hard to take a picture of one of the signs but since I didn’t know exactly where they were, I couldn’t do it. How appropriate for the road between Memphis and Nashville. The Grand Old Opry was also great. I can’t wait to go back and actually see a show there. We are going to have to get our country on!

By tomorrow night we will be in North Carolina at Kevin and Kathy’s house. I must admit I’m looking forward to living in a house again. We have had a grand adventure touring these 4250 miles of America in our little RV. I think we would have bitten off more than we could have handled to do this any longer at one time. What we have done feels just right.