On the mend

It's Friday evening and we've just had a Costco curry - and very nice it was too. Jo and I are definitely much better now, although still not 100%. This one's going to take a while to clear.

I've been out on my bike a couple of times, but fairly short and non-taxing rides - that's when I really notice that I haven't fully recovered yet.

The weather here's been fine so far - mostly mid 90's, but, unlike down south, the temperature drops to mid 60's overnight, so the early mornings and evenings are the times to do anything. They're forecasting a fairly substantial increase in temperature in the next few days, however - up to 112 F - that's mid 40's C. That's about as hot as we've ever had it in Grants Pass. Memories of what it was like when Lucy stayed in Redding, Northern California.

 What have we done this week then? Well. there was Scott and Lucy's 16th anniversary - all four of us went to River's Edge restaurant for a lovely meal:

Braeden was playing on his trampoline one evening and I tried to get some action photos:

We did a couple of wineries in the Applegate valley on Thursday - Lucy drove. It's a lovely area. We were the only people at the first one - Serra Vineyards. Nice spot, but disappointing wines. The next one - Wooldridge - was much busier and much better. The photos, however, are from the first one:

Today (Friday), we were granted special dispensation to go and pick Blueberries at Judy's farm/home. Officially, the picking season's over, but Scott and Lucy work in the same place as Judy so we got a royal reception. Her husband Pete constructed a fun tree house:

Later on, Lucy was heading to Medford for a Costco shop, so Jo and I tagged along for the ride and got Lucy to drop us off at the new brewpub, RAM, for an hour:

This next bit really belongs in my Renshaw's Chronicles blog. I'd found a group on FaceBook for former pupils at Victoria Drive SS and spotted a pal I'd been on holiday with exactly 50 years ago. Robert Rowan now lives in Edinburgh so I've agreed to meet up with him sometime - and possibly another old school chum, Donnie Gemmell, who Robert met recently for the first time for 52 years! The power of Facebook.

Robert sent me a couple of very embarrassing photos of one day in 1965 when we were on a school trip to Annan apparently. I'd forgotten all about it - and I had no idea these photos existed:

16 years old and daft as a brush.

Sick week

Well, it's been a week since we travelled from the South East to the North West of USA and there's not much to report as we've both been a bit poorly, suffering from some kind of respiratory illness. Lucy was Googling it last night and reckons it's the spores that fly around in hot, humid climates like we were travelling in. Apparently it's quite a common thing.

Jo didn't move from her bed for the first 3 days. In fact, Cade didn't even see her until a brief glimpse on Wednesday evening. I thought I'd escaped it - after all, I'd been a bit sick in Savannah, so I thought it had now passed - but it came back to bite me again. Before it did its worst, I thought I needed to stretch my legs a little so I went for a short ride on the bike on Thursday. Perhaps, on reflection, I shouldn't have pushed it as I think this set me back again.

We've both been dosing up on various medications to alleviate the symptoms, the worst of which was the all-night coughing. Thankfully, we're now getting some sleep, so that's a relief.

Yesterday (Sunday), Jo and I went for a short midday walk down to the river and back, but I was pretty knackered after it. On Saturday, Jo and Lucy travelled to a Lavender farm for a class on how to make lavender wreaths. Everyone else was away, but I did nothing - just stayed at base camp, slept and read.

Today is Monday and the plan is to travel to Medford - Barnes & Noble's book store, lunch at Kaleidoscope plus some camera shopping - Jo's has bust too, so all we have is our phones.

To close a couple of photos:

The feature here is my Father's Day gift - the leather growler holder that fits on the bike

In practice for the next season, Scott has been heard blowing this - his Elk caller

Memphis (2) and Clarksdale

After Sun, we used Lyft to take us over to Stax Studios - another place I'd always wanted to visit, having been brought up in their halcyon days in the mid 60's when Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, Booker T and the MG's, Eddie Floyd etc were all the rage in Europe - to the artistes' huge surprise when they took a chance and toured here.

It's a huge operation, with tons of memorabilia, but somehow it lacked the sheer magic of Sun Studios. One of the original artistes there - and at Sun - was Rufus Thomas, who used to specialise in funny dance songs, with animals as the main theme. Here he demonstrates how to do the Funky Chicken, with Jo pulling the shapes:

I think she did pretty well, didn't she?

It was back to Beale St again for some lunch, more music and a stroll round the historic area. We came across two very famous stores - Lansky's, the tailor that used to dress Elvis, and the historic A. Schwab's, a store that has changed little in the last century. We could have spent hours in there - there were lots of little speciality sections, one of them being the "Hoodoo" (voodoo) area where we came across some Mojo Hands, as sung about in so many of the old blues songs, notably Hoochie Coochie Man, covered by umpteen blues artistes, including Muddy Waters. There was a brief explanation of it there:

We even found some Davy Crockett (King of the Wild Frontier) hats. No doubt this is another name that means nothing nowadays, but to those of us brought up on late 50's/early 60's TV, he is a fond memory - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txcRQedoEyY:

Rather fetching, don't you think?

We had to use their soda fountain bar - we thought about sasparilla, but coke floats went down well:

Time now for a short cruise on a paddle steamer on the Mississippi:

Then it was more beer, music and food. I especially enjoyed listening to Blind Mississsippi Morris, who we saw in two different bars.

On Sunday, we took the short drive south on Highway 61 to Clarksdale, where the famous crossroads is, where Robert Johnson allegedly sold his soul to the devil. It's a small town and it was a quiet Sunday when many shops etc are closed, but it seemed to us like a bit of a ghost town, with deprivation everywhere. Some of the local worthies are trying to keep the heritage and history of the birth of the blues there alive, but it didn't strike us as a very vibrant scene.

We had brunch at Abe's - excellent pulled pork rolls - and took the obligatory photos at the crossroads:

The only place of interest open was the Rock and Blues Museum, so we spent an hour or more there before heading back up to Memphis to pack for our early start on the nightmare journey - thank you United Airlines - over to Oregon on Monday.

It had been a really interesting road trip, covering well over 1,200 miles and 5 states - here's our map:

United had altered our original plans for 2 flights over to Medford, Oregon to 3 flights, going through Chicago and Denver, so this was the route:

Anyway, we made it in the end. Lucy was there to meet us at the airport. We were both shattered - not just from the journey, but also what seems like a recurrence of the respiratory problem I had when we were in Savannah, only this time it seems more flu-y. We had a bad night last night - especially Jo - and are now under medication from Dr. Lucy. Hope it goes away soon.

Nashville to Memphis

Our first target on Thursday morning was to visit the Grand Ole Opry at its "new" site (been there for more than 40 years now). We had booked tickets online for the 10.45 am show and we just made it after trailing around the area for about 20 minutes:

We went for a short walk after we did the Grand Ole Opry tour - we had been recommended to look at the adjacent hotel, which was abolutely fabulous with its own indoor gardens and even boat rides along the internal waterway. The nearest thing we'd ever seen to it was the Venetian in Las Vegas - but this even surpassed that. Here's just a brief glimpse:

We then went back to our hotel to dump our car and use Lyft's excellent service again to take us on the short ride downtown. First stop was a tour of the Ryman Auditorium, home to the Grand Ole Opry until the mid 70's. The place is steeped in history and although the Opry don't use it every week nowadays, there are lots of gigs there - all the top rock and country stars have appeared there, desperate to experience its history and wonderful acoustics. The "Mother Church" as it is affectionately known:

It was then a question of hitting the bars and listening to some music.

Our brief Nashville trip was now over and we headed off the following morning (Friday) for Memphis, crossing another time zone in to USA Central Time on the way. We had one brief stop on the road - at a Civil War site at Parker's Crossroads:

Our hotel in Memphis - Springhill Suites (not Springfield as I said in an earlier post) - had an excellent location. We had a view of the Mississippi and one of the bridges from our room and we were able to walk along the riverbank to lively Beale Street:

We arrived at Elvis' statue:

Followed by BB King's bench right outside his store:

Then WC Handy, the "Father of the Blues":

We had dinner, listened to some music, then off to bed.

The plan the following morning was to walk round to Sun Studios. According to the rough map on their web site, it was only just round the corner from our hotel:

The "2-3 minutes from Beale St" that they refer to above was obviously in a fast car, not walking. I had compounded the felony by misreading the address as 106 Union Avenue, when it was, in fact, 706 Union Avenue. We got there eventually - 15 hot and sweaty minutes later.

The tour was great - it really did feel magic being in the room where rock 'n' roll history was made. They still keep the original microphone that Elvis - and many others - used back in the 50's and I tried to throw an Elvis shape:

Failed. Maybe I'd do better on Jerry Lee Lewis' piano:

Perhaps Jo could do better on the vintage drums, recently used by U2:

Now time for the outside photo:

That's enough for now - I'll finish off our Memphis trip in the next post.

Dollywood

It was the longest drive of our road trip - from Hilton Head Island, SC through North Carolina to Pigeon Forge, TN, but we did it in 3 legs - a 3 hour drive followed by two 2 hour spells. We arrived at the Dreammore Resort mid/late afternoon, in time to take in the surroundings, have a drink and dinner (buffet) and a relax by the fire pit.

Tuesday was the day we planned to "do" Dollywood. It's a theme park, but there was no way I was going to get Jo to go on any of the rides, so we planned our day on doing all the shows instead - and there were plenty of them. We made a prompt start and were in the park before 10 am, only to find that there was virtually nothing open at that time - thankfully with the exception of the Grist Mill, where they bake the apparently "famous" cinnamon bread - so we had to have one.

Our first show was a gospel one - the Kingdom Heirs (https://www.kingdomheirs.com/). The band were good and the 4 vocalists excellent - especially the bass singer - Johnny Cash eat your heart out. I was a bit fearful that it might get a bit "preachy" - and there was some of that, but thankfully not too much. I got picked on by the compere/drummer - "where are you from"? He couldn't understand my answer at first. We were in the front row, sitting next to a couple of locals who had seen the group many times before. He kept yelling "yeah, yeay" all the time and he seemed to take a shine to me, even swapping seats with his wife so he could sit right next to me and tell me some stories about the group. Creepy. Notably, not a black face to be seen - the complete opposite of our experience in Atlanta at the Juke Joint.

The Smoky Mountain String Band gave us some bluegrass and we got all of Dolly's hits at My People, which featured Dolly's brother and other members of her family. Country Crossroads was good - like Country's greatest hits all condensed in to an active half hour show:

We heard the GemTones, a street corner acapella group featuring mostly 50's music and we did the self guided tours of The Dolly Parton Story and the Southern Gospel Museum and Hall of Fame. We even squeezed in a ride on the steam train, the Dollywood Express - a misnomer if ever there was one. We had a burger and shake at Red's Drive-In. Soon it was time to return to Dreammore:

We toyed with having a swim in the evening, but the pool was busy so we opted for a simple relax and read until the nightly fireworks show, which we viewed from the lobby area:

We enjoyed Dollywood - a little twee in places, but the day went quickly and I just love the sound of banjos!

On Wednesday we travelled across Tennessee to Nashville. It looked like a two and a half hour journey, but we overlooked the change to Central Time, so it took an hour more, but we were still at our hotel by lunchtime. We took a taxi downtown - short ride - and walked up and down Broadway. There were bands playing in every bar - no wonder it's dubbed the Music Capital. We managed a couple of brewpubs in the Gulch area but the best place to go - no music - is the rooftop bar at the Acme (http://theacmenashville.com/) overlooking the Cumberland River. It's on a corner site and you can see all the way up Broadway:

By sheer coincidence - and luck - James Taylor and Bonnie Raitt were playing that evening and we managed to get tickets.

Hilton Head - day 4

It was our 3rd - and last - day with the bikes so we rode out to South Beach and found a spot with a little shade (not much) to sit and read for a while:

We couldn't quite settle there so we rode on to the Sea Pines Beach Club - a much better option. It was now lunchtime and the bar looked tempting so we stopped for a while for some nibbles and beer:

We then moved over to the beach where we hired a couple of deckchairs and a parasol for a very relaxing afternoon:

The sea was warmer than the pool at our hotel - and way warmer than any sea we'd experienced before, incluing Newport Coast, CA.

That was about it for Saturday. We had no more bottled beer left in our apartment so we crossed the road and had a couple of draft beers at Harbourside Burgers and Beer, listening to some live music, to while away the time until 6 pm when the workers stopped at our resort and we could safely return to a more peaceful environment.

It was a case of leftover pizza, pasta and ice cream for our meal tonight. Our last full day here is tomorrow (Sunday) and our plan is to get a relatively early start on Monday morning for the six and a half hour drive to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee and Dollywood!

Hilton Head - Days 2 & 3

On Thursday morning, we took the plunge, and, like almost every other holidaymaker on this island it seems, we hired bikes. It's as flat as a pancake here - no hills at all - and the bikes are all the same - no gears and no brakes - just pedal back a bit to slow down and/or stop.

It is hot, however - and very humid, so any outdoor activity is draining. We might have been a little adventurous on our first outing - especially given that this was Jo's first time on a bike since her disastrous falls last year in Oregon. She freaked out a bit at the start - the bike lanes were very busy here and she was concerned about crashing in to someone. To be fair, the bikes aren't that easy to handle either, but, eventually, Jo got the hang of things and relaxed a bit.

We cycled up to the main shopping mall 4 miles away and stopped for a coffee and a bite. Suitably refreshed and strengthened, we headed to the South Beach through the Forest Preserve. From there, we made it out all the way to the South Beach marina for more much-needed refreshments:

The journey back to our apartment wasn't too far and soon we were both down by the pool at our resort - although we didn't last long there - partly due to the fact that it was pretty busy, but mostly through the noise of all the machines repairing the hurricane damage. I'm now in touch with Marriott about the amount of work going on here - it's way more than usual maintenance and I believe they should have closed the resort to guests until the work is completed.

Our apartment is lovely and the resort would be too, if there wasn't so much work going on. It would normally be a nice tranquil spot overlooking the water:

Today, we took another short ride on our bikes - out to see the Stoney-Baynard ruins:

In the afternoon, we went on a short Dolphin cruise, which, to our surprise, was hugely successful. We must have seen 30 - 40 dolphins and on so many occasions - hundreds - and so close to our boat. It was fascinating - I swear they were playing with us. I also spotted a shark leaping completely out of the sea. We had a nice time:

Independence Day and beyond

We celebrated July 4th by setting out on a series of walks round Savannah, taking in as many of the lovely little squares as we could. In the morning, we headed towards the river and walked along the shore line as far as we could before returning to our hotel to shower again - and, in my case, have a quick dip in the pool.

We found a nearby coffee shop for lunch and then headed in the opposite direction towards the largest patch of greenery that the city has - Forsyth Park. Then back to the hotel, shower again and then hang around for a while before heading out for the evening, when we headed towards the river again - albeit by a different route, taking in more of the squares. Geometrically, of course, some of them are oblong, some circular, oval etc. (That one was for the pedants out there). We reckon we did about 15 of them, but probably missed another 9 or 10 - all of them within a short walking distance.

By the time of our evening walk, I figured I might be well enough to face a beer again - and it was July 4th, so it would have been rude not to. We tried a couple of pubs - one brewpub, Moon River Brewing, and adjacent Churchill's, which had a nice rooftop bar outside.

We'd had enough beer by now and it was time to eat before the fireworks began at 9:30 pm. We tried a couple of place along River St but the waiting times were pretty long, so we ended up in the Hyatt, where we had a lovely meal and a fine rooftop view of the fireworks.

So, time for some photos then - here's a few that didn't appear on Facebook:

This is the square where Forrest Gump sat waiting for the bus

So that was Savannah - a very pretty city indeed. Just a pity I wasn't feeling too great when we were there, but it was now time to move on to our next destination - Hilton Head Island - just an hour's drive north east across the state line in to South Carolina. We arrived there about noon - way too early for our room to be ready, of course, but we parked our car and then walked out for a bite of lunch at Harbourside Burgers and Beer at the yacht marina, adjacent to the lighthouse.

It was hot and steamy so we bought ice creams and sat on the shore front under the shade of a tree before taking a short walk along the shore. There were shells everywhere - oysters, razor clams, mussels, scallops.

When we got back to our resort, our apartment was ready so we took in our luggage and then drove off to the grocery store to stock up for our 5 nights here. It's like a building site as they rush to repair the damage from the October hurricane before the next hurricane season. Thankfully, the workers knocked off at 6 pm and didn't start again this morning until 9 am, so we had a peaceful evening on our balcony looking out towards the ocean, albeit through some trees.

The staff tried to make light of the building work with a gift for us:

Jo bemoans the quantity left in the bottle: